What issues/themes should i look out for when reading Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe?

Answer 1

A Journal of the Plague Year is a novel by Daniel Defoe. It is a fictionalised account of one man's experiences of the year 1665, in which the Great Plague struck the city of London. The book is a roughly chronological account, purporting to have been written several years after the event. It was in fact written in the years just prior to the book's first publication in March of 1722 – Defoe was only five years old in 1665, and the book itself was published under the initials H. F. The novel was probably based on the journals of Defoe's uncle, Henry Foe.
In the book, Defoe goes to great pains to achieve an effect of verisimilitude, identifying specific houses in which events took place, providing tables of casualty figures and discussing the credibility of various accounts received by the narrator

Answer 2

It's easy to forget that it's a fiction after you start reading it.
It's based on real stories though, about the plague which struck England when he was only five. He is using real statistics, and trying to show how society deals with plague. You will not be able to stop reading it!