Publishers Weekly
03/27/2017
SF author Benford (the Galactic Center series) makes the relevant science accessible to the lay reader in this intriguing alternate history thriller that speculates on the road not taken in the U.S.’s frantic path toward developing an atomic bomb during WWII. Chemist Karl Cohen’s suggestion that centrifuges be used to create the weapon accelerates the production process, so that it’s available for use in 1944, against a different Axis enemy than the Japanese. En route to that deployment, Benford brings to life all the heavy hitters involved in the Manhattan Project, such as Enrico Fermi, Leo Szilard, and Robert Oppenheimer. Diagrams help illustrate the scientific concepts involved, and the story line is laced with stranger-than-fiction facts, such as the national security apparatus’s concerns that stories in the magazine Astounding Science Fiction were based on leaks of classified information. Cohen’s conversion into a field operative later in the book is a stretch. (May)
David Brin
Amazing.
The New York Journal of Books
The author does a marvelous job of blending political thriller, spy novel, and science fiction.
, The Wall Street Journal - Tom Shippey
Physics and politics, engineering and imagination, “The Berlin Project” has them all. No one has ever been better than Mr. Benford at expressing the sheer excitement of new science and the human tension of making a case, on which the future of the world depends.
“Let’s not think that there aren’t other decisions being made now, or not made now, on which our future depends. The answers depend on the science, yes, but also on the salesmanship. You have to sell the Moon, and Mars and the stars, to the politicians and the public. And if you don’t get it right . . . there will be consequences. That’s why sci-fi is not just for fans.”
Scientific American
Through an informed exploration of what might have been, The Berlin Project provides a unique and darkly enthralling perspective on the events underpinning the advent of the atomic age.
Tor.com
Master of SF Greg Benford delivers a taut thriller that pivots off of a spectacular twist of history: scientist Karl Cohen, working on the Manhattan Project during World War II, has a brilliant idea that speeds up development—and the first atomic bomb is ready a year earlier, in summer of 1944, when it could strike a decisive early blow against the Nazis. Laced with real science delivered in easily-absorbed, creative ways, the plot combines espionage, politics, and the “what if” thrill of imagining a world where Hitler was stopped in his tracks nearly a year earlier, as Cohen is forced out of his comfort zone and into the field.
, The Wall Street Journal - – Tom Shippey
Physics and politics, engineering and imagination, “The Berlin Project” has them all. No one has ever been better than Mr. Benford at expressing the sheer excitement of new science and the human tension of making a case, on which the future of the world depends.
“Let’s not think that there aren’t other decisions being made now, or not made now, on which our future depends. The answers depend on the science, yes, but also on the salesmanship. You have to sell the Moon, and Mars and the stars, to the politicians and the public. And if you don’t get it right . . . there will be consequences. That’s why sci-fi is not just for fans.”
Scientific American
Through an informed exploration of what might have been, The Berlin Project provides a unique and darkly enthralling perspective on the events underpinning the advent of the atomic age.
Tor.com
Master of SF Greg Benford delivers a taut thriller that pivots off of a spectacular twist of history: scientist Karl Cohen, working on the Manhattan Project during World War II, has a brilliant idea that speeds up development—and the first atomic bomb is ready a year earlier, in summer of 1944, when it could strike a decisive early blow against the Nazis. Laced with real science delivered in easily-absorbed, creative ways, the plot combines espionage, politics, and the “what if” thrill of imagining a world where Hitler was stopped in his tracks nearly a year earlier, as Cohen is forced out of his comfort zone and into the field.
-- The New York Journal of Books
“The author does a marvelous job of blending political thriller, spy novel, and science fiction.
David Brin
Amazing.