Hominids by Robert J Sawyer. On a parallel Earth, Homo neanderthalensis won out over Homo sapiens. As technologically advanced as we are – although they never developed agriculture – they’ve built an experimental quantum computer in the same nickel mine that the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory is located in our world. A glitch causes a rift between the two universes, and one of their researchers is suddenly in the middle of the heavy water tank of the the detector.
Neanderthal society is quite different than ours and it is a fascinating look at the contrasts. The other two stories of the Neanderthal Parallax trilogy, Humans and Hybrids are not as good.
Stephen Fry’s Making History was a good read. It begins with the question of what would happen if you could prevent Hitler’s birth. If you’ve read Fry’s autobiography (Moab is My Washpot), I’m pretty sure the hedgehog incident is the inspiration for Making History’s denouement.
Thanks all. I will check out “He Walked Around the Horses” online: I’m actually familiar with the 1809 event from some unsolved mystery book or another I read as a teen.
Not sure about the Lord Darcy books: magic annoys me.
Two I’ve enjoyed fairly recently are Cowboy Angels by Paul McAuley, which has government-controlled portals between various similar worlds, but it’s written as a thriller with shady organisations running black ops between the worlds…
And Resonance by Chris Dolley. A lowly office messenger is apparently an obsessive-compulsive; he believes if he doesn’t ‘maintain order’ through repitition that the world will change. Then he meets another person with a different psychological problem… It’s also fairly thriller-ish.
Obviously with a high level of fantasy involved there is the novel Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke. It’s set in a parallel version of Georgian England where there is magic (but not much) which has a fairly significant past to ours (yet, oddly enough, ends up mirroring our own version of Georgian England fairly closely).
In a similar vein but written for a slightly younger audience (although I enjoyed them immensely) is the Bartimeus trilogy by Jonathan Stroud - however that book is set in the modern day in a parallel world with magic/demons.
I enjoyed the original 4 world war Turtledove books although the Colonization trilogy that came after was pretty poor in comparison, in my view.
Also there is a little gem of a book I once read called The Iron Dream by Norman Spinrad. It’s the fictional novel Adolph Hitler wrote in the parallel world where he didn’t go into politics and moved to America instead. The novel explores his Nazi and racial supremacist views in a sci-fi setting whilst in itself being in a world different to ours due to the absence of Fascism (with an interesting epilogue by the “editor” of the book).
Finally the Northern Lights trilogy by Pullman is very much about parallel worlds too, the first book being set in one and the second and third dealing with a universe populated by them.
Ugggh! I thought it was really good for about the first 3/4 of the book. Then it seemed like the author didn’t know where to go with it, pulled a Deus ex Machina, and collected his paycheck.
Another vote for Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. Don’t be alarmed by the size of the book… the plot moves along quite swiftly and there’s a very engaging quality about the Victorian-style prose.
And just because I can’t possibly recommend this book often enough, The Yiddish Policemen’s Union by Michael Chabon is another great pick for alternate histories. It’s a classic noir detective novel set in an alternate universe where the Jews are driven out of Israel (errr… Palestine) in 1948 and settle down in Alaska instead.
Wow, we got this far and no-one mentioned S. M. Stirling’s The Domination. After the American revolution, loyalists shove off to South Africa and found a highly militaristic slave-owning society named after Francis Drake, for some reason. They play both ends against the middle in WW2 and come out of it ruling half the planet, and the final conflict between them and the Free World is played out in the third book. By this time they’re genetically engineering their next generation and also some useful near-human servants/soldiers, and also biologically brainwashing the rest of humanity to like being their slaves. Chilling stuff, and the threat is of cross-universe contamination, with the Draka entertaining notions of muscling in on our reality.
Apologies for any errors or omissions in this 5-cent summary, there are a few other posters hereabouts who are well able to chime in.
S M Stirling is either loved or hated on this board but if you do like his style I’d strongly recommend The Peshawar Lancers. Set in the early 21st century in a world where a comet has hit the earth in 1878, destroying most of Europe and the East Coast of the USA (from a “nuclear winter” type change in the climate). The British government and a large chunk of the population migrated to India where a hybrid Anglo-Indian Raj remains the strongest power on the planet but is locked in a struggle with the evil minions of the Czar.
With the destruction of Germany and the US - and without the impetus of two world wars - technology is significantly behind our universe. Generally the impact of the change is well thought through and, most of all, it’s a ripping yarn
ps Just previewed and seen the mention of Stirling’s Draka books. Have to say, although a Stirling fan, I hated these. Found them thoroughly unpleasant. If you want an alternate universe series from Stirling go for the *Island in the Sea of Time *trilogy.
I second the WorldWar and the Colonization series, lots of fun.
My all-time favorite (or should that be alt-time favorite, thanks, I’ll be here all week) has got to be The Two Georges by science fiction author Harry Turtledove and Oscar-winning actor Richard Dreyfuss.
I’ve read it about half a dozen times. A real ripping yarn.
Kieth Robert’s Pavane is interesting, though some find it’s character driven stories a little slow. The Spanish Armada is victorious and the Reformation never happens, nor does the Scientific revolution. There’s a twist ending.
I’ve read some of the Turtledove tomes and I’d recommend skipping them. While his story’s set-ups and settings are brilliant, his writing and story-telling are both repetitive and lumbering. Glaciers move faster than his storylines and I think he got paid per word used.
Minor point – Lord Darcy doesn’t exactly have magic. It is more like psionics. In this timeline a monk made discoveries in mind powers as significant as Newton’s insights into physics.
Also good by Stirling is Conquistador, which posits a universe in which Alexander lived quite a long time. The alternate reality is discovered by a returned US soldier, and is accessed through a “gate” hidden in Oakland, CA. Preety good yarn, for a once-off.
I believe I’ve also read the novel you mention regarding the Cuban Missile Crisis going hot, unfortunately I’m not at home so I can’t check my bookshelf. I agree that it was weak in a lot of respects, especially towards the end, but it did have some memorable scenes. I’m thinking of the young man working in the office whose mind has been shattered by being part of a US bomber crew who vapourised a Russian city and the nice touches such as the protestors refusing to help clear up the radioactive debris still left behind after the war, “Hell no! We won’t glow!”
‘Hitler Victorious’ is a nice collection of short-stories concerning a Nazi victory in WW2, some are better than others and most are fantastical rather than realistic but worth reading for that. My favourite has the oddest premise, ‘Thor Meets Captain America’.
I didn’t like ‘The Difference Engine’ at all but then I’m not much of a fan of steampunk and ‘Number of the Beast’ is one of the very very few books I’ve failed to finish after starting. It was the first Heinlein work I read and very nearly put me off trying the rest of his work.
Larry Niven’s ‘All the Myriad Ways’ is a good short story, if one with a depressing conclusion.
A slightly different twist on this topic are ‘future history’ books written some time ago, I find it interesting to see what people believed the future would hold. Its also strange to read a book set in the early 21st century and featuring the Soviet Union.
I’ve actually just started ‘Apocalypse 2000’ BY Peter Jay and Michael Stewart, written in 1987 it depicts a global economic meltdown in the 1990’s. Lets just hope the authors didn’t simply get the decade wrong!
