Failed to grab me. Seemed caught up in Futurist visions of the time.

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 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. ( )

A Time Travel story. While this book was written in the Vietnam War period, yet here we are in the 2010+ period still dealing with the recurring themes of Presidential Ego, and racial unrest. But increasingly readable book, as time goes by. there is an amusing reference to Ronald Reagan as "An actor who was defeated in 1980" the year in which Reagan won his resounding Presidential victory, sadly to the detriment of civilization since. {2019 ed.] ( )

Brian Chaney, a Dead Sea Scrolls scholar and think-tank thinker, finds himself volunteered, along with two other men plucked from military ranks, for a government-funded mission to test a Time Displacement Vehicle. Their first field study is an order from the president to go ahead two years to discover whether he wins re-election (yoicks), and, well, they find so much more than that.
Ooof, this one was surprisingly good. And disturbingly relevant. There are a couple of really good twists sprinkled in for good measure, too. Definitely recommended. ( )

[Minor Spoilers]

Year of the Quiet Sun by Wilson Tucker is a sci fi adventure that unfortunately didn’t really get going until page 75 or so! The characterization was slow and yet created an intriguing narrator, Brian Chaney, an archeologist of sorts who is controversial (yeah, a controversial archeologist, go figure) who is brought in as part of a special team to travel through time.

Plots & Characters:

Except for Brian and Kathryn (one of the people in charge of this time travel project), it’s hard to care for the rest. We don’t really know much about the rest of the team except in a superficial way. And the political scene is vague as well. We spend pages on the Congressional Record and other statistics. Sigh.

Many pages are spent meeting his military buds on the team, the lovely Kathryn and how corrupt the government is, its current secrets and what’s going on in the Asian war theater. Apparently Tucker is predicting what if Vietnam continued and how the president and Congress are heading towards corruption.

That’s fine, I mean authors have used science fiction as a back drop for their own theories be they political or whatever. I was not expecting a race war to occur somewhere in Chicago! The men go forward in time two years and see things are getting bad: riots, a takeover of Chicago by the poor and desperate, and a president who cares more about re-election and has a major ego problem.

Bottom Line:

The ending was disappointing. I was expecting Brian to come through but that did not really happen. There were a few surprises regarding Brian that helped save it for me. But would it not have been cool to have him return to the present, stop the riots and the insane government and save the day?

Oh well!

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