Plague Pit (UK: Hamlyn, 1981)
Tagline: "From the depths of the earth rose a hideous stench of
death."
Honestly, after reading Ronson's earlier nasty, Ghoul, I wasn't real keen on
looking at anything else from him. It wasn't that Ghoul was poorly-written or
anything, but it was basically an espionage novel sold off as horror (and very,
very light on the latter, I'm afraid.) But let's give the old boy another chance
and dig deep into the Plague Pit and see what we get under our fingernails.
First off, what a cover! Absolutely perfect. Back in the day, this is exactly
what I went for: the most lurid covers I could find. I would have snatched this
one up without a second thought. But as we who read these kind of books
fully know, a good cover does not always make for a good story. So let's
Tagline: "From the depths of the earth rose a hideous stench of
death."
Honestly, after reading Ronson's earlier nasty, Ghoul, I wasn't real keen on
looking at anything else from him. It wasn't that Ghoul was poorly-written or
anything, but it was basically an espionage novel sold off as horror (and very,
very light on the latter, I'm afraid.) But let's give the old boy another chance
and dig deep into the Plague Pit and see what we get under our fingernails.
First off, what a cover! Absolutely perfect. Back in the day, this is exactly
what I went for: the most lurid covers I could find. I would have snatched this
one up without a second thought. But as we who read these kind of books
fully know, a good cover does not always make for a good story. So let's
peek under the hood and have a look at what Plague Pit has to offer in the way of cheap thrills.
First off, Ronson does a nice job of introducing us to a poor, downtrodden blue collar soul named
Hacker: he lives in a shitty flat with a view of a cemetery, his girlfriend is a prostitute, and since
dropping-out of college he's been forced to take a laborer's job on a construction site. He's not the
happiest of men and his boss, Jennings, is a first-class A-hole. Hacker and the rest of the crew have a
spot of vodka for lunch then return to the site to get to work. Hacker, buzzed and pissy, decides to raise
some hell. Jennings warned him not to smash the scoop of his digger into an old brick wall, so that's
exactly what Hacker does--revealing an ancient subterranean pit out of which rises a horrible stench
that soon dissipates. Grabbing a flashlight, the crew investigates and find bones:
"Skeletal arms rose from the mould as though petrified in the act of waving; skulls assumed eerie
expressions as shadows danced in their eye sockets and half-buried rib cages gleamed like strange
jetsam cast up on a dark shore..."
Realizing that what Hacker has revealed is a plague pit dating from the Great Plague that decimated
London in 1665-66, the boys decide they need to go down there and look about. They find gold coins
and chains and other valuable booty amongst the bones and happily steal it. Hacker even cuts his
A-hole boss in for a share. The workers leave, taking their booty with them...and one by one they begin
to feel ill. And there lies the set-up of Plague Pit: the plague germs are still active and the workers are
spreading them from one end of London to another. Now enter into the story intrepid radio journalist
Charity Brown who just so happens to be doing a story on the Great Plague. As plague victims begin to
be confirmed in London, Charity is on the case (hoping for her own TV show), trying to get some
answers. Parliament, however, is doing everything possible to quash the plague talk, saying it's a new
type of flu...even though rumors are flying that some genetically-engineered bacterium has escaped
from an East German lab. But Charity does not believe in the flu-angle and neither does anyone else.
And especially when the bodies start turning up:
"Twice the size of the human body it had once been, the torso was bloated to an extraordinary degree
with the belly ballooned as with a monstrous pregnancy and the limbs forced apart by their own
obscene swelling. The skin was black except where pressure had caused it to split and reveal gray
flesh. Patches of liquid putrefaction seeped from beneath it..."
Things get out of control rather swiftly. Parliament continues to deny the existence of the plague (even
though they, of course, know it's everywhere and consider the plague pit itself to be "nuclear waste of
the Middle Ages"). Bodies pile up like cordwood. Religious whackos take to the streets. Martial Law
ensues. Troops move into London. Charity is forced to seek out the only person who can help her:
research biologist Paul Mitchell. Not the guy who makes the hair care products, but a research
microbiologist whom Charity publicly attacked and ridiculed for his work in genetic engineering until he
was known in the press as "Frankenstein" and lost all his funding. He's a reclusive sort living on a boat
now. She finds him, they connect, have wild sex, and, together, they are determined to get to the
bottom of the whole mess. For it is indeed plague (Paul learns later). The good thing is that there is a
vaccine available, AP-13. The bad news is that a Neo-Nazi party, the NBP, is seizing control of radio
stations and other public and governmental facilities and they have control of the AP-13. Or do they?
Driven by moral outrage at society, they are destroying laboratories left and right. When they reach the
AP-13 lab, they demand the vaccine so that only their members will survive the pestilence. A plucky
Jewish scientist tricks them and gives them not the vaccine but a vial of live plague bacilli. Charity and
Paul get the AP-13 but they must make it to the Bio-Synthetics lab where it can be reproduced in mass
quantities to be sprayed over the city. Do they make it? Read this one and find out...even though I've
ruined many plot twists for you already.
Pros: This is a fun read. The descriptions of plague victims are pretty cool and I love the historical angle
of a 300 year old bone pit still containing active plague. A pestilence laying waste to London was a nice
change from the usual creepy-crawlies.
Cons: I never really identified or felt sympathetic towards either Charity or Paul. This book would have
been much more fun if Ronson would have followed the lives of Hacker and the other working class
types at the beginning of the book.
Overall: I liked Plague Pit. It was a fun read and even though it doesn't rate real high on the Ghastly,
Gruesome, and Gor-ifying scale, it had a few good moments. It's worth picking up.
3½ bloody skulls out of five.
Next month's Guilty Pleasure:
"...and death was only the beginning!"
First off, Ronson does a nice job of introducing us to a poor, downtrodden blue collar soul named
Hacker: he lives in a shitty flat with a view of a cemetery, his girlfriend is a prostitute, and since
dropping-out of college he's been forced to take a laborer's job on a construction site. He's not the
happiest of men and his boss, Jennings, is a first-class A-hole. Hacker and the rest of the crew have a
spot of vodka for lunch then return to the site to get to work. Hacker, buzzed and pissy, decides to raise
some hell. Jennings warned him not to smash the scoop of his digger into an old brick wall, so that's
exactly what Hacker does--revealing an ancient subterranean pit out of which rises a horrible stench
that soon dissipates. Grabbing a flashlight, the crew investigates and find bones:
"Skeletal arms rose from the mould as though petrified in the act of waving; skulls assumed eerie
expressions as shadows danced in their eye sockets and half-buried rib cages gleamed like strange
jetsam cast up on a dark shore..."
Realizing that what Hacker has revealed is a plague pit dating from the Great Plague that decimated
London in 1665-66, the boys decide they need to go down there and look about. They find gold coins
and chains and other valuable booty amongst the bones and happily steal it. Hacker even cuts his
A-hole boss in for a share. The workers leave, taking their booty with them...and one by one they begin
to feel ill. And there lies the set-up of Plague Pit: the plague germs are still active and the workers are
spreading them from one end of London to another. Now enter into the story intrepid radio journalist
Charity Brown who just so happens to be doing a story on the Great Plague. As plague victims begin to
be confirmed in London, Charity is on the case (hoping for her own TV show), trying to get some
answers. Parliament, however, is doing everything possible to quash the plague talk, saying it's a new
type of flu...even though rumors are flying that some genetically-engineered bacterium has escaped
from an East German lab. But Charity does not believe in the flu-angle and neither does anyone else.
And especially when the bodies start turning up:
"Twice the size of the human body it had once been, the torso was bloated to an extraordinary degree
with the belly ballooned as with a monstrous pregnancy and the limbs forced apart by their own
obscene swelling. The skin was black except where pressure had caused it to split and reveal gray
flesh. Patches of liquid putrefaction seeped from beneath it..."
Things get out of control rather swiftly. Parliament continues to deny the existence of the plague (even
though they, of course, know it's everywhere and consider the plague pit itself to be "nuclear waste of
the Middle Ages"). Bodies pile up like cordwood. Religious whackos take to the streets. Martial Law
ensues. Troops move into London. Charity is forced to seek out the only person who can help her:
research biologist Paul Mitchell. Not the guy who makes the hair care products, but a research
microbiologist whom Charity publicly attacked and ridiculed for his work in genetic engineering until he
was known in the press as "Frankenstein" and lost all his funding. He's a reclusive sort living on a boat
now. She finds him, they connect, have wild sex, and, together, they are determined to get to the
bottom of the whole mess. For it is indeed plague (Paul learns later). The good thing is that there is a
vaccine available, AP-13. The bad news is that a Neo-Nazi party, the NBP, is seizing control of radio
stations and other public and governmental facilities and they have control of the AP-13. Or do they?
Driven by moral outrage at society, they are destroying laboratories left and right. When they reach the
AP-13 lab, they demand the vaccine so that only their members will survive the pestilence. A plucky
Jewish scientist tricks them and gives them not the vaccine but a vial of live plague bacilli. Charity and
Paul get the AP-13 but they must make it to the Bio-Synthetics lab where it can be reproduced in mass
quantities to be sprayed over the city. Do they make it? Read this one and find out...even though I've
ruined many plot twists for you already.
Pros: This is a fun read. The descriptions of plague victims are pretty cool and I love the historical angle
of a 300 year old bone pit still containing active plague. A pestilence laying waste to London was a nice
change from the usual creepy-crawlies.
Cons: I never really identified or felt sympathetic towards either Charity or Paul. This book would have
been much more fun if Ronson would have followed the lives of Hacker and the other working class
types at the beginning of the book.
Overall: I liked Plague Pit. It was a fun read and even though it doesn't rate real high on the Ghastly,
Gruesome, and Gor-ifying scale, it had a few good moments. It's worth picking up.
3½ bloody skulls out of five.
Next month's Guilty Pleasure:
"...and death was only the beginning!"
