(1998) Mona Clee, ACE SF pbk, 510pp, US$5.50, ISBN 0-441-08291-9
In 2062 the only humans in an atomically devastated world send back in time three 18-year-olds, two girls and a boy, to try to stop the catastrophe. They have a pocket-sized machine capable of projecting them into four different pasts.
The first target - stopping President Kennedy from starting a nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis - is relatively easy, and there are amusing descriptions of the travellers’ reactions to 1962 America.
But the mood turns sombre. They now have to live in what is their past with a moral responsibility of preventing ‘later’ nuclear wars, and this becomes increasingly difficult.
This story has great chunks of American political history, romance, and a final solution which starts a lot further back than the reader expects. A very good yarn, especially suited I would think to female readers.
Vince Clarke
[Up: Fiction Reviews Index | SF Author: Website Links | Home Page: Concatenation]
[One Page Futures Short Stories | Recent Site Additions | Most Recent Seasonal Science Fiction News]