The World in Winter

By John Christopher

This is one of those Penguin classics from the 1950's which like Wyndhams 'Day of the Triffids' probably made a bit of an impact when it was released, but has since faded into relative obscurity. The premise of the tale is simple enough. The sun hiccups and the next ice age kicks in, fast! Within a year the northern hemisphere is freezing over, the masses move south and then the racial interplay is reversed with whites becoming servants, cleaners and prostitutes for black Africans. The story doesn't waste any time. As the ice age kicked in fast, so the Africans are quickly returning to the frozen wastes of London in a colonising attempt which meets unexpected resistance from the survivors. The story is seen from the perspective of a British TV producer who must not only contend with an oncoming ice age and the trip to a some what hostile Africa, but also with an unfaithful wife who does what she must to survive.

The book is very biased, but its hard to tell in which direction it really leans. Christopher appears to be making some point about the racial politics of the 1950's, but at the same time he pulls no punches with regards to the Africans. Every one is portrayed in an unflattering light which left me some what frustrated. There are no likable characters at all and even the hero spends most of his time stoically accepting one betrayal after another. Cynical as hell, I can't decide if this book is as realistic in its approach to basic humanity as it is unrealistic in its portrayal of global politics in the fact of a world shattering event; I imagine the Europeans would not just walk cap in hand to Africa, I reckon they'd dust off their colonial instincts, grab some superior weaponry and invade the place. Those who couldn't or wouldn't turn to such extreme measures simply wouldn't survive. Morality is dependent on circumstances and people with few options left for survival usually don't quote the Geneva conventions.

This is one of the fundamental lessons of any post apocolypse tale. Just how far will you go to survive? Would you kill other people just to take their food/land/fuel? If you knew that other people's survival stood between your family and probable death, what would you do? 'Do the right thing' means nothing when people disagree as to what 'the right thing' is. This book only tries to address this point towards the end, and shys away from following its own premise to the logical conclusion. Instead I think it tries to make some obscure point regarding colonialism and as such it scores low.
2/5

Another review.