James Nicoll Reviews

Sir Fred Hoyle and John Elliot’s 1962 A For Andromeda is the first of two Andromeda novels. It is a novelization of Hoyle and Elliot’s 1961 television SF serial drama of the same name. 

In the distant future of 1970, Britain is increasingly under the sway of an America on whom the British are dependent for defense against the Warsaw Pact nations. Once a mighty imperial power, now it enjoys also-ran status. It does have one accomplishment of which it can be proud: the Bouldershaw Fell Radio Telescope, the most powerful radio telescope on Earth. 

Almost immediately following Bouldershaw’s activation, the grand device detects a signal coming from a star in the direction of the constellation Andromeda. 

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1957’s TheBlack Cloud was Sir Fred Hoyle’s first novel.

Ayoung astronomer working  a blink comparator gets a career-making break when he noticesthat a small black region on two photographic plates grew measurablyin the month between exposures. After a hurried consultation, thediscoverer and his colleagues conclude:

• The dark spot is an interstellar cloud. 
• Its apparent growth is because it is headed towards the Solar System. 
• The lack of transverse motion means that it is headed directly at the Solar System. 
• It will arrive in about two years. 

Excitingtimes to be an astronomer! Very exciting, because if the cloud passesbetween the Earth and the Sun it is dense enough to blot out sunlightentirely ¹, dooming us all to a slow lingering death.

Well,the discoverer can enjoy his enhanced career for the two years he hasleft.

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