Rating: 
Summary: An interesting what-if, but lacking in huge details.
Review: Resurrection Day details an America that is shattered after having won WWIII at enormous cost. The problems immediately at hand have been mentioned, but here they are again: 1) According to the book, New York City, Washington DC, Miami, and San Diego were total losses. While this would doubtless be a heavy loss, it would not relegate America to the status of a second-class power. There are just too many cities and too many resources that would be there to take up the slack. Germany and Japan, both much smaller countries, sustained damage comparable to that and were thriving ten years after the war. Secondly, while the scheme for San Diego (destroyed by a nuke-armed submarine) is feasible, it's hard to believe they wouldn't have done a better job of protecting New York. 2) Britain's scheme for being a major world power is a bit hard to believe -- by 1962, most of the former British Empire was independent. I doubt, for example, that reasonably peaceful Canadians would welcome a huge British military presence with no real enemy in sight (the USSR was removed from the map in the 1962 war, and America was too debilitated to be any real threat to the Canadians -- and let's face it, the last time Americans and Canadians fought was 150 years prior to the story taking place.) Who are the British there to protect them from, the Eskimos? 3) The book rips off entire scenes and premises from the far better and more cogently written 'Fatherland'. The semi-hostile superior officer reviewing the hero's record, for example. The 'lost people' the hero is searching for (the Weisses in Fatherland, Sarah Landry in this one.) The hero's attitude of being a good cop / reporter while being enough of a freethinker to disapprove of the totalitarian government under which he lives. If you like what-if stories, this is a good one, but not a great one.
Rating:
Summary: A different kind of apocalyptic novel
Review: An interesting "what if" novel dealing with the cuban missel crisis, what if things had turned out differently and the soviet union and the u.s. went to war. At least that is the premise of the novel, it's setting. What the story really is is part love story, part espionage story. Dubois keeps the story moving with various turns in the plot and some interesting background story as to what it is like in this alternate world. He creates likeable, believable characters. It's good for some light reading.
Rating: 
Summary: "What if" has never been as haunting as in this novel.
Review: Except for "Fatherland" and other isolated examples, alternative history novels are usually, and strangly, short on originality. However, Resurrection Day, is not only an example of originality but also very good writing that kept me reading until the end. It also provides a disturbing warning about the power given to our elected officials and military who are, in the end, flawed and human. Their human mistakes unfortunatly may, and in this book almost did, result in the instant destruction of the planet.
Rating:
Summary: This time, cooler heads didn't prevail
Review: Alternate history enthusiasts familiar with "Fatherland" will be delighted to get their hands on this romp through the post-World War III United States, devastated emotionally to a much greater degree than physically. For those who like fast, easy reads, a warning: you will have to slosh through some more or less tedious preliminary scenes that are nevertheless essential for the overall plot setup before you get to the fast-paced, page-turning stuff in the second part of the story. Personally, however, I've enjoyed the "preliminaries" as much, if not more, than the thrilling unwinding of the plot and a breathtaking, head-spinning ending. A very old adage came into my head reading about media censorship, peaceful demonstrations broken up violently and without provocation, work camps, orphan street gangs, and more: In conquering, we become the conquered. In the world where the largest communist power is covered with radioactive sludge, its worst traits - civil rights and freedoms infringement - are continued by those who seemingly fought to eliminate them. It is very appropriate that the main protagonist of the book is a reporter - defender of the First Amendment, representative of the most cherished freedom in America, which is the freedom of speech and expression. Despite an optimistic ending, "Resurrection Day" once again stresses the point that there can be no winners in the nuclear war, even if the survivors remain.
Rating: 
Summary: Everybody Duck and Cover!
Review: "Resurrection Day" is a mystery novel set in America a decade or so after the nuclear war resulting from the Cuban Missile Crisis. The real mystery however is how one man wrote a book that starts so well and goes so wrong. Opening with a flourish of details about the now shattered and crippled US of A so perfectly nuanced in their detailing of the fried and irradiated nation that one can't possibly fault the dated attempts to write Anglo-dialog for its british characters or how blatantly the author rips off from the far superior "Fatherland". In RD, far from backing down from the brink of nuclear warfare, the Yanks and Ruskies went toe-to-toe. Though details are scarce, eveyrbody seems to blame the now assumed dead JFK. (Imagine a world in which Dallas, 1963 never happened? No disco, no bell-bottoms or mood rocks? About the only history left pristine was the collapse of South Vietnam). Though scarred by the war, America is its victor - with Russia bombed back to Tsars. The only real winners were the Europeans who somehow managed to avoid being dragged into the war or at leats catch some of its heat. Still armed with nukes, the US's situation approximates that of the former USSR - were too poor to survive, but too powerful to be left for dead. We're also an embarrasing joke for the rest of the world: even foreigners profiting at America's expense silently pine for the great USA of old. Though the war as described here was actually quite limited, Dubois describes an America in a state of collapse, with whole territories considered lawless zones, and martial law becomes the rule. All newspapers are subject to military censorship and, for good order, are staffed with army vets - guys not prone to buck the system. Though it's business as usual a decade later, the author throws in a plot of something brewing: the murder of a visiting Brit who may be on a secret mission; the dissappearance of a vagrant who may have been on JFK's honor guard; the heralded re-opening of Manhattan Island (left sealed off and supposedly deserted since 1962); more secret machinations from the British and also those of the powerful General "Rammer" Ramsay, and hints that the truth of October, 1962 may somehow turn up. Then it goes bad. I'm not sure where, but the author soon takes a turn for the trite. Dubois' hero/Detective is Carl Landry, an ex-soldier who writes government-sanitized news in Boston. Landry's job seems guaranteed to engender in Landry an evolved acumen for investigation, primed to turn the soldier into a true detective. Instead, Landry becomes less an active investigator than a poor shmo powerless to ignore the steady stream of conspiracy theories that come his way. Dubois gives his hero no sense of disbelief and therefore deprives the reader of any sense of surprise. Dubois's JFK never rises above being the same product of the Camelot myth - eventually enjoying a sort of fulsome praise that undermines this novel as an objective mystery. By the same token, General Ramsay never becomes more than an uninspired fictionalized version of General Curtis LeMay, the hawkish USAF Chief of 1962. Though popular, the General is the object of suspicion that Dubois practically telegraphs from the moment his character is introduced. (Popular blame for the war falls squarely on JFK and his circle; but the sentiment seems forced, making it obvious that conventional wisdom is in for a painful reasessment). Though billed as a mystery-alternate history in the "Fatherland" mold, Dubois never ties in the disparate elements of his story to the alternate history as Harris had in that other novel. There are none of the historically ironic moments of "Fatherland" (my favorite being a murder victim whose criminal history amounts to a disturbance at a beer hall in 1922). Dubois spends so much time crafting his alternate history to match "Fatherland" he almost completely forgets the deft connection between the mystery and the history and the historical figures who live through both. Few of the characters are developed beyond being foils for Landry, and some details are painfully wrong - when Landry and his british lover meet and relive the story of WWIII, despite the hardships of daily life in post-war America coupled with censorship appropriate to a police state, Landry is actually better informed on the subject than she is. Also, unlike Dubois, Harris used real figures taken out of their historical context (one of whom, strangely enough, is an altogether different President named Kennedy, and not one anybody will be comparing to King Arthur). It is in its climax that "Day" compares least favorably with "Fatherland". The latter of the two books has no happy ending, only the willingness to look the Holocaust square in the face. In comparison, by the end of "Day" the main charachters pal around, pat each other on the back and congratulate themselves for successfully re-writing history, i could almost hear the laugh track and the strains to the MASH theme. A major botch - nuke this book.
Rating: 
Summary: Extremely entertaining
Review: I got this book from the local library and read it in one sitting. Having read "Fatherland" a few months ago I though the idea of a post nuclear holocaust US very intriguing. The prospect of "what could have been" is truly terrifying and though maybe the book might contain some cliches I think it is a great read and a great escape for a few hours. I like the character of Carl, an individual in the true American sense who will not be compromised. Very worthwile.
Rating:
Summary: A Good Read, But Had Its Distractions
Review: This novel was more successful as suspense than as effective alternative history. As an investigative thriller, it had its moments and kept my interest. As an alternative history, however, it was fairly weak. There is so much gratuitous Kennedy worship and obvious, ham-handed left-liberal propaganda (evil Republican dictators, the saintly George McGovern, how wonderful we would all be if we just gave control over everything to the UN, etc.) that plausible implications of the counterfactual got lost. Even the big secret of the book is essentially an anti-anti-Communist fantasy/nightmare. This book does not compare to Fatherland or SS-GB, which work on both levels. Still, despite its flaws, it was a good, engaging read which I enjoyed. This should not be the first alternative history you read, but is worthwhile.
Rating:
Summary: GREAT "WHAT IF" - NOT ENOUGH DETAIL
Review: This is an extremely important part of World history which has really been ignored. "What if" the crisis turned out differently and war broke out? Did we have such an advantage over the USSR? Would our alies have sat back and watched? Who would the world powers have been in the aftermath? I think it would have been better to describe actually what occured in '62 and explain in the alternate history version what went wrong. The author could have done this when the hero went to NYC - maybe he could have run into someone that could explain in more detail why things turned out the way they did. This could have been a great chance to explore exactly what went right, what JFK and others did that helped avoid a war. In reading this book you get the real impression that it was simply the toss of a coin that made the difference between war and peace. I'm not a big JFK fan but from what I know of how the crisis was handled, this was one of his brightest moments. The turncoat girlfriend was also predictable and goofy. P.S. For a good "alternate history" novel on the Civil War - check out "Guns of the South".
Rating:
Summary: Could not put the book down.
Review: The location and activities of the early sixties in the book were like looking in the mirror of the past. Whoever live in the the sixties and seventies can relate to this book. I remember living those days where the "Sisters" use to tell us to get under the desks because of Cuba and Russia.
Rating: 
Summary: Thrill-less Thriller (2 1/2 stars)
Review: Lord Cornwallis below has pointed out a a number of relevant shortcomings in the plot and has highlighted (highlit?) the cardboard nature of a number of the characters. For my 2 cents worth, I would also add that the "love" interest is surprisingly underdeveloped. The two characters have sex a couple of times and eventually declare their love for each other but there appears to be no real connection between them (modern love....?) But my biggest gripe is the complete abscense of thrills in what is supposedly a novel of the thriller genre. Where is the tension? Where is the edge-of-your-seat quality which forces you to keep reading to the wee small hours. I found this novel easy to put down (and admittedly easy to pick up), which is a shame because the premise was an excellent one. It was just so mundanely executed. You never felt that the characters were in any real danger (moral or otherwise) or that it really matters what happens in the end anyway. The ending was a bit pat as well. If it was really that easy to publish the story (locking the censor in the storeroom indeed!) then why hadn't the press done it before. And one more thing.... Where were all the women? I know it was the 70's and after a nuclear war, but the only female with a serious speaking part was the supposed love interest. Even Tom Clancy can generally manage better than that.... All in all, a dissapointing effort.
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