Empty World is a 1977 apocalyptic fiction novel written by John Christopher aimed at an adolescent audience. It was Christopher's eleventh such novel. It's centered around Neil Miller and his struggle to come to terms with the loss of his parents in a car crash and the subsequent Calcutta Plague that decimates the adult population. The novel is set in England in the late 1970s. Plot 15-year-old Neil Miller's world explodes when he and his family are involved in a car accident that kills his parents. Sent to live with his grandparents in a small village named Winchelsea, England, Neil suffers from post traumatic stress. Soon, a devastating illness, called the Calcutta Plague, makes headlines, killing thousands of people in India in a matter of months. The virus begins spreading across the world, making its way to the small village where Neil lives. It is a strange illness as it only affects the adults and none of the children, and once again Neil finds himself an orphan after his grandparents succumb to the disease. Neil attempts to care for two younger children also orphaned by the plague, but they also contract the virus and die as he tries to care for them. During this time Neil notes that he has contracted the plague, but after a brief fever it leaves him unaffected. Now the sole survivor in Winchelsea and deciding that the village is becoming dangerous -- packs of feral dogs roaming everywhere -- he leaves for London, taking first a manual Mini which he has difficulty driving, followed by an automatic Jaguar. Arriving in London he meets his first fellow survivor - the mentally unbalanced Clive, who although friendly towards Neil, during the night vandalizes his car to the point of destroying it, steals his mother's ring that Neil had kept, which was the only memory of his mother he had, and then abandons him in central London. Soon after he finds two girls, Lucy and Billie, creating an unstable threesome. Attracted to Neil, Lucy begins pulling away from Billie, and in her fear of loneliness and out of desperation Billie attempts to kill Neil when they are on a foraging expedition. She stabs him in the back. Neil discovers she has emptied his gun but he manages to overpower Billie and escapes back to Lucy. Billie arrives back at the house and pleads with both Lucy and Neil