Published by Ace Books, February 2014
ISBN: 978 0 425 259740
308 pages
Review by Mark Yon
Subtitled ‘A Novel of Alternative History’, this is a novel expanded from a story, ‘Goddard’s People’, published in Asimov’s Magazine in 1991. It is a novel that reinforces the ‘what-if’, and allows the reader to imagine what might have happened with space rockets had events taken a different turn.
It is a tale that is strong on wish-fulfilment in a world where the Space Race of our 1950’s was actually begun in the 1940’s. In this version of our history, during the Second World War, the Germans, with defeat beginning to be an option, realise that desperate measures are necessary. A proposal is made to Adolf Hitler for the building of a sub-orbital super bomber, partly because the Americans are allegedly already designing one (a false rumour) and partly because such a weapon would put New York under threat, should the need arise. German rocket scientist Wernher von Braun is given the task of creating such a weapon, the Silbervogel, at Peenemunde.
Underground resistance discovers this information and relays it, at great cost, to the Allies. The US President, Franklin D. Roosevelt, fearing another Pearl Harbour-like event, decides that such a weapon is a risk to the American homeland and persuades American rocket scientist Robert H. Goddard to put effort into the development of an American counter-weapon – a rocket that could knock out the German bomber before it would have had chance to release its bomb load.
Of course the great fun with such a novel is that unravelling of what is real and what was almost-real: there were plans for such weapons created, although fortunately the War finished before they were developed.
Here Allen mixes up fictional events with real people. Most of the story is based around the two main scientists of this Space Race. The German rocket scientist Wernher von Braun is dealt with quite compassionately, as a boffin constantly under scrutiny, torn between continuing his rocket research with the fact that his research can only be continued under Nazi supervision and with Nazi funding. His situation is in contrast to his counterpart, Robert Goddard, who is presented much more sympathetically, working with friends and allies. Where Goddard’s team are enthusiastically determined to defend the homeland, expand knowledge and understanding, von Braun’s drive is more to do with fear and the repercussions of what would happen to him personally if he failed.
Of the other real-life characters, Adolf Hitler, Heinrich Himmler, Hermann Goering and Roosevelt are much simpler and a little two-dimensional, but they are perhaps well known enough not to need too much development beyond the basic. The appearance of author Ian Fleming as a Commando Naval Intelligence operative is a little far-fetched (although it is true that the author did work for Naval Intelligence in our WW2) with a line that it a little groan-worthy.
The middle part of the book deals with the ultra-secret 390 Group, assembled at Goddard’s university in Worcester in order to create the X1 counterweapon. A more congenial group of nerds you are unlikely to meet outside of The Big Bang Theory. They are all likeable guys, involved in work for the war effort in a way reminiscent of Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein and L. Sprague de Camp on their war years’ sabbaticals at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard. Here the 390 Group gang deal with attempted assassination, first love and reclusive behaviour, all for the sake of national security.
The book’s ending is where the race between the Germans and the Americans to create their weapon is accelerated, each believing the other ahead. I read the last few pages with great speed as the tension mounted. There’s a lot of tying up at the end in fairly few paragraphs yet the general feeling at the end is one of satisfaction.
In contrast, there is a melancholic note running through the book where the remaining space oldsters meet together in 2013 to reminisce with families about what they did and why, knowing that this is one of the few remaining times they will ever get the chance to do so. In a conclusion (rather different to our reality) the point is made and highlighted that our development into space was effectively squandered in peacetime. It’s a sobering point that could be made by NASA/Soviet astronauts today, perhaps.
Yet in the end V-S Day (the title never explained but presumably a pun on V-J Day) is an entertaining novel that shows how exciting space exploration was at the cutting edge of development seventy years ago and also reminds the reader (should they have forgotten) of the potential of space flight, of the human need to explore and expand. It makes the reader examine why, as a race, we need to travel into space and why our commitment to it is so important. It reminds us of why we wanted to be ‘out there’ in the first place, not just for world domination but for future generations to expand into.
It’s not the longest novel, nor the deepest, particularly. But if you are a fan of all those 1950’s SF movies, with their rocket-sleds and their silver Hugo Award shaped ships, (like I am) this is a searing blast of ‘what if’. I enjoyed it a lot.
Mark Yon, March 2014
The original story sounds awful familiar.
Hi, Paul. If it helps, the original story was in Asimov’s Magazine, December 1991 issue: http://www.philsp.com/data/images/i/isaac_asimovs_science_fiction_199112.jpg
It is mentioned in Allen’s The Tranquility Alternative, which I read (but remember little about, other than I enjoyed it!) in the late 1990’s. From the same alternate universe, evidently.