As Japanese authorities struggle to head off catastrophic meltdowns at their devastated nuclear power plants, the contentious debate over the future and safety of nuclear power is on the rise again here in this country. Originally published in 1980, investigative reporter Karl Grossman’s acclaimed anti-nuclear power expose, Cover Up: What You Are Not Supposed To Know About Nuclear Power (Permanent Press), has long been out of print but Permanent Press copublisher Martin Shepard is looking for publishing partners to bring out a revised edition.
Shepard said Permanent Press is preparing an e-book edition of the Cover Up and said he was looking for publishers interested in reprinting a revised ediiton of the book. "We've gotten responses from several scouts for overseas publishers and from our agents abroad," Shepard said. "We hope to get some requests from US publishing houses today." Shepard said that the 1980 hardcover and the revised 1982 paperback edition of Cover Up sold a combined 18,000 copies.
Crammed with documentation from federal and corporate sources, Grossman’s meticulously reported expose details a long history of suppressing serious reports focused on the overall danger and likelihood of nuclear disasters in the nuclear power industry. Shepard credits the book with forcing New York State Governor Mario Cuomo to stop building, “the Shorham Long Island nuclear power plant on Long Island,” and said the book, “slowed the growth of the nuclear power industry in the United States.”
“Though nothing has changed regarding the safety of nuclear power, the past 30 years has seen the dangerous technology make a comeback based on false information and false safety guarantees,” Shepard said. A noted environmentalist investigative reporter and anti-nuclear energy activist, Shepard said Grossman has been much in demand by media outlets over recent weeks to discuss the issues around the dangers of nuclear energy in Japan and here in the U.S.
“My hope is that major publishers around the world will want to make an updated version available and help prevent more catastrophes,” Shepard said, noting that Grossman is at work on a new introduction for the book. “This is a vital book that needs to be issued quickly and widely to people around the world so that they will know what is happening around them, what the danger are, and help empower them to do something about it,” said Shepard.
