TILLEY, Patrick

(1928-)

   UK writer whose first sf novel, Fade-Out (1975), after the fashion of borderline works like Fail-Safe (1962) by Eugene BURDICK and Harvey WHEELER, concentrates long-windedly on the workings of governmentand military in a TECHNOTHRILLER context, in this instance displaced sf-wards by the fact that the action is occasioned by an ALIEN landing which damps out all electrical impulses (UFOS). In Mission (1981) Christ returns to contemporary New York, bearing with him the news that His crucifixion was one small event in a long SPACE-OPERA conflict between the Ain-folk and the evil Brax. The Amtrak Wars sequence - The Amtrak Wars \#1:Cloud Warrior (1983), \#2: First Family (1985), \#3: Iron Master (1987), \#4: Blood River (1988), \#5: Death Bringer (1989) and \#6: Earth-Thunder (1990) - more vividly set primitive Mutes against the blindly technocratic Amtrak Federation in a post- HOLOCAUST USA; as the sequence develops, the geopolitical realities governing the land become increasingly complex and the fulfilment of the revelatory Talisman Prophecy-though constantly deferred - gives succeeding books an increasing momentum. Dark Visions: An Illustrated Guide to the Amtrak Wars (1984 chap), with Fernando Fernandez,provides a useful orientation. The sequence, clearly incomplete at the end of \#6, was one of the most compelling sf-adventure series of the decade.

   JC

   Other work: Xan (1986), horror.