Long Voyage Back was written by George Cockcroft

George Cockcroft

George Cockcroft is an author who writes under the pen name Luke Rhinehart.-Biography:George Cockcroft was born in the United States, son of an engineer and a civil servant. He got his BA at Cornell University, and his MA at Columbia University. Subsequently he got a PhD in psychology, also at...

 under the pen name

Pen name

A pen name, nom de plume, or literary double, is a pseudonym adopted by an author. A pen name may be used to make the author's name more distinctive, to disguise his or her gender, to distance an author from some or all of his or her works, to protect the author from retribution for his or her...

 of Luke Rhinehart. It was published in 1983, at the height of the Cold War

Cold War

The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...

, and it shows that influence. George sides with the nuclear disarmament

Nuclear disarmament

Nuclear disarmament refers to both the act of reducing or eliminating nuclear weapons and to the end state of a nuclear-free world, in which nuclear weapons are completely eliminated....

 side of the debate and the only character in the book with vociferous views on the subject, the daughter of the lead character, probably represents his own views. It also reflects his love of sailing.

Plot summary

"In a nuclear war, the USSR will win. This is because the average Russian doesn't have a gun, so they can't all shoot each other and the army for food"

The story concerns a hypothetical World War III

World War III

World War III denotes a successor to World War II that would be on a global scale, with common speculation that it would be likely nuclear and devastating in nature....

 between the USSR

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 and the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, and graphically depicts the ensuing carnage. One family and some friends try to run away in a sailboat, and the story describes their battles with nuclear winter

Nuclear winter

Nuclear winter is a predicted climatic effect of nuclear war. It has been theorized that severely cold weather and reduced sunlight for a period of months or even years could be caused by detonating large numbers of nuclear weapons, especially over flammable targets such as cities, where large...

 and fallout

Nuclear fallout

Fallout is the residual radioactive material propelled into the upper atmosphere following a nuclear blast, so called because it "falls out" of the sky after the explosion and shock wave have passed. It commonly refers to the radioactive dust and ash created when a nuclear weapon explodes...

, and with the ensuing collapse of civilization.