The inspiration for Dr. Strangelove! In the late-'50s post-nuclear war tradition, Peter George's (Peter Bryant's) tale of men struggling to get the bomb off took quite a turn before reaching the screen. Still, it's the author's best-known work, and at one George was hired by Kubrick to transfer his work to celluloid. First published 1958.
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12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A great story well written. Must read.,
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This review is from: Red Alert (Paperback)
Red Alert (originally published as Two Hours to Doom in Gt Britain) is an excellent book: gripping, tense, written in good, economical, and forceful language, and (to this very civilian layman, at least) marvellously realistic. I can see why Stanley Kubrick bought the film rights to this little novel: its storyline alone is well worth the price of admission, and with Kubrick and Terry Southern's collective imagination working it up to the screenplay for Dr. Strangelove, it could not miss as a film. Peter Bryant/Peter George did exceedingly well with this book and it remains an excellent read. My only criticism is that the current edition issued for sale has not been sufficiently proofread and edited: there are some typos and omitted words in the text. If the present publishers would amend these minor flaws, this little book would be that much better to read, very good as it is anyway. The Cold War may be over, but this story set in the late 1950s is still a cracking good read. Nothing like a thoroughly good and credible Cold-war thriller to fire the imagination and to get the blood racing. A five-star+ rating.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A Study of Fear and Paranoia,
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This review is from: Red Alert (Paperback)
Before you start to read this book it might be a good idea (especially if you are under thirty years old) to do a little reading about 1958 in an almanac or encyclopedia supplement for that year. For those of us who as elementary school students, were taught to turn our desks to the window and cower behind it, or hide in the halls; this could have been a true story. There were more than one or two scares in those days that could have led to a "Nuclear Exchange".
Of little note today is that SAC (the Strategic Air Command) had air fleets of B-52s armed and in the air from the 1950s until the early 1990s. During that time there were many 'incidents' that could have triggered a 'bombing' should there not have been numerous "failsafes" that kept this from happening. One of the major protections was the 'red phone' lines directly between the US President and the General Secretary of the USSR. While Kubrick decided to turn this into a satire, most of what happens in the book does happen in the movie, without the comedy. What prevented this disaster from actually happening was that 'Plan R' was NEVER a scenario that was approved for use by the Joint Chiefs. One of the reasons that no one person (except for the President) could order a strike was to prevent some one going off the deep end and ordering a nuclear strike. In most cases it took two or more people to arm a missile and fire it. The 'Minuteman' sites were set-up so that one person couldn't turn both keys at once and the two men in the silo were armed so as to able to shoot each other should it become necessary to stop any attempted launch. This is a must read for anyone who wants to understand the tension that existed between the two superpowers in the fifties and sixties and how lucky we were that nothing happened. The idea of "MAD", mutually assured destruction, was enough to keep even the most fanatical nationalist from starting something that no one could win. Zeb Kantrowitz
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
"Red Alert" is a red-hot read,
By Kentucky Kurio (Louisville, Ky) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Red Alert (Paperback)
Like others, the printing errors annoyed me, but the story is so compelling that I soon overlooked them. As tense as "Fail Safe" if not more, and nothing like "Strangelove" other than the surface details.
Completely gripping, the story moves forward like a juggernaut to it's chilling yet believable ending. One of my favorite cold war novels. For those of us who remember "duck and cover" exercises in elementary school, this is a must read.
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