What kind of person reads a book about a pandemic in the middle of a pandemic? Me… There was definitely something comforting about picking up this book about the 1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic during our current time, and while I’m not sure that I would have been able to read this in the beginning of March of this year, (2020), I thought it gave a great perspective to our current time.
Bright as Heaven opens as the fictional Bright family leave their family farm to move to Philadelphia for Mr Bright to take over his uncle’s mortuary business. They are mourning the loss of Henry, the youngest child who didn’t even live to see his first birthday. The story is told through alternating points of view of each of the women in the family; there is Pauline- Mamma, Evie the eldest, Maggie the middle child, and Willa the youngest. They each come to Philadelphia fighting their own inner battles but soon enough a whole new battle comes crashing into their lives.
They are just beginning to settle into life in the big, busy city when seemingly out of nowhere the Spanish Flu springs up, and instantly their residence which is also the mortuary business is overrun with the dead. We think of the years of 1918 and 1919 and we think of World War One, totally forgetting about this global crisis that occurred in the midst of the war. As the flu reaches its deadly peak, Mamma and Maggie are out tending to the ill when Maggie hears a baby crying. She follows the crying and comes to a dilapidated house. Inside she finds his mother is dead as she picks up the baby, Maggie also notices a girl, his sister, nearly motionless on a couch. Before Maggie’s eyes the sister dies, or at least Maggie thinks that she does… This image will haunt Maggie continuously for years to come in ways she couldn’t imagine.
Not only does Susan Meissener weave together a gripping story with; as I like to say, no boring parts, she also sheds light on an often forgotten chapter of history. The Spanish Flu of 1918 was a global event that took more lives than World War One did. Imagine, not just a world war, but in addition a flu that couldn’t be cured or treated effectively raging at the same time. This book really gave me perspective on our current times. This is not the first time our world has seen tragedy and chaos, nor will it be the last. We must remember that we are not defined by the times that we live in, but rather how we react to our current circumstances. Since the world has been in existence there have been cataclysmic events, but the world has kept on turning. I would like to challenge you to pick up this book and after you finish, ask yourself- do we really have it as badly as today as we think we do? Will we rise to the challenge of our times as the Bright Family does?