Publisher: Saga press, 2017
New York Times bestselling author Gregory Benford creates an alternate history about the creation of the atomic bomb that explores what could have happened if the bomb was ready to be used a year before it was in reality.
Karl Cohen, a junior chemist and mathematician who is part of The Manhattan Project team, promotes an alternate solution for creating the uranium isotope needed to cause a chain reaction. After convincing his fellow scientists and government authorities of his new method, Cohen and his team establish giant factories, preparing to have a nuclear bomb ready to drop by the summer of 1944 in an effort to stop the war on the western front.
Combining science with authentic characters, based on intimate and firsthand knowledge of many members of The Manhattan Project, this intensifying and intricately plotted novel builds to an action-packed climax. the sympathetic and well developed characters are challenged by moral dilemmas which affect the fate of millions.
Benford's premise - that the last phase of the war was its bloodiest (6-12 million deaths in the last year) and that any action to shorten it is morally justifiable is explored in this richly detailed and persuasive novel.
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