Fever 1793
Laurie Halse Anderson (2000)
“A fourteen-year-old girl must grow up overnight when yellow fever turns Philadelphia — the nation's capital — into a city of the dead.”
Short Summary
In the summer of 1793, fourteen-year-old Matilda 'Mattie' Cook lives above her mother's coffeehouse in Philadelphia, dreaming of wealth and dodging chores. When yellow fever strikes the city, Mattie's world collapses: her mother falls ill, her grandfather dies on the road north, and she herself barely survives the disease. Alone and orphaned in all but name, Mattie rescues an orphan named Nell, reunites with the free Black cook Eliza and the heroic members of the Free African Society, and ultimately rebuilds the coffeehouse — and herself — from the wreckage the epidemic leaves behind.
Detailed Summary
Philadelphia in August 1793 is the young nation's capital, a thriving port city of fifty-five thousand people where President Washington walks the streets and coffeehouses hum with commerce. Fourteen-year-old Matilda 'Mattie' Cook lives above the Cook Coffeehouse on High Street with her widowed moth...