The Sun Grows Cold - Howard Berk
This is the only novel by Howard Berk.
I got it when it came out in paperback in the UK and read it maybe 3 times after that, but not since, although I've always felt it would be worth re-reading again at somepoint. And it is!
Parnell is an amnesiac (all the patients are, it's part of the process to rehabilitate them after the horrors of nuclear war have driven them insane) who awakes in a vast Complex and clashes continually with the powers that be (shown very sympathetically) as he progresses by leaps and bounds towards recovery, unlike the rest of the patients.
Eventually he escapes but the war has left America, and the rest of the world, a shattered ruin and he hides by roaming the network of radiation free corridors between various Pioneer Zones meant to be at the heart of the post-war recovery. Inexplicable flashbacks keep occuring to him and drive him close to the edge. Eventually, though, his memory returns, revealing his past and why so much time and energy has been spent on him...
The science sounded a lot more plausible back then, or maybe I was younger, and now it's definitely in the Cold War doomsday scenario area, with a touch of the sf New Wave about it. But talk about downbeat endings!
The Sun Grows Cold - Howard Berk
This is the only novel by Howard Berk.
I got it when it came out in paperback in the UK and read it maybe 3 times after that, but not since, although I've always felt it would be worth re-reading again at somepoint. And it is!
Parnell is an amnesiac (all the patients are, it's part of the process to rehabilitate them after the horrors of nuclear war have driven them insane) who awakes in a vast Complex and clashes continually with the powers that be (shown very sympathetically) as he progresses by leaps and bounds towards recovery, unlike the rest of the patients.
Eventually he escapes but the war has left America, and the rest of the world, a shattered ruin and he hides by roaming the network of radiation free corridors between various Pioneer Zones meant to be at the heart of the post-war recovery. Inexplicable flashbacks keep occuring to him and drive him close to the edge. Eventually, though, his memory returns, revealing his past and why so much time and energy has been spent on him...
The science sounded a lot more plausible back then, or maybe I was younger, and now it's definitely in the Cold War doomsday scenario area, with a touch of the sf New Wave about it. But talk about downbeat endings!