WILD CARD

by Raymond & Roger Bingham Hawkey ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 1974

All set to go. . . off. . . a spellbinding total totalizer set in a frighteningly plausible future Amerika in which guerrilla warfare that claims thousands of lives per year has become a way of life: National Guard I.D. checks at bridges and airports, sabotage of the Lincoln Memorial and Statue of Liberty; endless riots, strikes, assassination attempts in the total splintering disintegration of our country. In desperation, the President approves Operation Wild Card -- a super top-secret science group that will fabricate an outer space threat in the form of an accidentally crashing UFO that will release a deadly virus killing approximately 10,000 Angelenos -- hopefully unifying the country. The technical difficulties of creating both non-earthly ""hardware"" and life-forms (""cerebroids"" linked organically to each other and the space vessel) and the engineering gimmickry necessary to replicate a bona-fide crash, are as exciting as your average adventure story. As for the dubious morality of the project, the woman with a conscience kills herself, and as for the rest -- dead men don't talk, maybe. The President makes Nixon look like St. Jerome -- but what about a ""national security project"" that could truly save the country by killing off a city?

Pub Date: May 1, 1974

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Stein & Day

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1974

Categories: FICTION