Death of Grass.

Book info: Death of Grass. (Hardcover, 232 pages – Michael Joseph, 1973) – Michael Joseph, 1973. Language: Eng.

Condition: Very Good

As the story opens, the initial viral strain has already attacked rice crops in East Asia causing massive famine & a mutation has appeared which infects the staple crops of West Asia & Europe such as wheat & barley, threatening a famine engulfing the whole of the Old World, while Australasia & the Americas attempt to impose quarantine to exclude the virus. The novel follows the trials & struggles of the narrator's family as they attempt to make their way across England, which is already descending into anarchy, to the safety of his brother's potato farm in an isolated Westmorland valley. The main characters sacrifice many of their morals in order to stay alive. At one point, when their food supply runs out, they kill an innocent family simply to take their bread. The protagonist justifies this with the belief that "it was them or us." Some critics have viewed this as an attempt by the author to distance the work from the cosy catastrophe pattern made popular by John Wyndham.