The Age of Radiance

Starred review from December 16, 2013
The atomic age arrived with a bang in 1945, terrifying the world with the threat of nuclear holocaust while offering the possibility of a cheap source of energy. Yet neither scenario followed and the era petered out with the century’s end, as the digital age was ushered in. Nelson (Rocket Men) writes a wonderfully detailed, anecdote-filled account of atomic energy, from Wilhelm Roentgen’s 1895 discovery of radiation to the ongoing hangover of the Fukushima disaster. Roentgen’s fateful discovery opens this account and is followed in turn by four more geniuses—Pierre and Marie Curie, Enrico Fermi, and Leo Szilard—as well as the colleagues who helped them tease out details of a hitherto unknown but spectacular source of energy. Hardly anyone believed in its practicality until Hitler expelled the cream of Europe’s physicists and claimed that those remaining were working on an atomic bomb. America embarked on an immense project to beat the Nazis at their own game before becoming entangled with Soviet nuclear program in the bizarre, abysmally wasteful Cold War. Other authors have covered the myriad ways this invisible power impacts our lives, but Nelson brilliantly weaves a plethora of material into one noteworthy volume. Agent: Stuart Krichevsky.

February 1, 2014
Nelson (Rocket Men, 2009) presents a sweeping panorama of the nuclear age, from Wilhelm Rntgen's discovery of X-rays to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, paying particular attention to the colorful scientists whose brilliance and diligence unlocked the secrets of the atom. These include the big names whose contributions have been well documented, like Marie and Pierre Curie, Enrico Fermi, Leo Szilard, and Robert Oppenheimer, but also lesser-known figures, including the suicide team of Tokyo Electric technicians (derisively nicknamed gamma sponges ) who entered the Fukushima reactor to manually open its exhaust vents. Nelson tells their stories vividly, with a journalist's eye for symmetry and irony; the science itself is, at times, less central to his narrative than the fusion-reactions of interacting scientists and government officials. Despite truly harrowing descriptions of Chernobyl and Fukushima, as well as a tense account of Cold War nuclear maneuvers, this selection at times sounds a note of disappointment at the world's emerging squeamishness about the two-faced god of nuclear technologies. It is time, Nelson suggests, to learn to live with blessed curses. (Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)