January Style Masterclass: Chapman Pincher, Not With A Bang (1965); Philip Kirk, Chinese Roulette (1984).

I had no idea that Pincher wrote SF. I did read one of his fourth man, fifth man, nineteenth-man, whatever it was factual spy books, which argued that Harold Wilson was a mole or something. I chanced upon Not With A Bang in a selection of books for sale at 10p a go on a shelf in a sports centre (where my son was attending a 6-year-old friend's trampoline party) and read it out of curiosity. The west develop immortality drugs, and perennial youth puts various strains on marriages and society as a whole. But then the evil Soviets poison our eternally young with nuclear radiation, causing them to turn into wizened gnomes. These poor souls commit mass suicide by walking into the sea from the beach, with the as-yet-untreated young standing by screaming in horror. But it all ends well, as the Chinese invade Russia and the two nations rather arbitrarily destroy one another leaving the world free for capitalism. And then there's the prose. The prose!

For a zoologist, a profession which tends to recruit the plainer girls, Shirley was outstandingly attractive. [9]

Like many scientists, only about a quarter of his wakened time could have been spent in the presence of any wife. [14]

The terror of impotent old age manifested itself in a mushrooming of Darby and Joan. [97]

The dead men’s shoes remained filled by agile feet. [131]

He watched her drift out of earshot, her bottom, which had a life of its own, giving her dress a delightful motion. [146]

[At the aforementioned seaside mass-suicide] On the shore, some of the young watchers screamed out hysterically, pressing their clenched fists to their faces, as they had done so often under happier circumstances. [243]

Which brings us to:

‘Somebody had perfected the ultimate weapon! Butler’s mission: search and destroy!’ This title wins the month's ... well I was going to say 'Bad Sex Award', but actually it's more like the 'Surreal and Bafflingly Described Sex Award':

Butler pumped hard now and felt himself getting crazy. Somebody had stuffed eight pigeons up his ass and he felt like he was going to explode. The pigeons flew through his penis and he bit his lip as they flew out the tip. He hung onto her shoulders for support and she fell back against the mirror on the wall, her eyes rolling in her head, because the pigeons had flown into her egg roll and were flapping their wings around in there. [38]

I especially like the specificity of that 'eight'.