Countdown: The Blinding Future of Nuclear Weapons

The average person thinks about nuclear weapons less than they did during the mid-20th century. Yet we live in a time when nuclear culture is as important as it was the Cold War, and some experts say we could be closer to a nuclear catastrophe now than we were at the height of that conflict. Conversations surrounding weapons of mass destruction generally happen in past or future tense. In Countdown, science journalist Sarah Scoles uncovers the shocking reality of our present-tense nuclear age.

Drawing from years of on-the-ground reporting at the nation's nuclear labs, Scoles confronts the comforting idea that having nuclear weapons keeps us safe, through the threat of "mutually-assured destruction." She deftly lays out the current nuclear apparatus in the United States, taking readers beyond the news headlines and policy-speak to reveal how far nuclear-weapons technology has come, who the true decision-makers and gatekeepers are, and how the current generation of nuclear weapons scientists have come to think about WMDs and a society that has the power to use them.

Through a sharp, surprising and undoubtedly urgent narrative, Scoles brings us out of the Cold War and into the present, opening readers' eyes to the true nature of nuclear weapons while also giving us the needed context to understand the magnitude of our abilities, for now and for the future.