Remember the American Flu Epidemic of 1918? Do you remember studying it in grade school, or did you go straight from the great war to the great depression?
Yeah, same here.
This particular strain of influenza was actually a pandemic that killed over 21 million people worldwide.
I bring this up because I have a soft spot in my heart for alternate history. I haven’t read much fiction in said genre, but I do like thinking about it. Of note is the “Crimson Skies” universe. Crimson Skies is an alternate version of North America, circa 1937. I say North America because the United States doesn’t exist. Instead, there are nation states. Completely sovereign, and with no central governing body, the nation states constantly bicker with one another over what little resources that they have. One of the factors that leads to the fall of federalism is–you guessed it, the flu epidemic of 1918.
I imagine that this vision of the North America would make it like Europe, only everybody speaks english.
Oh, and there are air pirates. Forgot that small little detail.