Sunburst

A nuclear accident ravages a small town outside of Chicago, resulting in a government quarantine isolating it from the rest of the world. A generation later, with the quarantine still in place, strange mutations have affected the minds of the town's children – mutations which could either spell the next stage in human evolution, or something far more sinister. As the children's psychic powers begin to manifest themselves in more demented and destructive forms, the kids escape their compound. Now it is up to Shandy Johnson and her friends to track down the runaways. Possessing similar powers, Sandy and her friends find themselves facing increasingly frightening confrontations with their escaped peers.

First published in 1964 and again in 1978, Sunburst has lost neither its edge nor its relevance. Predating the near-misses and disasters at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, Gotlieb reminds us of the tremendous forces we have at our fingertips – powers that humans use daily but do not fully comprehend.