Ling Ma's Severance was initially published in August 2018. Ma's novel follows a young woman named Candace Chen, a woman who works in an unfulfilling role selling Bible-related products. The novel follows Chen's life before a pandemic that is described in the novel and after that pandemic that sweeps the United States in 2011. That pandemic called the Shen Fever forces those who are infected with the disease to unconsciousness and repeat their routines until they die. While trying to contend with the disease, Chen must also deal with the total collapse of the United States. But Chen, unlike most people in the world, is immune from the disease, which helps her survive the disease but results in some trouble for her in the long run.
Fundamentally, Severance is a novel about capitalism and how destructive its influence can be on countries. It is also a novel about immigration (Chen is an immigrant to the U.S. from China), monotony, the culture of the U.S. and the world, and nostalgia — among many other things.
In their exceedingly positive review of Severance, which they named one of the best books of 2018, The New York Times wrote that the novel "offers blatant commentary on 'dizzying abundance' and unrelenting consumption, evolving into a semi-surreal sendup of a workplace and its utopia of rules." NPR thought similarly, writing that Severance is "A stunning, audacious book with a fresh take on both office politics and what the apocalypse might bring."
