Books

For years universities have been restive sounding boards for those who talk of revolution, of a new system, of freedom for every man. This chilling tale begins with a university, and a student riot — only this time the riot becomes a revolution and produces a new epoch in the American Way of Life.

Robert Kiley, a member of the faculty, seems to endorse the change as a giant step forward in the educational process. After all, his name appears on the plan that created the change. But his efforts at reform have brought him near death, saved only by a colleague’s experimental research in cryogenics.

Awakening years in the future, Kiley finds that he is still on the university campus where, through some strange metamorphosis, he has become the spiritual leader of the people — against his every wish. He can’t understand where he fits, in a new era when everyone speaks in distorted versions of today’s ghetto jargon, everyone (literate or not) has a Ph.D., and the university has become a miniature hell, isolated from the new paradise of America. But the money still comes from Washington and as the new “leader,” Kiley goes to fetch it, a journey across America which reveals just how alien he — or his world — has become.

Often hilarious, this devastating first novel shows how easily the best intentions can produce a nightmare.

Readers’ Comments -

…where did you get these characters? They’re implausible, and persuasive, and reasonable, and insane all at once…great imagination…
- M.N. Itaca NY

…funny and frightening. I hope you’re wrong!
- K.L.C. Fargo ND

Reviews -

Culling the length and breadth of speculative fiction as I do affords a number of peak moments, explosive discoveries. Imagine finding for the first time Delany, Disch, Lafferty. I can recreate in a blink the impact on me of my first exposure to D.G. Compton, Barry Malzberg, and Elizabeth Saxton. Well here’s another one. Richard E. Peck in Final Solution (Doubleday) has written a yarn of the “if this goes on” category which will curl up your toes in delight. Coupled with a swift, bright, narrative style and a coruscating sense of humor is a sharply serious social commentary, generally encompassing the immediate future but most specifically dealing with the University. Take current trends in higher education — the lowering of entrance requirements, the increasing voice of students in curriculum and administration and the purse-power of the government — and extend, extrapolate them. Mix in a lot of laughter and an underlying sense of respect and responsible concern for education per se, throw in a fistful of genius for characterization (and caricature) and a fine feel for language, and you have a rough idea of Richard Peck’s recipe — and clear notice to watch for this name again.
- Theodore Sturgeon, Galaxy Magazine

The author has a deft sense of language.
- Edward Janusz, Garage Sale Gold