Fallout

Later, we leave the shelter and I thank him for allowing me to visit. I get in my car, drive past a few houses, and stop at the top of the hill for which the street is named. Lining the curb are the houses of my childhood friends and neighbors, a few unchanged, but others almost unrecognizable thanks to redesign and renovation. Here my thoughts are once again filled with the memories — of baseball and football games we played on this street, of the Good Humor Man’s ringing bells and how we’d all run home to beg our mothers for quarters for ice cream, of playing in piles of leaves, splashing in puddles, and building snowmen. Ours were truly innocent childhoods.

People say that the era of post–World War II American innocence died on November 22, 1963, with the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. But I wonder if perhaps that innocence began to fade earlier than that, with the Cold War nuclear arms race and the threat of mutually assured destruction. Certainly that was the first time my friends and I became aware that there were countries thousands of miles away, on the other sides of vast oceans, that wanted to destroy us. Countries populated by people we didn’t know, had never met, and had no reason to dislike.

As history shows, the Cuban Missile Crisis was averted and no bombs fell. The American people were led to believe that Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev backed down and ordered the ships carrying missiles and other weapons to return to Russia. In actuality, though, the crisis was forestalled when President Kennedy secretly agreed to Khrushchev’s demand to remove all American nuclear missiles located in Turkey — on the condition that this information not be made public. Thus, what was presented to our country as a military triumph was at best a draw, if not a defeat.

Why is it that since the dawn of civilization, we have persisted in following a pattern where mere handfuls of influential men manage to convince or force great masses of peaceful human beings to fear and hate one another enough to go to war? Has the result ever been anything other than misery, death, and destruction?

More than fifty years have passed since that week in October of 1962 when the world came the closest it’s ever been to complete annihilation. And yet we are still at war.

Will we never learn?

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

My heartfelt thanks to:

Stephen Barbara, for getting behind this book and steering it to the wonderful folks at Candlewick.

Karen Lotz, for taking a leap of faith on a partial manuscript from an author she’d never worked with before.

And finally, the magnificent Kaylan Adair, whose long, thoughtful, elegantly phrased editorial letters were precious gifts.

Candlewick Press Discussion Guide

1. Fallout is historical fiction, but it rewrites the past. What are the true historical events depicted in this novel? What are the imagined events? Why do you think the author chose to alter the facts of 1962? What do you think he is trying to tell us about the present?

2. The chapters in this novel alternate between the months leading up to the attack and the days immediately following. How does the novel’s structure enhance the story’s suspense? How does it deepen your understanding of its characters, especially the eleven-year-old narrator, Scott Porter?

3. For much of the late twentieth century, the United States and the Soviet Union fought each other in the Cold War. What is the difference between a “cold” war and a “hot” one? After reading this book, which would you rather experience? Why?

4. What is the historical connection between Russia and the Soviet Union? Why do the characters in Fallout use both names interchangeably? What happened to the country known as the Soviet Union? Why?

5. Before the attack, Mr. Shaw makes fun of the bomb shelter, but afterward he forces himself and his family into it and even keeps others out. Do you think he’s a hypocrite? What would you have done in his situation?

6. Why was Mrs. Porter opposed to building a bomb shelter? Why does Mr. Porter decide to build it anyway? Before the attack, which parent would you have agreed with? Why?

7. What are Scott’s greatest worries in the hours immediately after the attack? What are they as the days go on?

8. Evil was a word that Scott and his classmates often used to describe the Soviet leaders. What were their reasons for this judgment? How did they regard President Kennedy? How did their new teacher, Mr. Kasman, challenge their beliefs?

9. Ronnie could be a liar, a bully, a Peeping Tom, and even on occasion a thief. So why is he Scott’s best friend? What do the two boys fight about just before the attack? What happens to their friendship in the shelter?

10. Janet spends one night each week babysitting and cleaning for the Porter family. Why do they know so little about her family?