The late Brad Linaweaver won the Prometheus Award in 1989 for his novel, Moon of Ice. The book apparently has gone out of print, but I thought I would note that both Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea praised the book, and obviously anyone who wishes may hunt up a used copy.
In Quantum Psychology, Chapter 16, Robert Anton Wilson writes, "The Nazis believed the Moon consisted of solid ice. Brad Linaweaver's superb science fiction novel, Moon of Ice, concerns a parallel universe where World War II ended in a truce, rather than total victory for the allies. In Nazi Europe, the "moon of ice" theory still reigns supreme in government-run universities, learned societies, etc. while in anarchist America (in that universe, we become pacifist, isolationist and finally anarchist) the orthodox model of the moon remains dominant. When tbe Nazis land a spaceship on the moon and find no ice, all the data of the flight becomes Top Secret and the Europeans never learn of it."
Robert Shea, in the summer 1989 issue of the Prometheus, newsletter of the Libertarian Futurist Society:
June 23, 1989
Dear Editor:
I quite agree with Victoria Varga that more favorable reviews of Moon of Ice by Brad Linaweaver may be redundant, but I can't resist adding a few more words of praise to her comments in the last issue of Prometheus. Moon of Ice, clearly the product of libertarian thinking, performs the valuable service of showing us what the U.S. might be like as a much more free society than the one we've got. It is also an artistic achievement with an ingenious structure that allows us to compare two opposite societies and two opposite personalities. Moon balances a U.S. better off than the one we've got today, portrayed in the frame story, against a Europe far worse off than the one that exists in the "real" world, as portrayed in the diaries of the Goebbels, father and daughter. The contrast of liberty and tyranny is carried through in the juxtaposition of the diaries of the anarchist Hilda Goebbels and her Nazi father Josef.
Both Hilda and Dr. Goebbels are wonderful characters. Hilda's dry—and sometimes gallows— humor is delightful. And not too many authors have been able to present us with a credible and understandable portrayal of the mind of one of the principal architects of Nazism. These two creations are feats of imaginative empathy. With all due respect to the other contenders, a Prometheus Award for Moon of Ice would be well deserved.
--Robert Shea
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