The literature of the Cold War could fill a library. Tarah Brookfield's book, however, represents a very special approach: the reaction of the population, especially women, to Cold War dangers and tensions. The book is also a story of Canada, a country that is “sandwiched in between the Soviet Union and the United States,” (p.30), but was not in the first trenches of the Cold War confrontation. These features make the book both interesting and also somewhat marginal.
The discussion is divided into two quite separate parts: the home front and abroad. Canada was involved in wars with its Western allies and shared the Cold War hysteria and even the American anti-Communist crusade of McCarthyism in the 1950s and 1960s. The Canadian government warned the population to be prepared for a nuclear war and possible nuclear attack. The population reacted in various ways. Volunteers accumulated and stored food, even built...