Path: ...!weretis.net!feeder8.news.weretis.net!fu-berlin.de!uni-berlin.de!individual.net!not-for-mail From: ted@loft.tnolan.com (Ted Nolan ) Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written Subject: RI October 2024 Date: 17 Nov 2024 04:11:16 GMT Organization: loft Lines: 124 Message-ID: X-Trace: individual.net mX3ZLX8vPiQusuyZxi6OQgrTDZQ21Z2s2VosU9Ks822RmAvIcW X-Orig-Path: not-for-mail Cancel-Lock: sha1:zb03y2bE6OJHetJzLfocv6AG3qo= sha256:6/kw4Rar+lHqdW/XleheHxDIIhOaNHWVVQy4V7uuEtM= X-Newsreader: trn 4.0-test76 (Apr 2, 2001) Bytes: 6742 Here we are again, possibly less late than usual with books from October. As is traditional (and possibly required): The links below are Amazon affiliate ones which could potentially earn me something should you choose to buy through one. ==== Acts of War: A World War II Alternative History (The Usurper's War Book 1) by James Young https://amzn.to/3UAZsmc Collisions of the Damned: The Defense of the Dutch East Indies (The Usurper's War Book 2) by James Young https://amzn.to/3AryUx3 Here's the first two books of what I believe is to be an alt-hist WWII trilogy. The jumping off point for this universe is that the British take out Hitler in a bombing raid on Berlin. They had no idea where he was -- it was just one of those lucky accidents of war. Or, in this case unlucky accidents of war. Unlucky because taking out Hitler proved a very good thing for the Germans. Himmler came in after sidelining Goering (possibly fatally, I don't quite recall), and said to the Brits basically: Look Hitler was really a loose cannon and things got out of hand. What's done is done, and we're not giving back anything our boys died for, but is there really any reason we still need to be at war? Churchill said 'yes', but was eventually turfed out in favor of Eden who turned out to be what some people have always suspected and made peace. When the Brits stood down and Himmler felt secure enough, he cranked things up again, this time with gas and Eden essentially went Vichy. The king was killed in a RN sea battle on the way to the New World and the Duke of Windsor also proved himself to be what many suspected and happily re-took the throne, or so some would say, some most emphatically not to include the young Queen. For the US, the situation in Europe headed off the immediate crisis with the Japanese who had their hands full as a Russia, not currently facing German armies, sent Zhukov to drive them out of China (which immediately, if not unexpectedly, fell into warlordry). However the Japanese still needed the petroleum of the Dutch East Indies and were just biding their time for an attack there, and on the US. So anyway, that's a long winded setup. The actual action of these books is mainly centered on a dysfunctional Alabama family whose sons are all in the military, and whose daughter has escaped an unsuitable marriage by fleeing to Pearl Harbor. There are also story-lines centering on an American ex-pat who has been flying for a Polish resistance squadron, and who is consequently in bad odor at home as a mercenary (the US being at peace with both Germany & Japan as the series starts), a battle cruiser first officer in the US Asiatic fleet, various Japanese notables and minor characters who come and go. It's a very frustrating series in some ways. In particular, every conversation seems fraught, even between people who are supposed to be friends, or even lovers. It never is about shooting the breeze, or imparting facts -- every conversation seems to have winners and losers, and that's among friends. Conversations between officers and subordinates seem to be all based on how much each thinks the other to be an SOB and wants them dead. I'm not sure how much of the family dysfunction I mentioned we are supposed to find funny, but some parts don't work at all for me. For instance, the matriarch knows why her WWI vet husband has to leave the house whenever she cooks pork chops, but does it anyway, and the brothers tend to commit actual mayhem to protect their sister from imaginary dangers. It's also clearly an indie effort (I believe I picked it up from one of Hoyt's weekly indie-boost posts), and the second book in particular is notably much more poorly edited than the first. That all said, it's an interesting and sometimes compelling series, especially the bloody and nerve-wracking sea battles, and the second book ends with a general realization on the US side that we are losing this thing. I do want to see how it turns out, so I believe I will pick up the third book, warts & all. Task Force Hammer (Expeditionary Force Book 17) by Craig Alanson https://amzn.to/3CduhqZ These should be the salad days. After making Terra a first class power in the previously bipolar galactic system, and having seen off the threat of the return of the Elders, General Joe Gordon and his charge/friend/burden the renegade Elder AI Skippy should be resting on their laurels. Unfortunately, the menace which they believed to be another Elder AI and thought they had seen off turned out to be an Outsider -- the threat from beyond the galaxy which terrified the Elders so much that they 'ascended' out of our realm. Furthermore, to, apparently, see it off, Joe had unleashed Elder weapons which threw the galactic MAD doctrine into a cocked hat in the same way a country using nukes would in our current situation. Now, as is traditional in these books, the only hope is to get a mcguffin from one of the most highly defended systems of the Awful Kitties, something we will need the Spiders help to do but which is still an apparently impossible task, the only feasible approach to which will require Joe to betray his oldest friends... I was a bit worried in these books when Joe & Skippy apparently took out the Big Bad(s) that there would be nowhere to go, but Alanson has continued to provide interesting challenges for the Merry Band of Pirates, and Joe is actually starting to act like a general. That said, there is definitely some filler here around characters from "The Mavericks" whom Alanson is trying to keep viable in the setting even when they don't quite fit in. In particular the hijinks with Jates & Nerf are very forced. Joe's wife is also sidelined for this book, and her subplot is is really off the charts bad as well. Still on the plus side for me though, and I will definitely pick up the next book (which will, quickly I hope, resolve a major cliffhanger). -- columbiaclosings.com What's not in Columbia anymore..