The Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham

Triffids! Everyone’s favorite monster plant! I remember seeing this movie when I was a kid – and when I saw that John Wyndham’s book had been re-published, I snatched it right up in my grubby hands. I knew it was on several short lists of the best apocalyptic science fiction novels of all time, so naturally it had been on my short list for a long time.

In The Day of the Triffids, Bill Masen wakes up in the hospital after being stung by a Triffid. Bill made his living working with these strange plants that can uproot themselves and walk on three legs, kills or maim you with their poisonous sting, and possibly communicate with each other. Bill wakes up, his eyes bandaged from the attack, only to discover that the unusual meteor shower the night before has rendered most people on earth blind. He wanders through the city, watching things fall apart, people wandering aimlessly, only to find Josella, a sighted woman being held captive by a blind man. They join forces with a group of fellow survivors who plan to leave London before it becomes disease infested and ruined. Unfortunately things do not go as planned, and Josella and her new love are separated by a cog in the works – Coker. He’s kidnapped a few of the sighted survivors to help those in London left blind. More decay of civilization ensues, and Bill follows a quest to find Josella and escape to the countryside. The countryside is barely safer, as the Triffids have spread and have killed many of the humans left blind, as they are easy prey. The question is – will Bill ever find Josella again, and even if he does, will they be able to survive? Will the Triffids take over the planet?

While Wyndam’s novel suffers from the stereotypical male/female relationships of the time it was written, it is by no means as bad in that respect as Earth Abides, by George R. Stewart. It is courageously dark, in fact, not hiding the fact that humanity would fall apart and into all sorts of chaos were something catastrophic to happen such as this. The ending of the novel seems bleak, not without hope, but there is a very tarnished silver lining to this tale.

I really liked this book – not only was it way more complex than the film I remember (naturally) but it had all of that spooky Cold War paranoia built-in. The characters were a little easy to mix up, especially the secondary characters, but it’s not terrible. Overall, I can see why some folks rank this as one of the best science fiction novels. It has all the elements of a good one – a nice plot, devastation of humanity and it’s will to survive, possible alien invasion or biological warfare, all that good stuff.

If you like science fiction, and don’t mind an oldie, check this one out.

Rating: 4 purrs for one of my new favorite science fiction novels, right up there with Ender’s Game