Goodreads Choice Awards Book Club discussion

Winner of the Horror award



The Fireman by Joe Hill

From the award-winning, New York Times bestselling author of NOS4A2 and Heart-Shaped Box comes a chilling novel about a worldwide pandemic of spontaneous combustion that threatens to reduce civilization to ashes and a band of improbable heroes who battle to save it, led by one powerful and enigmatic man known as the Fireman.

The fireman is coming. Stay cool.

No one knows exactly when it began or where it originated. A terrifying new plague is spreading like wildfire across the country, striking cities one by one: Boston, Detroit, Seattle. The doctors call it Draco Incendia Trychophyton. To everyone else it’s Dragonscale, a highly contagious, deadly spore that marks its hosts with beautiful black and gold marks across their bodies—before causing them to burst into flames. Millions are infected; blazes erupt everywhere. There is no antidote. No one is safe.

Harper Grayson, a compassionate, dedicated nurse as pragmatic as Mary Poppins, treated hundreds of infected patients before her hospital burned to the ground. Now she’s discovered the telltale gold-flecked marks on her skin. When the outbreak first began, she and her husband, Jakob, had made a pact: they would take matters into their own hands if they became infected. To Jakob’s dismay, Harper wants to live—at least until the fetus she is carrying comes to term. At the hospital, she witnessed infected mothers give birth to healthy babies and believes hers will be fine too. . . if she can live long enough to deliver the child.

Convinced that his do-gooding wife has made him sick, Jakob becomes unhinged, and eventually abandons her as their placid New England community collapses in terror. The chaos gives rise to ruthless Cremation Squads—armed, self-appointed posses roaming the streets and woods to exterminate those who they believe carry the spore. But Harper isn’t as alone as she fears: a mysterious and compelling stranger she briefly met at the hospital, a man in a dirty yellow fire fighter’s jacket, carrying a hooked iron bar, straddles the abyss between insanity and death. Known as The Fireman, he strolls the ruins of New Hampshire, a madman afflicted with Dragonscale who has learned to control the fire within himself, using it as a shield to protect the hunted . . . and as a weapon to avenge the wronged.

In the desperate season to come, as the world burns out of control, Harper must learn the Fireman’s secrets before her life—and that of her unborn child—goes up in smoke.

I just finished this. Good timing on my part. Honestly, I wasn't blown away, I felt it could be a lot shorter than it was, but certainly imaginative. When ready, I would love for people to discuss the ending.

I agree that it could have been shorter, but I loved it. :)

I finished the first part. I liked how he built the world and I saw some lines which remembered me of The station eleven and I loved that. How things turn out in family was hard to read but I'm quite interested how things gonna go now.

768 pages made me really think if I was going to even start reading this but luckily chapters has quite short.

Colleen wrote: "I just finished this. Good timing on my part. Honestly, I wasn't blown away, I felt it could be a lot shorter than it was, but certainly imaginative. When ready, I would love for people to discuss ..."

I'll be curious to discuss the ending too.

54% Oh, I hate camp. I have to say I was expecting different kind of horror, this is very distressing.

Apparently, Joe Hill was upset that this book was nominated for horror, as he didn't feel it fit the genre. I guess it's more science fiction, maybe science fiction thriller?

I agree Reija. Certain parts were very distressing.

I started reading it, but I gave up at around 20%. It just didn't capture my interest at all and I had to force myself to continue reading it until this point.
The heroine was super annoying in her innocent perfection and I didn't like the religious vibe that started around that point. Mostly, I was just completely bored.

Sorry it wasn't for you, Janina.

I didn't expect much from it, so it's totally ok. Horror is not my genre. I do like dystopian novels, but this one felt more like a Stephen King novel (which I don't like much either).

Yes, I find his style very similar to his father's. But, I like King's writing.

Oh. I had no idea they were related. That's quite interesting.

Hah, Kristie, I did not know that Stephen King was his father either! I looked him up on Wiki as the HC, obviously, doesn't say anything about his family.

Some of his writing resembles his father's but King writes with a much tighter and intense structure. I've not read much of King's although I did read "11/22/63", "Dead Zone" and "The Stand" and liked all three of those. "11/22/63" is an amazing book, highly recommended to everyone.

I agree with two things:

1. I think that "The Fireman" is a bit too long but I don't think it is boring, just too much writing. I like it that Hill consistently tosses in bits of dark humor which helps to keep the story from being too morose or desolate.

2. Harper is just IRRITATING! I cannot even imagine somebody being that much of a doormat while still being compassionate. The compassionate people that I know most often stand up for those in difficulty and usually with quite a bit of strong-minded, deliberate action.

I'm about 3/4ths the way finished and basically can't put it down at this point, lol.

I'll definitely be back when I finish. :)

Yes! haha...if you look at Joe's pic on his GR page, he looks a lot like his dad too. :) Joe Hill

Can't wait to see what you think of the end, Danita. My issue with the book was (view spoiler)[ Harper's husband. I felt his character was a bit over the top. (hide spoiler)] Otherwise, I really enjoyed this one.

This was my review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Danita L wrote: "Some of his writing resembles his father's but King writes with a much tighter and intense structure."

I agree with most of what you've said, but from what I've read, Hill is a much better writer than King.