Fever 1793

Fever 1793 is a historical novel for young readers by the American writer Laurie Halse Anderson, published in 2000. It is set during the yellow fever epidemic that struck Philadelphia in that year.

Mattie Cook lives with her mother and grandfather above the coffeehouse they run, and she spends her days on the work of the business and on her plans for something better. When the fever arrives the epidemic takes the household apart: the serving girl dies, Mattie's mother falls ill, and the family has to decide whether to leave the city as the wealthier families are doing. Philadelphia in 1793 was the capital of the United States, and the novel uses the city's streets, its docks and the newspapers of the period to show how a community responded to a disease nobody understood. Anderson writes from Mattie's point of view and keeps the medical and political detail of the epidemic in the background of a story about a girl who has to manage on her own.

Anderson later wrote several other historical novels for young readers, and this one is among the most widely taught in American middle schools.