The Stand by Stephen King (1990, Hardcover)

Here's the scenario - a government plague center testing viruses to use for chemical warfare lets a baddie escape. It's a killer virus with a 99.6% susceptibility, and it's on the loose and spreading everywhere. This is the setting for Stephen King's epic "The Stand". Of course, being King, the book describes the travails of multiple characters, and does it in such a way that you feel like they have become your friends and seem almost impossible to be imaginary. To me, that is King's best gift. Of course, the engaging and always interesting storylines are also a big draw. This is not only a superb and classic King story, it's also the first every of its kind trying to imagine what life would be like if an apocolypse of the Captain Tripps magnitude ever occurred. This makes it as much a sociological treatise as much as entertaining fiction. A truly awesome offering by King not to be missed. I challenge anyone to read the first fifty pages and not finish it.