Four years after a bizarre blindness plague hits the capital, a mysterious turnout of blank ballots appears on election day that prompts a state of emergency.

"In this, his last novel, Saramago daringly reimagines the characters and narratives of the Bible through the story of Cain. Condemned to wander forever after he kills Abel, he is whisked around in time and space. He experiences the almost-sacrifice of Isaac by Abraham, the Tower of Babel, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, Joshua at the battle of Jericho, Job's ordeal, and finally Noah's ark and the Flood. And over and over again Cain encounters...

Set in Alentejo, a southern province of Portugal known for its vast agricultural estates, the novel charts the lives of the Mau Tempos as national and international events rumble on in the background-the coming of the republic in Portugual, the two World Wars, and an attempt on the dictator Salazars life. Yet nothing really impinges on the grim reality of the farm laborers lives until the first communist stirrings.

A geological disturbance causes the Iberian peninsula to split from the rest of Europe and sail into the Atlantic. The novel describes the impact the event has on the inhabitants of Spain and Portugal, and on the politics of the European Union. A satire by a Portuguese writer, author of The Gospel According to Jesus Christ.

Through the Alentejo family, Saramago conveys the story of rural Portugal from 1920 until 1979, including the Workers Movement Revolution of 1974. The author captures the language of the peasants using a concise and brilliant style, with a dose of black humor that show Saramagoś talent for painting a perfect picture with words.

A city is ravaged by an epidemic of 'white blindness.' Those first afflicted are quarantined by the authorities in an abandoned mental hospital where societal norms quickly break down. Criminals and the physically powerful prey upon the weak, hording the meager food rations and committing horrific acts. Inside the hospital is one eyewitness to the nightmare. Following her husband into the hospital, a woman whose sight is unaffected by the plague goes...