Fallout

February 15, 2016
Turtledove returns to characters introduced in 2014’s Bombs Away in this overwrought thriller set in an alternate 1950. When the story opens, Paris has been obliterated by an A-bomb, and President Truman finds himself having to work with a difficult Charles de Gaulle in order to stand against the Russians and their campaign of terror. The long list of characters includes Gustav Hozzel, a WWI vet fighting the Red Army; his wife, Luisa, who has been taken to a Russian labor camp; Marian Staley, who lives in a U.S. refugee camp with her five-year-old daughter; Ihor Shevchenko, a Kiev farmer conscripted by the Red Army; and Cade Curtis, an American soldier. The characters are straight out of central casting, and the narrative is more a series of interconnected vignettes than a cohesive whole. The effects of radiation sickness and the psychological and physical toll of war are explored, but the obvious attempt at epic, old-fashioned adventure isn’t fully realized. Readers can take one thing away from the whole shebang: war is hell. Only diehard fans of the series need apply. Agent: Russell Galen, Scovil Galen Ghosh Literary Agency.