Wilson Tucker (1914–2006)

I almost didn't make it through the first chapter of this one, he protagonist is such an unlikable jerk, and the story seems not very promising, The guy doesn't get any more likable, but the story gets better, moving sometimes in fits and starts, jumping months, then years, sometimes a little jarringly, but it kept me interested to the end, which is an open-ended nightmare. Not the best of its kind but worth the two hours or so it takes to read it.

2.5/5

Some important context for The Year of the Quiet Sun is that the author, Wilson Tucker, was primarily a fan of the SF genre during the 1950's through the 1970's. He ran some clubs and was generally involved in the early scene. This novel is his most well known work, and he didn't produce much else, though one of his others works also was published in the first run of Ace science fictions specials. Why I point all of this out is that my main sticking point with The Year of the Quiet Sun show more is that it doesn't feel like it was written with an experienced hand. The quality is mixed at best, and even if the time travel element is interesting, I don't know that the writing itself is good enough to make this a super worth while read. It very much reads like higher quality fan fiction.

In terms of plot, we follow an anthropologist named Brian Chaney who recently uncovered and translated several ancient scrolls near Jerusalem that he believes points to the bible being a work of fiction. Because of this work, and another previous work of his that predicts the events of the near future, he is selected for a secret government team of men to test and use a recently developed time machine. First they are sent only 2 years ahead to see if the current president gets elected, and then they are sent 20 years forward to see if Chaney's predictions are true. This is set against the backdrop of a slightly embellished version of a 1970's United States, where racial tensions are high, and there is the looming threat of war with the USSR, China, and a brewing conflict in the Middle East. He mentions Ronald Reagan (though not by name), and envisions a future US in which cronyism and corruption lead us to an apocalyptic demise.

For some odd reason, Tucker writes a lot of the dialogue like he's writing a stage play with directions, starting lines of dialogue with an emotion or name of the charter followed by a colon and then the words they speak. It's comically lazy at worst, and a stylistic choice that makes for bad writing at best. Tucker also has the classic lecherous writing of women, as two of the time travel group consistently fawn over the director of the program. Tucker is pretty flippant about this, detouring from the action of the plot to mention some physical attribute of hers for no reason other than to be horny. This also speaks to the poor editing of the novel. Large passages of the text could've been removed without a tangible effect to the book, especially during the bloated and slow first half, in which there is no time traveling at all.

The second half of the book, which focuses completely on the three men venturing 20 years into the future is much more readable and interesting. If the whole book had been like that it would be much improved. The paradox involved with time traveling, and the constraints of the vehicle itself were fun to think about. I also like getting the perspective of all three men sequentially as they went forward in time. It's just such a bummer that Tucker doesn't get around to any of this until he wasted my time with the first 100 pages, because it's not like that time was spent making realistic characters or developing interesting themes.

I find it hard to get rid of a book with this cool of cover art (I'm a sucker for this era of Ace Science Fiction Special), but jeez, I can't really see myself reading it ever again despite the much improved second half of the novel. It's teetering on the edge of getting voted off the island. show less

Time travel ranks as the most difficult of science fiction genres. Though there are numerous stories featuring characters voyaging into the past to change history or venturing into the future to see what will become of humanity, most break down on various points of logic. As a result, in spite of the numerous novels, short stories, movies, and television series which incorporate time travel into the plot, there are only a few in which it is done well enough to deserve to be remembered.

Wilson show more Tucker’s novel ranks among the few in this category. In it, a demographer and biblical scholar is recruited to join a government team surveying the future. As they do so, they witness a deteriorating world torn apart by racial and political strife thanks to weak and egotistical leaders. Here Tucker establishes time travel using a series of consistent rules that work very effectively, allowing him to focus on the plot and characters. These are the true strengths of the novel, for while the future he extrapolates seems a dated product of its times thanks to the luxury of hindsight, it is just the background for a poignant inquiry into the fate of society as seen through the lives of five very different people. This results in a thoughtful tale that is a must-read for any fan of science fiction, one that demonstrates how best to tell a time travel story that works. show less

The cover of the Dell paperback says "A Shocking, Realistic Novel of Tomorrow." Of course, paperbacks always said things like that, especially in 1952. But in this case the cover is right. This post-apocalyptic odyssey has more in common with Cormac McCarthy's The Road than you would expect. The US is sundered in two by an A-bomb + plague attack on the eastern US. The western half survives by shooting anyone who tries to cross the Mississippi from the eastern half. The book follows the show more development of Gary, who wakes from a major binge to find his world has ended, and traces the steps he takes to survive in the world that follows. While A-bomb apocalypses were rife in the fiction and movies of the 1950's, the A-bomb itself is very much incidental here. Plague, not radiation, drives the plot. Warning: the opening scene, where Gary awakes post-attack, is unconvincing, and, confusingly, repeated almost verbatim at the beginning of Chapter 6. Be patient. Once Gary stops observing and begins acting, the novel becomes sure-footed and very effective. show less