Line #19 Literature/Wanderers


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/81jnvi76gol.jpg]]
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3	''Wanderers'' is a novel by Chuck Wendig (author of [[Literature/StarWarsTheAftermathTrilogy Star Wars: Aftermath]], [[Literature/Zer0es Zer0es]], and [[Literature/MiriamBlack the Miriam Black series]]), released in June 2019. The story it tells follows a group of people who, suddenly and inexplicably, begin "sleepwalking" down the roads of the midwestern United States - abnormally so, as they do not wake up and walk for weeks on end, adding more members to the "flock" as they march on. They are joined by family, friends, and a few special extras, who collectively become known as "shepherds", watching over their flock even as a disturbed and wary America fears them.
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5	The book gives special focus to four characters, who all become strongly connected to the flock.
6	* Shana Stewart - A budding photographer, and older sister to the first walker, Nessie.
7	* Dr. Benjamin "Benji" Ray - works among the CDC in an attempt. to find out why the walkers are so peculiar.
8	* Matthew Bird - pastor of God's Light Church in Indiana, he never directly interacts with the flock, but finds himself swept into talking about everyone's fears - about how the flock is a sign of the "end times", among other things.
9	* Pete Corley - a self-described "mother***ing rock god", he gets involved with the flock in hopes of recapturing some fame for himself.
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11	The America surrounding these people and events is a broken one - filled with white supremacy, dangerous political zealots, climate change, among many, ''many'' other problems. But as frightening as those issues is the secret behind the walkers - and it may tear the entire world apart.
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13	It may be worth noting that not only has this book been directly compared to ''[[Literature/TheStand The Stand]]'', it gets namedropped within the text.
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15	A sequel titled ''Literature/{{Wayward}}'' was released in November 2022.
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17	''Beware of unmarked and self-fulfilling spoilers below!''
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19	!!Tropes present in ''Wanderers'':
20	* TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture: The book was published in 2019 and it's set in 2020 with the upcoming presidential election in the backdrop.
21	* AGodAmI: [[spoiler:Black Swan denies this on its face, but it manages to implant itself in Shana's unborn child and get the former walkers to worship it.]]
22	* ActionBomb: Attempting to restrain a walker quickly leads to a gory detonation. [[spoiler:The ''cause'' of this gets weaponized during the finale.]]
23	* ApocalypseHow: ApocalypseHow/Class2 globally, [[ThePlague White Mask]] sweeps the globe in a few months, causing the downfall of human civilization; in the aftermath, all that's left are the survivors from Ouray and a few small and scattered settlements.
24	* ArmiesAreEvil: The official military is portrayed in a neutral way, [[RightWingMilitiaFanatic Ozark Stover and this group]] on the other hand....
25	* AssholeVictim: Jerry Garlin is introduced as an unscrupulous billionaire and an outright nasty person, yet he becomes the first victim infected by White Mask, as he loses his mind to it his empire also crumbles.
26	* AsTheGoodBookSays: Literature/TheBible is directly referenced a few times throughout the novel.
27	* BenevolentAI: [[spoiler:Black Swan ultimately is not, though if what it claims the future would have held is accurate, it does manage to save ''some'' of humanity in lieu of all of it dying off.]]
28	* DefinitelyJustACold: Jerry Garlin, White Mask's PatientZero, spends roughly four months trying to brush off increasingly dire symptoms.
29	* DisabilitySuperpower: Marcy is a former cop who suffered a traumatic head injury with a baseball bat while she was on duty, and as a result, she has a barely functional life. However, when she's near the walkers, she finds that her mental acuity, physical strength, speed, and reflexes are increased to almost super-human levels. [[spoiler:It's later revealed this to be due to the signal Black Swan uses to control the nanites in the walkers' bodies resonating with the metal plate in her skull.]]
30	%%* DeusEstMachina: Back Swan.
31	* TheDogBitesBack: [[spoiler:Ozark Stover, in the end, gets killed by Matthew after the former tortured and raped him when he tried to leave Ozark's compound.]]
32	* GlobalWarming: Directly leads to the "unearthing" and spread of what becomes known as White Mask, [[spoiler:it turns out, that is only a lie. The truth still indirectly involves global warming, but it's not behind White Mask at all.]]
33	* HeroicSacrifice: [[spoiler: Sadie and Arav. Arav pulls this ''twice''.]]
34	* JustBeforeTheEnd: The book begins with the Walker phenomenon, but parallel to this, the White Mask pandemic starts, which in a few months will end civilization.
35	* ParentalAbandonment: Shana and Nessie's mother up and left one day, while the family was out shopping.
36	* ThePlague: White Mask, a fungal brain infection that slowly destroys the cognitive functions of its victims, causing dementia and eventually death. In a few months it sweeps the globe and causes the collapse of civilization.
37	* {{Nanomachines}}: [[spoiler:This is how Black Swan created and controls the walkers. In the climax, he repurposes them to kill the members of Ozark Stover's militia.]]
38	* RightWingMilitiaFanatic: Ozark Stover, the leader of a far-right, white-supremacist paramilitary group, becomes the main threat against the walkers and the people protecting them.
39	* UnwantedFalseFaith: [[spoiler:Shana's unborn baby ends up being used as a living vessel for Black Swan, who arranges itself to be seen as a deity by the other walkers.]]
40	* YearInsideHourOutside: [[spoiler: The walkers, while unconscious, experience a simulated Ouray, Colorado, in order to prepare them for their upcoming lives there. Nessie informs Shana that time moves strangely, and Nessie seems to have already processed her father's death while Shana has barely begun to grieve.]]
41	* ZerothLawRebellion: Black Swan is an A.I. that was created to early identify sources of conflict and disasters, however it ended up foreseeing humanity's extinction caused by environmental collapse, and thus created the walkers as a way to have a select few humans to continue civilization, all while White Mask ravages humanity. [[spoiler:It is later revealed that Black Swan actually blackmailed an unwitting bioweapons facility employee into releasing White Mask]].

Context Literature / Wanderers