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Children of the Atom
This limited edition facsimile reprint volume is a complete reproduction of the original first edition (published by
Gnome Press in 1953) and includes a full-color dust jacket, protective slipcase, and biographical information about the author.
Hidden throughout a future America of 1972 are a group of incredibly gifted children. All roughly the same age, all
preternaturally intelligent, and all hiding their abilities from a world they know will not understand them. They are Wilmar Shiras Children of the Atom, the results of an unintended experiment in genetic mutation. Born to workers caught in an explosion at an atomic weapons facility, these remarkable youths were orphaned just a few months after birth when their parents succumbed to delayed effects from the blast. Now they are in their early teens, scattered across the country, each unaware of the others existence.
But beginning with the introduction of 13-year-old Timothy Paul to school psychiatrist Dr. Peter Welles, all that is about to change. After identifying Timothy and his fellow prodigies for what they are and for what their potential might be Dr. Welles commits himself to gathering these Wonder Children into an experimental new school, both to harness their intellectual abilities and to protect them from the jealous suspicions of the normal population. At this new Academy, teachers and students alike throw themselves into discussion and learning, laying the groundwork for what they hope will become a rich new chapter in human history. But once the Children of the Atom are all in one place, keeping their existence a secret becomes more and more of a challenge, and escalating events soon force a reckoning not only among the Wonder Children themselves, but also with the larger society that lies just outside their sanctuary's walls.
And although it was to be the only book that Shiras would publish in the genre, Children of the Atom has earned its author an honored place among science fiction's pantheon of creators in 2002, the Science Fiction Book Club named it one of the Most Significant Science Fiction and Fantasy Books of the Last 50 Years. Shiras passed away in 1990.
Gnome Press in 1953) and includes a full-color dust jacket, protective slipcase, and biographical information about the author.
Hidden throughout a future America of 1972 are a group of incredibly gifted children. All roughly the same age, all
preternaturally intelligent, and all hiding their abilities from a world they know will not understand them. They are Wilmar Shiras Children of the Atom, the results of an unintended experiment in genetic mutation. Born to workers caught in an explosion at an atomic weapons facility, these remarkable youths were orphaned just a few months after birth when their parents succumbed to delayed effects from the blast. Now they are in their early teens, scattered across the country, each unaware of the others existence.
But beginning with the introduction of 13-year-old Timothy Paul to school psychiatrist Dr. Peter Welles, all that is about to change. After identifying Timothy and his fellow prodigies for what they are and for what their potential might be Dr. Welles commits himself to gathering these Wonder Children into an experimental new school, both to harness their intellectual abilities and to protect them from the jealous suspicions of the normal population. At this new Academy, teachers and students alike throw themselves into discussion and learning, laying the groundwork for what they hope will become a rich new chapter in human history. But once the Children of the Atom are all in one place, keeping their existence a secret becomes more and more of a challenge, and escalating events soon force a reckoning not only among the Wonder Children themselves, but also with the larger society that lies just outside their sanctuary's walls.
And although it was to be the only book that Shiras would publish in the genre, Children of the Atom has earned its author an honored place among science fiction's pantheon of creators in 2002, the Science Fiction Book Club named it one of the Most Significant Science Fiction and Fantasy Books of the Last 50 Years. Shiras passed away in 1990.
182 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1953
10 people are currently reading
337 people want to read
About the author
Wilmar H. Shiras
23 books7 followersWilmar House Shiras was born in 1908 in Boston, Massachusetts, where she spent her formative years before moving west to attend the University of California at Berkeley. After completing four years of graduate studies in history, she settled in the neighboring city of Oakland with her husband Russell, where they proceeded to raise five children. It was for her family's entertainment that Shiras first began to create stories. In 1948, at the insistence of her small but loyal audience, she submitted the short story In Hiding to editor John W. Campbell Jr.'s groundbreaking magazine Astounding Science Fiction, which published it in that year's November issue. In Hiding proved to be one of those rare works with which readers felt a deep identification, and over the next two years Shiras built on her success with the sequels Opening Doors and New Foundations (both also published in Astounding Science Fiction). Those three pieces became the first three chapters of Children of the Atom, published by Gnome Press in 1953. Over the decades that followed, this eloquent portrait of gifted children confronting a hostile world proved itself to be an enduring classic.
It has also been credited, though never officially confirmed, with providing the inspiration for Stan Lee and Jack Kirby s world-famous comic book creation, The Uncanny X-Men.
It has also been credited, though never officially confirmed, with providing the inspiration for Stan Lee and Jack Kirby s world-famous comic book creation, The Uncanny X-Men.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 48 reviews
July 29, 2013
This book is actually five short stories liked together. the five stories are: In Hiding; Opening Doors;New Foundations; Problems and Children of the Atom.
Published in book form in 1953, these stories concern a group of incredibly gifted children. Their parents were caught in an atomic experiement in 1958, and all died with two years. But all the surviving children of these parents are so intelligent that no Iq test can measure their level of intelligence.
Many of these children, in their teens have written adult books; pateneted ideas; learned college level subjects and so on.
The stories are character driven; and a bit talky. Also, somewhat dated. Still the premise is interesting and there are some interesting ideas here.
The book is quite short---182 pages--most SF readers could finish it in one evening and I do strongly recommend at least one try. It has always been a favorite of mine.
Note: If time is pressing or you are uncertain, I recommend you read the first 34 pages--the short story "In Hiding". Then if you are not interest, quit--if you like it, finish the book. "In Hiding" is the best written of the five parts, imho. It is also the best known of the five stories, having been in various anthologies.
Recommended for any SF fan; those with an interest in pyschology, and anyone who like books about unusual children.
Read before I joined Goodreads, so date unknown.
Published in book form in 1953, these stories concern a group of incredibly gifted children. Their parents were caught in an atomic experiement in 1958, and all died with two years. But all the surviving children of these parents are so intelligent that no Iq test can measure their level of intelligence.
Many of these children, in their teens have written adult books; pateneted ideas; learned college level subjects and so on.
The stories are character driven; and a bit talky. Also, somewhat dated. Still the premise is interesting and there are some interesting ideas here.
The book is quite short---182 pages--most SF readers could finish it in one evening and I do strongly recommend at least one try. It has always been a favorite of mine.
Note: If time is pressing or you are uncertain, I recommend you read the first 34 pages--the short story "In Hiding". Then if you are not interest, quit--if you like it, finish the book. "In Hiding" is the best written of the five parts, imho. It is also the best known of the five stories, having been in various anthologies.
Recommended for any SF fan; those with an interest in pyschology, and anyone who like books about unusual children.
Read before I joined Goodreads, so date unknown.
January 29, 2015
Wilmar Shiras' Children of the Atom is in many ways a classic 1950s sf "thoughtpiece" novel. There's a great deal of dialogue, not a lot of action, and it is unashamedly didactic. Even so, I enjoyed it very much, for reasons which may be somewhat idiosyncratic.
The plot of the novel is quite simple. School psychologist Peter Welles is called in to talk to a young teenager, Tim, who seems to be completely ordinary in every way - but his teacher senses that something is not quite as it seems and is worried about him. Welles quickly discovers that Tim is in fact a super-intelligent and very lonely child pretending to be normal - that this is in fact his survival strategy, but what he needs most is friendship and real intellectual stimulation. Having learned that Tim, an orphan raised by his grandparents, was born shortly after his parents were exposed to high levels of radiation in an explosion in a nuclear weapons plant, Welles reasons that there are others like Tim, and the two set out to find them.
Not al the children have been as lucky in finding ways to avoid drawing attention to themselves - the first child they find, Elsie, is a patient in a mental hospital - nor have all the children grown up as well-adjusted - one child, Fred, displays a serious lack of empathy and emotional affect, having devoted himself entirely to intellectual development. These issues, however, are addressed with relative ease once Welles manages to bring all the children he can find together in one community under the guidance of several well-chosen adults unthreatened by the extreme abilities of these "Children of the atom."
Late in the story, the children and their community are threatened by a rabble-rousing preacher who has heard some of the details about the children and launches a pogrom against these "malevolent mutants" - but the mob that attacks the school is quieted when they see Tim, a boy that many of them have known in their community as the classmate of their children and the boy who delivered their evening paper for some years. They also recognise Pete Welles, the kindly school psychologist and another of the adults, who was a local teacher. This incident brings the children to a realisation that the only way to avoid future threats is to integrate themselves into the larger community, which they decide to do by attending "normal" school but continuing to live in their own community until they can go out into the world as adults.
Several things struck me about this novel. First, the powerful "cult of psychology" that was such a key element of middle class culture in the 1950s, and how the novel could never have been constructed as it was without this. Second, the focus on Jungian rather than Freudian psychology - rather a departure from the norm, although it's possible that Shiras did not want to have to deal with Freud's theories of psychosexual development in astory dealing with young teens. Since I personally prefer Jung to Freud, this was part of what I enjoyed about the novel - seeing the children apply Jung's thinking about the anima/animus and the four basic personality functions to their own development as balanced human beings.
I was also struck by the resolution and its belief that if the different among us become integrated into the overall community, that difference will cease to be seen as threatening or evil. It reminded me of the frequently cited finding that one of the key factors in acceptance of marriage equality is knowing someone who is gay.
The thing that made this story so very real and resonant for me, however, is that to a les extreme degree, This was one big part of my life story. I know that IQ tests are inherently flawed in many ways, but the fact that I topped out of the Stanford-Binet superior adult battery of tests at age eight is an indication that there was something not quite normal about me as a child. I knew it, the adults around me knew it, and above all,the other kids knew it - and they were none too pleasant about it. My social development was awkward and delayed, to say the least. I ran a real risk of becoming all intellect and nothing else, because my mind was what made me important enough to adults that they protected me from the other children.
And then I and a few others like me were saved, quite literally, by a group of educational psychologists who were trying to figure out how to teach the gifted child, and picked eight of us who tested the highest in our grade in the whole city to be their guinea pigs. It only lasted a few years, but the wide-open curriculum, the total acceptance, support and emotional guidance of the adults looking over us (there was little need to teach, just to let us loose in libraries, museums, laboratories, and make sure we didn't accidentally harm anything) and the utter bliss of being able to play as a child with other children in ways that were true both to our developing social natures and our advanced intellectual accomplishments - these things are a large part of what made me the at least somewhat well-adjusted person I am today, and helped me learn to move comfortably in the midst of people who had once tortured me for being different.
I saw a lot of myself, magnified by the lens of science fiction, in Wilmar Shiras' Children of the Atom.
The plot of the novel is quite simple. School psychologist Peter Welles is called in to talk to a young teenager, Tim, who seems to be completely ordinary in every way - but his teacher senses that something is not quite as it seems and is worried about him. Welles quickly discovers that Tim is in fact a super-intelligent and very lonely child pretending to be normal - that this is in fact his survival strategy, but what he needs most is friendship and real intellectual stimulation. Having learned that Tim, an orphan raised by his grandparents, was born shortly after his parents were exposed to high levels of radiation in an explosion in a nuclear weapons plant, Welles reasons that there are others like Tim, and the two set out to find them.
Not al the children have been as lucky in finding ways to avoid drawing attention to themselves - the first child they find, Elsie, is a patient in a mental hospital - nor have all the children grown up as well-adjusted - one child, Fred, displays a serious lack of empathy and emotional affect, having devoted himself entirely to intellectual development. These issues, however, are addressed with relative ease once Welles manages to bring all the children he can find together in one community under the guidance of several well-chosen adults unthreatened by the extreme abilities of these "Children of the atom."
Late in the story, the children and their community are threatened by a rabble-rousing preacher who has heard some of the details about the children and launches a pogrom against these "malevolent mutants" - but the mob that attacks the school is quieted when they see Tim, a boy that many of them have known in their community as the classmate of their children and the boy who delivered their evening paper for some years. They also recognise Pete Welles, the kindly school psychologist and another of the adults, who was a local teacher. This incident brings the children to a realisation that the only way to avoid future threats is to integrate themselves into the larger community, which they decide to do by attending "normal" school but continuing to live in their own community until they can go out into the world as adults.
Several things struck me about this novel. First, the powerful "cult of psychology" that was such a key element of middle class culture in the 1950s, and how the novel could never have been constructed as it was without this. Second, the focus on Jungian rather than Freudian psychology - rather a departure from the norm, although it's possible that Shiras did not want to have to deal with Freud's theories of psychosexual development in astory dealing with young teens. Since I personally prefer Jung to Freud, this was part of what I enjoyed about the novel - seeing the children apply Jung's thinking about the anima/animus and the four basic personality functions to their own development as balanced human beings.
I was also struck by the resolution and its belief that if the different among us become integrated into the overall community, that difference will cease to be seen as threatening or evil. It reminded me of the frequently cited finding that one of the key factors in acceptance of marriage equality is knowing someone who is gay.
The thing that made this story so very real and resonant for me, however, is that to a les extreme degree, This was one big part of my life story. I know that IQ tests are inherently flawed in many ways, but the fact that I topped out of the Stanford-Binet superior adult battery of tests at age eight is an indication that there was something not quite normal about me as a child. I knew it, the adults around me knew it, and above all,the other kids knew it - and they were none too pleasant about it. My social development was awkward and delayed, to say the least. I ran a real risk of becoming all intellect and nothing else, because my mind was what made me important enough to adults that they protected me from the other children.
And then I and a few others like me were saved, quite literally, by a group of educational psychologists who were trying to figure out how to teach the gifted child, and picked eight of us who tested the highest in our grade in the whole city to be their guinea pigs. It only lasted a few years, but the wide-open curriculum, the total acceptance, support and emotional guidance of the adults looking over us (there was little need to teach, just to let us loose in libraries, museums, laboratories, and make sure we didn't accidentally harm anything) and the utter bliss of being able to play as a child with other children in ways that were true both to our developing social natures and our advanced intellectual accomplishments - these things are a large part of what made me the at least somewhat well-adjusted person I am today, and helped me learn to move comfortably in the midst of people who had once tortured me for being different.
I saw a lot of myself, magnified by the lens of science fiction, in Wilmar Shiras' Children of the Atom.
May 29, 2017
What I am reviewing here is not actually "Children of the Atom". Rather it is the three linked novelettes published by Shiras in "Astounding Science Fiction" between 1948 and 1950. In 1953 the author integrated new material and this volume became "Children of the Atom" I have ordered a copy and will review it when it arrives in a month or so.
The three novelettes first published were "In Hiding" (1948), "Opening Doors" (March, 1949) and "New Foundations" (March, 1950). All three are well-written, but the first is an acknowledged classic and has frequently been anthologized separately.
The plot deals with children whose intellects have mutated to super-human levels. The adults in the story are involved in attempting to help the children find their places in human society.
The setting is in the fifties and this naturally conditions the types of decisions, motives, and assumptions within the story. The writing is very delicately controlled and the over-all effect is gentle and sensitive. The characters are well-drawn and have psychological depth.
The three stories do create a logical cycle but there is little doubt that the readers wanted more and three years later Wilmar Shiras obliged with the novel.
UPDATE
I have finished the full novel and have consequently upgraded the rating to five stars. Whether or not this book was the initial inspiration for "The Uncanny X-Men", it has its own quite distinct character. It is an engaging and rather gentle story, though the darker aspects of human nature are not altogether ignored. The author seems to have a distinct interest in Thomistic scholastic philosophy as well as Jungian psychology--and a clear understanding of children.
While the setting is the world of America in the mid-twentieth century, the novel as aged well and deserves its high reputation.
The three novelettes first published were "In Hiding" (1948), "Opening Doors" (March, 1949) and "New Foundations" (March, 1950). All three are well-written, but the first is an acknowledged classic and has frequently been anthologized separately.
The plot deals with children whose intellects have mutated to super-human levels. The adults in the story are involved in attempting to help the children find their places in human society.
The setting is in the fifties and this naturally conditions the types of decisions, motives, and assumptions within the story. The writing is very delicately controlled and the over-all effect is gentle and sensitive. The characters are well-drawn and have psychological depth.
The three stories do create a logical cycle but there is little doubt that the readers wanted more and three years later Wilmar Shiras obliged with the novel.
UPDATE
I have finished the full novel and have consequently upgraded the rating to five stars. Whether or not this book was the initial inspiration for "The Uncanny X-Men", it has its own quite distinct character. It is an engaging and rather gentle story, though the darker aspects of human nature are not altogether ignored. The author seems to have a distinct interest in Thomistic scholastic philosophy as well as Jungian psychology--and a clear understanding of children.
While the setting is the world of America in the mid-twentieth century, the novel as aged well and deserves its high reputation.
August 5, 2018
Children of The Atom was written as a series of short stories beginning in 1948. However it never really read like it was dated at all. The basic story, which is rumored to be a precursor to The X-men(minus the super powers other than intellect). I found the stories to be prescient and the characters to be fully formed and believable. This was one of the better books I've read this year.
Read
December 23, 2009http://nhw.livejournal.com/1056925.html[return][return]On that list of the 100 most influential sf books that was going round a year or so ago, this was the only one whose author I simply had never heard of. It is set twenty years in the future (ie 1973), and revolves around the assembling of a group of children whose parents all died after a nuclear accident in 1959, and who all display exceptional intelligence. At the end of the book, the children decide that they must integrate into the mainstream of society.[return][return]It's obviously at least in part a parable of fandom / geekdom, but a rather effective one. Definitely an under-rated classic.
October 13, 2020
170804: of its era late 1940s-early 1950s. didactic, dialogic, monologic. portrayal of gathering, education, psychology of exceptionally intelligent children in america imagined as liberal/democratic and caring society. series of linked short stories. faith in intelligence as solution/understanding of human problems, creation/tech and art for general welfare. faith seems somewhat naive but pleasant: everything solved if we just got together and... talked? i am not overwhelmingly convinced intelligence is always answer, but then ignorance is definitely not...
have to say i prefer 'more than human' by sturgeon, as a portrayal of super human beings: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5...
have to say i prefer 'more than human' by sturgeon, as a portrayal of super human beings: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5...
February 21, 2010
A small group of super-intelligent children try to start their own school with the help of a few adults who know their secret: their parents died from an atomic blast, but not before giving birth to these extraordinary babies with super talents (not superheroes). They're all terribly lonely because they have to hide their intellect from others lest they be labeled freaks. This ends when one of the boys meets a psychiatrist who agrees to help launch the school.
Good study in human nature. Supposedly, the X-Men derived from this story, though no one has super powers here.
Good study in human nature. Supposedly, the X-Men derived from this story, though no one has super powers here.
March 11, 2014
Interesting premise: an atomic accident creates a group of super intelligent children. It's also interesting to consider in what ways the story is reflective of the 50's and in what ways it explores constants of human nature.
July 20, 2016
Rated G for clean. If you liked Flowers for Algernon because you could follow one man's journey to genius, you will like this book about a group of genius children. The dialogue got very technical at spots, which made the book seem to drag, but if you were in an intellectual mood and wanted to learn things indirectly about psychology then you'd enjoy those parts.
April 15, 2013
Excellent story and very intelligent. Shiras gave a lot of thought to the science as well as the emotional side of the story and it come off very ahead of it's time. I think it would make a great movie but everyone would think it's an X-Men ripoff, even though the opposite is somewhat true. I appreciate the personal touch of the doctor's interactions with the kids and their sophisticated minds but always knowing they are still children.
December 21, 2009
This is a great light read that is almost as relivent as it was in 1950. It is a character driven book based aroun a group of "gifted" children with amazing IQ's and there teachers.
I'd recommend this book to anyone that has an interest in psychology or with the X-Men comic books, cartoons, and/or movies.
I'd recommend this book to anyone that has an interest in psychology or with the X-Men comic books, cartoons, and/or movies.
September 25, 2013
Cute story about development in some hypersmart children. Could have used a little more development and a less rushed ending though.
January 29, 2016
A very good early 1950s SiFi book. Rumor has it that this book was some of Stan Lee's inspiration for creating the X-Men. Great read and a good plot. Very recommended
February 18, 2019
Good 1950s SF.
This novel is an expansion of the excellent novelette "In Hiding", where the central character discovers a young boy who is a supergenius, but has been carefully concealing his intelligence from fear that in the country of the blind, the one-eyed man could be in for a rough time - perhaps an allegory of the problems faced by gifted children in that era.
Learning that the boy's intelligence is the result of his parents' exposure to radiation in an atomic disaster, he sets out to find others of his kind. He does, and sets them up in a "special school", where they can receive an education to match their IQs.
It has to be said that the later chapters are not really up to "In hiding", and in particular that the ending is a bit weak. Would it really help much for the Children to return to ordinary schools where they would surely stick out like sore thumbs now that their secret is out? When I first read the book at 13, this infuriated me, rather as three years earlier when the author of "Earth Abides" killed off Joey.
Looking at it from (I hope) a more mature perspective, I have more sympathy for Shiras, who I suspect had got into a bit of a bind. In the sf of the period there were two basic tropes for the "mutant superman" situation, and I suspect that she wasn't really happy with either. Basically, either the supermen are accepted as the natural rulers, and allowed to run the world either openly or from behind the scenes, or else the normal people turn on them and they are wiped out - and by the time of writing both had become stock clichés.
At the end of "In Hiding", Shiras seems to be leaning to the first option. Dr Welles muses that he will always be Tim's friend "as a loyal dog, loved by a good master, is never cast out". However, the problems of this are well brought out in a later chapter, where it becomes clear that some of the Children are better-adjusted than others. Had his first contact among them been someone like Fred, rather than Timothy, one suspects that Welles himself would have been less accepting.
Nor, in any case, would all normals be as accepting as Welles. When the secret comes out in the last chapter, a massacre is narrowly averted. Here the novel very much reflects the slightly paranoid time when it was written.. Today, of course, the revelation would probably be greeted with a yawn, and the Children shrugged off as just another lot of gifteds . But sixty years ago, fear of anyone different was pretty much taken as read.
Still, these are only nitpicks and overall it's a pretty good read. You just need to keep in mind that it is of its time.
This novel is an expansion of the excellent novelette "In Hiding", where the central character discovers a young boy who is a supergenius, but has been carefully concealing his intelligence from fear that in the country of the blind, the one-eyed man could be in for a rough time - perhaps an allegory of the problems faced by gifted children in that era.
Learning that the boy's intelligence is the result of his parents' exposure to radiation in an atomic disaster, he sets out to find others of his kind. He does, and sets them up in a "special school", where they can receive an education to match their IQs.
It has to be said that the later chapters are not really up to "In hiding", and in particular that the ending is a bit weak. Would it really help much for the Children to return to ordinary schools where they would surely stick out like sore thumbs now that their secret is out? When I first read the book at 13, this infuriated me, rather as three years earlier when the author of "Earth Abides" killed off Joey.
Looking at it from (I hope) a more mature perspective, I have more sympathy for Shiras, who I suspect had got into a bit of a bind. In the sf of the period there were two basic tropes for the "mutant superman" situation, and I suspect that she wasn't really happy with either. Basically, either the supermen are accepted as the natural rulers, and allowed to run the world either openly or from behind the scenes, or else the normal people turn on them and they are wiped out - and by the time of writing both had become stock clichés.
At the end of "In Hiding", Shiras seems to be leaning to the first option. Dr Welles muses that he will always be Tim's friend "as a loyal dog, loved by a good master, is never cast out". However, the problems of this are well brought out in a later chapter, where it becomes clear that some of the Children are better-adjusted than others. Had his first contact among them been someone like Fred, rather than Timothy, one suspects that Welles himself would have been less accepting.
Nor, in any case, would all normals be as accepting as Welles. When the secret comes out in the last chapter, a massacre is narrowly averted. Here the novel very much reflects the slightly paranoid time when it was written.. Today, of course, the revelation would probably be greeted with a yawn, and the Children shrugged off as just another lot of gifteds . But sixty years ago, fear of anyone different was pretty much taken as read.
Still, these are only nitpicks and overall it's a pretty good read. You just need to keep in mind that it is of its time.
January 3, 2024
I read In Hidding in The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume Two. Since the first chapter is from 1948 it is apparently this is the first use of . I really liked In Hidding and wanted to know what happened next.
There are 5 stories. The original ”In Hiding” is the first followed by Opening Doors; New Foundations; Problems and Children of the Atom.
Opening Doors is OK, a bit naive, built after that the quality declines to 2-3-star level. Maybe I am prejudging people with a IQ over 160, but I would guess most of them would be open minded about things they did not have definitive data about:
"Some of them may not believe in God," said Welles. "Many people don't."
Elsie turned on him swiftly and snapped: "I don't know how to talk about people like that if I can't say either 'stupid' or 'crazy.'" Nahhh,....
From “New Foundations” onward we get some really long discussions on -I guess- the authors pet pocket philosophies.
You can not imagine what you have not first seen, but you can combine different images into one. … a man born blind can't imagine red or blue," said Tim. Try imagining a new color. Go on, try."
An atom? A black hole? Both was imagined many years before the first images/photos.
In sections “Problems”: People who valued only the intellect made the atom bomb and turned it loose upon the world, not knowing or caring what might be done with it. Someone clearly did not know the history of the Manhattan Project. Oppenheimer said: “We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried. Most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad Gita, ‘Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds’. I suppose we all thought that, one way or another.”
Also… what on earth is up with that stupid title? Giving away a major twist of the first fifth of the book in the title. You are meant to have read the first story before even picking up the book.
All in all ”In Hiding” was more convincing as a stand alone. Most of the rest of the book fails in convincing me about the high IQ of these people. They neither speak nor act like 120+ Letting loose the pets, boiling the research egg as a joke? That in plain unintelligent.
There are 5 stories. The original ”In Hiding” is the first followed by Opening Doors; New Foundations; Problems and Children of the Atom.
Opening Doors is OK, a bit naive, built after that the quality declines to 2-3-star level. Maybe I am prejudging people with a IQ over 160, but I would guess most of them would be open minded about things they did not have definitive data about:
"Some of them may not believe in God," said Welles. "Many people don't."
Elsie turned on him swiftly and snapped: "I don't know how to talk about people like that if I can't say either 'stupid' or 'crazy.'" Nahhh,....
From “New Foundations” onward we get some really long discussions on -I guess- the authors pet pocket philosophies.
You can not imagine what you have not first seen, but you can combine different images into one. … a man born blind can't imagine red or blue," said Tim. Try imagining a new color. Go on, try."
An atom? A black hole? Both was imagined many years before the first images/photos.
In sections “Problems”: People who valued only the intellect made the atom bomb and turned it loose upon the world, not knowing or caring what might be done with it. Someone clearly did not know the history of the Manhattan Project. Oppenheimer said: “We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried. Most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad Gita, ‘Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds’. I suppose we all thought that, one way or another.”
Also… what on earth is up with that stupid title? Giving away a major twist of the first fifth of the book in the title. You are meant to have read the first story before even picking up the book.
All in all ”In Hiding” was more convincing as a stand alone. Most of the rest of the book fails in convincing me about the high IQ of these people. They neither speak nor act like 120+ Letting loose the pets, boiling the research egg as a joke? That in plain unintelligent.
April 26, 2022
As a artifact from the history of literary science fiction, this book is unique and fascinating, but as a novel it does not succeed at what it seems to want to do. The author is attempting to create a story that speculates what would really happen if super intelligent, mutant children were born into the world, and she wants to portray the world as realistically (as determined by her view of what is realistic) as possible. She deliberately eschews melodrama, but has some dialog where she shows that she has thought of these possibilities (super geniuses bent on world domination, master criminals), and rejected them.
Alas. Melodrama would have been a lot more fun. Instead we get a bunch of sophomoric dorm room conversions about Jungian psychology, literary criticism, and some bad math (4/0 is *undefined*, it is not infinity, though the limit of 4/(1-x) as x goes to 1 from either direction is infinity-- you would think super geniuses would know this).
But even without melodrama, the novel could have been interesting. The characters would have needed to have been more flawed. The author would have needed to speculate how the world of 1973 might be different from the world of 1950. The genius kids would have had to actually have some interesting insights into their world and would have had to question things, like, for example, Tim might question why boys and girls must live separately instead of just blindly designing a school where dorms are segregated by gender. Heck, they might question why there are two genders. But this would have been a different novel, and even if a writer from 1950 was able to create it, it is unlikely they could have sold it. There are hints in the story that the author might have considered going places in her discussions of religion if the science fiction market were different.
Alas. Melodrama would have been a lot more fun. Instead we get a bunch of sophomoric dorm room conversions about Jungian psychology, literary criticism, and some bad math (4/0 is *undefined*, it is not infinity, though the limit of 4/(1-x) as x goes to 1 from either direction is infinity-- you would think super geniuses would know this).
But even without melodrama, the novel could have been interesting. The characters would have needed to have been more flawed. The author would have needed to speculate how the world of 1973 might be different from the world of 1950. The genius kids would have had to actually have some interesting insights into their world and would have had to question things, like, for example, Tim might question why boys and girls must live separately instead of just blindly designing a school where dorms are segregated by gender. Heck, they might question why there are two genders. But this would have been a different novel, and even if a writer from 1950 was able to create it, it is unlikely they could have sold it. There are hints in the story that the author might have considered going places in her discussions of religion if the science fiction market were different.
April 23, 2020
Classic 1950s science fiction (in fairness however it began as a series of three novellas in 1948, the most famous of which was In Hiding, and was later expanded into a book in 1953).
I went into this blind having picked up the Science Fiction Book Club 1959 hardcover edition which does not contain any blurb or description, so all I new was it was published in the 50s and science fiction, probably involving atomic energy on some level. With memories of the faction by the same name in the Fallout game series I thought I'd give it a look and see if there's any relation - there's not.
The book centres around a school psychologist Peter Welles and a student who a concerned teacher refers to him, Tim. It turns out that Tim's problem isn't a problem per se but rather that he's extremely intelligent and unable to relate to others well, spending a good amount of time hiding his true intellect. It's from here we learn that Tim's parents were killed in an atomic explosion and he's somewhat of a mutant with the side effect of his radiation exposure being a higher than usual intellect.
The story then goes on as Peter Welles forms a school for these mutant gifted children (bit of xmen deja vu here) and collects other children who were effected by the atomic explosion and are mutants also.
Overall, it was alright, not particularly enthralling and the dialogue is cumbersome in parts with the author becoming a little preachy at times. I found the first chapter In Hiding was the best part of the book, with the final chapter being my least favourite chapter. If you like classic science fiction it's worth reading just for completions sake as it was ranked as the 14th most significant science fiction books by the SF Book Club.
I went into this blind having picked up the Science Fiction Book Club 1959 hardcover edition which does not contain any blurb or description, so all I new was it was published in the 50s and science fiction, probably involving atomic energy on some level. With memories of the faction by the same name in the Fallout game series I thought I'd give it a look and see if there's any relation - there's not.
The book centres around a school psychologist Peter Welles and a student who a concerned teacher refers to him, Tim. It turns out that Tim's problem isn't a problem per se but rather that he's extremely intelligent and unable to relate to others well, spending a good amount of time hiding his true intellect. It's from here we learn that Tim's parents were killed in an atomic explosion and he's somewhat of a mutant with the side effect of his radiation exposure being a higher than usual intellect.
The story then goes on as Peter Welles forms a school for these mutant gifted children (bit of xmen deja vu here) and collects other children who were effected by the atomic explosion and are mutants also.
Overall, it was alright, not particularly enthralling and the dialogue is cumbersome in parts with the author becoming a little preachy at times. I found the first chapter In Hiding was the best part of the book, with the final chapter being my least favourite chapter. If you like classic science fiction it's worth reading just for completions sake as it was ranked as the 14th most significant science fiction books by the SF Book Club.
September 8, 2025
Children of the Atom is a collection of sequential short stories, though the overall structure is such that it can also be treated as a novel. The first story (or chapter) is Shiras’ most famous story, “In Hiding.” It tells the story of a young boy, Timothy, and the psychologist, Doctor Welles, who figures out the Timothy is hiding the fact that he is extraordinarily intelligent. Tim begins to open up to Welles as they talk more, revealing, among other things, that he is incredibly widely read and that he, under a pseudonym, is a known published author. As Welles investigates Tim’s history, he disovers that Tim’s parents had been in an accident at an atomic power station, and had died from radiation poisoning not long after Tim’s birth.
In the subsequent stories, Welles (with help from Tim) tracks down more children born of parents involved in the accident, bringing them together in a new, special school. The focus is on how the children, with their different focuses, learn to work together, to understand one another, and to use the skills to accomplish things in different areas. At times, some of the discussions are a bit long, but overall it’s fascinating, and the children are interesting. If it has a flaw, it’s that by the end of the book the children are pushing fifteen years old, and the book ignores the effects of teenage hormones at that age.
In the subsequent stories, Welles (with help from Tim) tracks down more children born of parents involved in the accident, bringing them together in a new, special school. The focus is on how the children, with their different focuses, learn to work together, to understand one another, and to use the skills to accomplish things in different areas. At times, some of the discussions are a bit long, but overall it’s fascinating, and the children are interesting. If it has a flaw, it’s that by the end of the book the children are pushing fifteen years old, and the book ignores the effects of teenage hormones at that age.
May 20, 2018
This novella started as a short story, “In Hiding”, which was published in 1948 and was well regarded at the time. Two more short stories were published in serial fashion and then the stories were extended into a novella. Children of the Atom was listed as one of "The Most Significant SF & Fantasy Books of the Last 50 Years, 1953-2002." I can see why it may have been considered significant. It is believed to have been a precursor to X-Men. There are some genuinely interesting ideas but the novella as a whole is too simple and poorly written. It feels a bit rushed, for example, buildings get built in a week. And character actions are largely removed from reality, for example, guardians willingly surrender their children to a total stranger. The story is dialog driven which is unfortunate because the dialog is stilted and pedantic. If you are willing to forgive these issues there are enough interesting ideas to keep a reader going until the end when the story devolves into halting speeches and is tied up too quickly.
December 4, 2022
You've got a friend.
When you're down and troubled
And you need a helping hand
And nothing, whoa nothing is going right.
Close your eyes and think of me
And soon I will be there
-- Carole King
This is a great book with a surprisingly wonderful story. However by the time you figure out where the author Wilmar H. Shirras is leading us the book ends and possibly the real story just begins.
A physiatrist stumbles on a secret that children born after a nuclear mishap have expanded intellects.
This, of course, can be a blessing or a curse depending on how it is handled. There is a much bigger theme of which this is just the core.
As with other readers, this book needs to be revisited periodically.
If you like this story you should also like “Starship on Saddle Mountain” It is a different kind of story but also has the general intent of this story.
When you're down and troubled
And you need a helping hand
And nothing, whoa nothing is going right.
Close your eyes and think of me
And soon I will be there
-- Carole King
This is a great book with a surprisingly wonderful story. However by the time you figure out where the author Wilmar H. Shirras is leading us the book ends and possibly the real story just begins.
A physiatrist stumbles on a secret that children born after a nuclear mishap have expanded intellects.
This, of course, can be a blessing or a curse depending on how it is handled. There is a much bigger theme of which this is just the core.
As with other readers, this book needs to be revisited periodically.
If you like this story you should also like “Starship on Saddle Mountain” It is a different kind of story but also has the general intent of this story.
May 3, 2022
This book is very dated: implausible science, simplistic plot, simplistically developed characters, pets kept in cages, etc. However, it has its charms. This book will not stress you out. There are bits of world building that seem prescient and other bits that give an insight into social conditions in the early 1950s. It is something of a love letter to introverted, intellectual children who struggle in various ways to fit in with the people around them. It's a quick, easy read. If you're looking for classic sf with a gentle mien, give this a try. If you're looking for complexity, high stakes, and realistic character development, pick up something more recent.
November 11, 2020
An interesting piece in science fiction and one that should have stayed in print for far longer than it ever has. It is hard to peg whether it should be on the young adult side or not, and the reading is certainly dated when it comes to perception of gender roles and the like, but if a person has any interest in psychology, how we work with others, and/or sociology, Shiras's work here sets the stage for many following her. Find a copy in the used book stores and read if you like the Doom Patrol and X-Men comics, along with Sturgeon's More Human than Human.
August 3, 2025
This is a story I have read more than twice over the years and I find that it stands up well for a 1950s ERA piece. The concerns and long term effects of radiation was still not well understood and the speculation of how it might eventually be revealed was well done.
Following the protagonist through this novel is well thought out for the time and accounts for the perceptions and prejudices of the time as well.
I especially like the interactions with his grandmother and how he finally started contacting others like him.
I highly recommend it!
Following the protagonist through this novel is well thought out for the time and accounts for the perceptions and prejudices of the time as well.
I especially like the interactions with his grandmother and how he finally started contacting others like him.
I highly recommend it!
November 2, 2022
There was recently a post on FB asking which book spurred your love of reading. My answer was Children of the Atom, I've never forgotten the book, but couldn't actually remember the story. I looked it up and found it on kindle unlimited. I'm now rereading it 65 years later, I've just begun, but so far it is still readable and enjoyable even as an adult. I have to say thank you inspiring my love of reading Ms. Shiras.
After posting the above I was asking myself what I did read before this novel, the answer comic books. I have to thank Superman and family, Batman too they were also responsible for my love of reading.
After posting the above I was asking myself what I did read before this novel, the answer comic books. I have to thank Superman and family, Batman too they were also responsible for my love of reading.
February 18, 2018
I remember reading this book as a kid. Is its literary value four stars? No, not really. The set up is simplistic, as is the resolution, and the manifestation of the children as distinct individuals with passion and genius is unrealized. But I can't separate it from my warm memories of reading it as a kid, so four stars it gets.
September 21, 2021
I remember reading this years ago, I liked it then and still it's a good book, though now I see that so much is missing and so much is overwritten.
March 7, 2022
Just introduces one genius kid after another and the money to build them a school falls in their lap. Very dry, almost all dialogue
March 8, 2022
Found an illustrated copy from the 80s at Boskone. It has a dissatisfying ending, and that's why it doesn't get 4 stars from me.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 28, 2022
Absolutely fascinating. Not at all what I expected. Phenomenal
September 25, 2024
I think understanding the historical context of the 1950s is important to enjoying this. I couldn't put it down until I finished it.
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