Virtues of Annihilation

TOMORROW (372 pp.]--PhilipWylie--Rinehart ($3.50).

The news of this book is that splenetic Philip Wylie has 1) stopped harping on Momism and sexual frigidity as the great enemies of the U.S., and 2) is now banging away at U.S. apathy in the face of the thermonuclear bomb. The heroes and heroines of Tomorrow are much the same as those in his previous polemics (e.g., Generation of Vipers, Night Unto Night). But where formerly they cried for a decrease in sexual pretense, they are now clamoring for an increase in Civil Defense.

The Conner family of the Midwest city of Green Prairie represent the new Wylie ideal. Father Conner is a sturdy sector warden who has kept his faith in C.D. throughout the dull years of cold war. So have his worthy wife and their sons Ted (a radio ham) and Chuck (an architect serving in Air Force intelligence). But their neighbors, the Bailey family, have spent the cold-war years lining their nests and crying haw-haw at C.D., except for daughter Lenore, who is devoted both to Chuck Conner and radiochemistry. Trouble is that Lenore is faced with the prospect of marrying a wealthy heel to save father Bailey from exposure as an embezzler.

All the rest of Wylie's characters--and they run into dozens of "representative" Americans--are divided like the Conners and the Baileys into C.D. sheep and irresponsible goats. When the Red bombers come roaring in from Canada and the Gulf of California, the sheep keep their heads and the goats go raving crazy. New York, Washington, Detroit and Philadelphia are wiped off the map; 20 million people are annihilated by a combination of bombs, fire, germ warfare and national hysteria. Luckily a U.S. submarine, containing "the largest hydrogen bomb ever assembled," is lying handy in the North Sea. It enters the Baltic, submerges, and explodes itself. The whole northeast of Russia goes up in smoke--and the "last great obstacle to freedom had been removed . . .."

The best bits of Tomorrow are Wylie's orgiastic descriptions of falling bombs and U.S. cities going up in sky-high sheets of fire. They are effective for the simple reason that Wylie has been expecting a large-scale annihilation of his erring fellow men for many years and can therefore write of it with passionate intensity. Indeed, he concludes that bombing may be regarded as an "ultimate blessing," because total devastation provides "opportunity for young men" and gives architects a chance to design better cities. Moreover, by obliterating Mr. Bailey and his embezzlements, it gives Lenore the chance to marry Chuck. So on the whole, perhaps the only really terrifying thing about Tomorrow is a statement on the jacket which says that Author Wylie is "an expert in Civil Defense matters and serves the Government in the capacity of Consultant."

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