Book Review - The Divide

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William Overgard's The Divide is an alternate history tale involving a world where the Axis Powers won the Second World War. From what I could tell history diverged at a couple points, one being the election of an isolationist President in the United States and the second being a change in Germany's tactics that allowed them a quick victory over Britain.

THE STORY
It is 1976. Two-hundred years since the Declaration of Independence and thirty years since the United States surrendered to the Axis. The elderly Hitler and Tojo plan a historic meeting in the center of America at a place they call the Divide. America has been a peaceful place for a number of years, no real uprisings, citizens being willing slaves to their German and Japanese masters. All that is about to change.

A number of people get involved in setting the stage for a new American Revolution. It starts with the bizarre assassination of a Japanese general on the Fourth of July. The story then jumps between various characters - the trio of freedom fighters and their interactions with other rebel elements, an SS officer tasked with destroying the resistance, and other people whose lives are touched by the ongoing events.

Pieces start to fall in place and all of the threads lead to the meeting of the two rulers at the Divide. There are plenty of set-backs and a few twists and turns along the way.

Overgard's style is interesting. There is a tendency to introduce new information and then spend a few pages telling the back-story of that new information, usually in the form of flashbacks. While this works in most cases, there were a couple of times I wished he would shorten some of the flashbacks and keep going with the events in the 'present'.

THE CHARACTERS
The Old Man (Wayne Stubbs) is the main character of the story. He has a checkered past involving accidentally injuring a prostitute, indirectly causing his wife to commit suicide, and then wounding another prostitute in an attempt to kill her while suffering the rage and despair following his wife's death. He then fled to Canada and eventually made his way back after America fell to the Axis. Not the most heroic of backgrounds but he now feels he has to make up for the past by saving the country's future.

The Cowboy (Cooper): This young man was raised by The Old Man. He was raised to be a hero and to be an inspiration for others in the coming revolution. He plays his role well but gets caught up in his first real encounters with women (he and The Old Man lived a very isolated and hobo-like lifestyle).

Claus Dieter is the antagonist from the SS. He is on the trail of the heroes after the July 4th assassination. He is an evil and deceitful man who, while smart, is usually in over his head. He tries to destroy the resistance while keeping his superiors from getting rid of him for any failures.

In addition there are numerous other characters, an Amerind girl, a Jewish woman who is putting the finishing touches on her father's bomb, and many others. Most of the characters are interesting and the liberal use of flashbacks in the novel gives us all the information we need about them.

FINAL ANALYSIS
A great story overall. I have mentioned the sometimes annoying use of flashbacks, but there were only a couple of places that this really bothered me. The ending, while it wrapped up the main story, did not reveal the eventual results of the new Revolution. In fact the last page was about Hitler's daughter being pregnant. I'm not sure if this was to set up a sequel or just to establish that history keeps chugging along, even after some really historic events take place.

As with life, there are not happy endings, just another day and new challenges following the last.

I gave this book 3 out 5 stars when I rated it on Goodreads. It's better than a three but not quite a 4. I was in a phase of not inflating my ratings with too many 4 and 5 stars.

PUBLISHER: Jove Publications, Inc.; copyright 1980 by William Overgard
GENRE: Alternate History
PAGE COUNT: 244
ISBN: 0-515-05492-5

Review - We Could Do Worse

Life's gotten a bit busy! It's been over a week since my last update. Sorry about that. Here's a brief book review until I can finish a couple of meatier posts I'm working on:

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Here is a collection of alternate histories that includes some big names. Brief descriptions follow... very brief since I wanted to avoid spoilers.

1) A Massachusetts Yankee in King Arthur's Court: by Harry Turtledove. JFK is sent back through time and space to Camelot. He meets and has a fling with Queen Guinevere. No real point to the story. Just makes JFK and the Queen look like jerks. Just involves time travel - not really alternate history.

2) Ike and the Mike: by Howard Waldrop. Instead of becoming generals Eisenhower and Patton are jazz musicians! Good story; not very believable but its not bad.

3) Looking for the Fountain: by Robert Silverberg. The story of one of the survivors of Ponce de León's expedition to search for the Fountain of Youth. A really good story about a lost civilization they discovered instead. Great idea - but there is no follow up, no indication of how history was altered.

4) The Return of William Proxmire: by Larry Niven. An interesting story of what happens to a man who travels back in time to change history and the consequences he suffers. Not one of those ironic Twilight Zone consequences, but a interesting take on what might happen to a time traveler.

5) The Arrival of Truth: by Kristine Kathryn Rusch. The best of the collection of this book. Tells a story from the point of view of a slave in the American south when a slave uprising begins. The most interesting characters in the entire anthology.

6) Goddard's People: by Allen Steele. In a world where America and the Third Reich are in a race involving rocketry. The Nazis want to create an ICBM and the US wants to create something to shoot it down. Interesting, but I'm not sure things would have turned out differently.

7) Over There: by Mike Resnick. I've read this one in other anthologies. Teddy Roosevelt assembles his Rough Riders to fight in the Great War. The old and new worlds collide in this fine story.

8) Bloodstained Ground: by Brian Thomsen. Failed novelist Sam Clemens vs. the legacy of newly deceased President George Armstrong Custer. One of the better stories in this anthology. Even if he failed as a novelist, Clemens would have excelled in whatever else he chose to do.

9) We Could Do Worse: by Gregory Benford. A short piece set in a world where McCarthy became president of the US.

Over all I'd give this book 3 stars. Maybe the low end of 3. While most anthologies end up netting out to about a 3 I had higher hopes for this one. Oh well, better luck next time.

Review - Warlords of Utopia

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WARLORDS OF UTOPIA

by Lance Parkin

THE STORY
The story of 1,000 alternate worlds dominated by an eternal Roman Empire go to war with 1,000 worlds where the Nazis won World War II. It doesn't get much more bad-ass than that. Written in the first person from the point of view of Marcus Americanius Scriptor. He describes how he recovered an item that allowed Roma I to travel to alternate Roman worlds and how the discovery of the Nazi dominated worlds led to war.

That's a lot of territory to cover in 180 pages. Throw in entities and mentions of an even bigger conflict (between the Great Houses and Faction Paradox) and the story becomes truly epic.

From an alternate history perspective there are only the occasional mentions of what some of the thousands of alternate worlds are like and how they diverged. The alternate technology of some of the worlds is interesting but at times unrealistic.

It would have been nice to learn a bit more about some of the other worlds. More descriptions of how they interconnect would also have been something I would have liked (they develop a rather haphazard way of mapping the Romes). Given the scope of the story I can understand why details were glossed over.

THE CHARACTERS
Marcus Americanius Scriptor is the main character. The book is written as his memoirs. He is not a nice person.

After murdering an old man for a device that would allow him to travel to alternate worlds he builds up a vast business empire revolving around cross-dimension travel. While there is nothing wrong with enriching himself and civilization with this item, he uses it to gather materials to blackmail political opponents. When one opponent to too noble and incorruptible Marcus just murder him.

Also, after page-after-page about hearing form Marcus about how Roma I was a perfect world and the Roman way of life is superior to everything he turns around and betrays his Emperor and starts a war that nearly led to the destruction of everything he held dear.

He is a selfish, narrow-minded, and disloyal man.

He does, however, have many heroic qualities. His strong will and vision help strengthen his family and does bring wealth through trade to many of the Roman worlds. He is also a great warrior and is able to quickly develop new tactics having to integrate new technologies and weapons into his plans.

He also has that single-minded stubbornness of the pulp heroes of old.

As with many books written from the first person point-of-view I found my self trying to read between the lines and figure out what might have really been going on. Anyone writing their memoirs, especially ones involving wartime, are bound to gloss over and change details that show them in an unfavorable light.

FINAL ANALYSIS
The story is well done. It covers a lot of ground and does it efficiently. Despite some of my complaints about the main character mentioned above he is not a bad one to be the viewpoint character. The first two-thirds of the book are solid. The last third - where the Romans and Nazis are at war - just does not seem believable. Of course what is believable in a story of nearly two-thousand alternate worlds at war? It was more of the swords vs. machine guns scenario. I can see times when the more basic weapons of the Romans would come in handy (and they did have some high-powered crossbows as well as catapults with ranges of a mile or more) but in a normal battle I'd bet on the automatic rifles.

The Nazis would also have adapted to the new type of warfare. They also would have made things much more costly for the Romans by using nuclear weapons on a much broader scale. The war would have lasted a century not the decade described.

I also wonder how the Romans, who have been at peace for centuries on many of their worlds, can be such disciplined and good warriors. Just seems a little odd to me.

I give it 3 out of 5 stars.

NOTES
Faction Paradox is an unofficial spin-off of the Doctor Who Universe. More information can be found at the Faction Paradox Wiki.