# Time Travel Fiction **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 29, 2010, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228 "2010-03-29T17:01:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Frostillicus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Frostillicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frostillicus)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2010, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/81 "2010-05-03T02:00:08Z")
The best time travel series by far is **the Axis of Time Trilogy by John Birmingham**. It revolves around what happens when a 21st century battle fleet is accidentally sent back in time and ends up right in the middle of the Battle of Midway. Needless to say, this event has a major impact on the ultimate outcome of WWII. [http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb\_sb\_noss?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&field-keywords=john+birmingham](http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&field-keywords=john+birmingham) ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/82 "2010-07-08T03:46:51Z")
> [@choie](#): > > I recently I wrote a time travel romance where the heroine finds herself manipulated into going back in time to Victorian England…was a hoot to write. So how do we find/buy/read this? Congrats on coming up with a cool concept… and finishing it! ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/83 "2010-07-08T03:51:14Z")
> [@Siam\_Sam](#): > > [Somewhere in Time](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0081534/) (1980), starring Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour… Was that based on one of those Jack Higgins time travel novels? The books were excellent, and the audiobooks well-read, but I tried to make it through this movie and it was way too schmaltzy. ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 4:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/84 "2010-07-08T04:27:25Z")
> [@digs](#): > > Was that based on one of those Jack Higgins time travel novels? The books were excellent, and the audiobooks well-read, but I tried to make it through this movie and it was way too schmaltzy. Oops-- meant **Jack Finney**. Wrote _From Time to Time_ and _Time and Again_, the excellent time travel books. The first time travel story I ever read was the REALLY FUN short story _The Third Level_ (1957), also by Finney – pub. in England as _The Clock of Time_ (1958). Try to find it. And when I looked all that up, I found: The film _Somewhere in Time (1980)_, starring Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour, is adapted from the 1975 novel _Bid Time Return_ by science fiction writer Richard Matheson, which was subsequently re-released under the film’s title. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/85 "2010-07-08T04:39:03Z")
No, I see from [Imdb.com](http://Imdb.com) that it was based on a novel by Richard Matheson, who wrote the screenplay. EDIT: Ah, yes, you found that. ---
**Author:** ![Balance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Balance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balance)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 5:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/86 "2010-07-08T05:23:45Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > He didn’t believe there was a paradox. In his view, only one thing happens at one point in history, and, even if you have time travel, the event is consistent if seen by all interacting at that point in space time (ignoring the “paradoxes” of relativity). He goes to pains to depict this in TimeMaster. It’s not clear to me what would happen if you actually _did_ try to confront your grandfather and shoot him, but in Forward’s universe you wouldn’t branch to an alternate timeline. Your attempt at interferenbce isn’t a change in the stream of time – it always was part of it. This is actually one of my favorite approaches to time travel fiction–you can’t change the past, you can only make it happen the way it already did. The interesting part is reinterpreting past events in light of the new information gained by the time traveler. As mentioned upthread, _Prisoner of Azkaban_ does this fairly well. The _Gargoyles_ cartoon series also used it in connection with the Phoenix Gate, as I recall. ---
**Author:** ![MonkeyMensch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@MonkeyMensch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MonkeyMensch)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/87 "2010-07-08T17:11:58Z")
\*\*Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency \*\*by Douglas Adams. One of my favorite books and probably my favorite Adams. ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/88 "2010-07-08T17:15:13Z")
> [@JoelUpchurch](#): > > Harry Turtledove got Ph.D. in Byzantine history because he read **Lest Darkness Fall**. > > Reading **Lest Darkness Fall** only caused me to find a copy of **The Secret History** by Procopius, so I could find out what the Empress Theodora used to complain about. 😉 Okay, I haven’t yet found a copy of that story, can it be put in a spoiler box? What Theodora complained about? ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/89 "2010-07-08T17:26:44Z")
I once read a very short story, don’t remember the title, that addressed the “Grandfather Paradox” A man wanted to commit suicide, but most methods were painful and messy. So he invented a time machine to go back and kill his father, so he himself would never exist. The guy hated his Dad anyway, because he’d always been cold to him, and mean to his mother. So he goes back, shoots his dad, and doesn’t disappear. He returns to the present and kills himself in a messy, painful way. What he doesn’t know is that at the moment he kills his father(who is a farmer) his mother is with the hired hand, and is telling him he’d better pull out in time because her husband’s war wound has made him sterile. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/90 "2010-07-08T18:46:37Z")
The whole changing-the-past aspect of time-travel SF was hilariously deconstructed in Alfred Bester’s 1958 short story, [“The Men Who Murdered Mohammed.”](http://everything2.com/title/The+Men+Who+Murdered+Mohammed) In his essay “The Theory and Practice of Time Travel,” Larry Niven posited that if time travel is physically possible in a given universe of discourse, it never will be invented – because so many people want to change the past, in different ways for different ends, that the process of past-changing will continue until a universe emerges where time travel never is invented, and then the process, of course, stops. See [“Niven’s Law [re Time Travel].”](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niven's_laws#Niven.27s_Law_.28re:_Time_travel.29) The flaw in this argument is the assumption that **changing** the past is the only reason people would want to visit it. What if you’re in a universe where visiting the past is possible, but changing it is not? E.g., if you go back to 1865 to prevent Lincoln’s assassination, some happenstance will prevent you from doing so – you already **know** that, because the assassination is already in the history books. But, you can still go back in time for tourism, or for historical research, or to get a dodo specimen, or to hook up with Cleopatra, or to watch the premiere performances of the plays of Sophocles or Shakespeare, or to see what really happened to Jesus’ corpse, or whatever; and if you don’t have to worry about “A Sound of Thunder” timestream effects while you’re doing it, so much the better. Robert Heinlein employed that model of time travel several times. There’s no reason time travel would not be invented, and stay invented, in such a universe. ---
**Author:** ![jackdavinci](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackdavinci/32/3259_2.png) [@jackdavinci](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackdavinci)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/91 "2010-07-08T19:06:51Z")
> [@Lethal\_Babydoll](#): > > The first book in this series has my all-time favorite time travel scene. > > When a general in the 40 Years War meets up with the people from our time and has his first look at camouflage. He’s quite impressed. “Clever bastards,” he says I wonder though - would camouflage really seem novel? I had the impression the only reason it wasn’t used then was a distaste for guerilla tactics, preferring straight open fighting. > [@Chronos](#): > > This one’s problematic, unless you’re really careful about it, because the watch should suffer wear and tear. Yep, I had the same problem with the eternal compass passed between Locke and Alpert on LOST. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Peyote\_Coyote](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/5f8ce5/32.png) [@The\_Peyote\_Coyote](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Peyote_Coyote)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/92 "2010-07-08T22:30:12Z")
Some good time travel stories that haven’t been mentioned are: \*Galileo’s Dream \*by Kim Stanley Robinson \*There Will be Time \*and "The Man Who Came Early by Poul Anderson “My Object All Sublime” by Fritz Leiber "The Shadow Out of Time " by H.P. Lovecraft “Soldier” by Harlan Ellison ---
**Author:** ![choie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/choie/32/7829_2.png) [@choie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/choie)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/93 "2010-07-09T02:15:32Z")
> [@digs](#): > > So how do we find/buy/read this? Congrats on coming up with a cool concept… and finishing it! Wow, thanks! I almost didn’t see this 'cause I’d forgotten about this thread, but another kind soul PMed me after you bumped the thread. Anyway, I’m pretty sure the mods would justifiably frown on commercial self-pimpage on the forums, so I’ll PM you. Edited to add: (…Though if you found _Somewhere in Time_ too schmaltzy, God only knows what you’d think of this book!) Edited again to add: Oh blimey, I can’t PM you as you’re a guest. Sorry. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/94 "2010-07-09T02:19:28Z")
> [@MonkeyMensch](#): > > \*\*Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency \*\*by Douglas Adams. One of my favorite books and probably my favorite Adams. I love (and have read most of, and have met) Douglas Adams. But I remember not understanding the end of _Dirk Gently_. (An’ I ain’t no dumby…) Am I the only one? Can someone explain it? Should I reread it? ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/95 "2010-07-09T02:57:10Z")
Two time travel short stories that come to mind… well, the stories, but not the titles (anybody who knows the titles/authors - feel free to supply them): One is a short-short story (likely by Asimov) where a do-gooder travels back to the Roman Empire and gives them modern medicines, industrial processes, etc, and the ramifications this has. The solution violates the grandfather paradox, but since it is so cheerfully ignored, it’s all good. The other is a short story about a failed composer (or music professor (or both)) who uses a process that allows one to travel back in time to hear the thoughts of specific people. Being a composer/professor/whatever, he goes back to the time when Beethoven is composing his most famous work. In time, the professor realizes he can get Beethoven’s attention by shouting a thought at him, which leads to tragic results as the professor decides to help Beethoven “improve” the Ninth Symphony. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/96 "2010-07-09T03:09:45Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > Two time travel short stories that come to mind… well, the stories, but not the titles (anybody who knows the titles/authors - feel free to supply them): > > One is a short-short story (likely by Asimov) where a do-gooder travels back to the Roman Empire and gives them modern medicines, industrial processes, etc, and the ramifications this has. The solution violates the grandfather paradox, but since it is so cheerfully ignored, it’s all good. > > The other is a short story about a failed composer (or music professor (or both)) who uses a process that allows one to travel back in time to hear the thoughts of specific people. Being a composer/professor/whatever, he goes back to the time when Beethoven is composing his most famous work. In time, the professor realizes he can get Beethoven’s attention by shouting a thought at him, which leads to tragic results as the professor decides to help Beethoven “improve” the Ninth Symphony. The first one is most likely “Lest Darkness Fall” by Lester Del Rey, or the parody of it “The Deadly Mission of Phineas Snodgrass” by Fred Pohl (more likely the parody, since the original was a novel, I think). Asimov wrote “Red Queen’s Race” but that one didn’t violate the Grandfather’s Paradox. The Beethoven story appears to be “The Ninth Symphony of Ludvig Von Beethoven and other Lost Songs” by Carter Scholz ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/97 "2010-07-09T03:20:15Z")
:sniff: And all in 12 minutes. Is it no wonder why I don’t mind paying $7/year for this place? Thanks! (And yes, it was the Pohl). ---
**Author:** ![TreacherousCretin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treacherouscretin/32/476_2.png) [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/98 "2010-07-09T03:21:09Z")
I enjoy time travel stories, especially when the paradoxes are ignored. Another big vote for “Time After Time”, and I’m another NewAgeSensitiveGuy who isn’t ashamed to admit he loved “The Time Traveler’s Wife”, book and movie both. Other faves of mine are: - “Slaughterhouse Five” the book. Movie-- not so much. - “The Terminator”, still Cameron’s best movie, IMO - “Twelve Monkeys”, a terrific movie with the added surprise of revealing that Bruce Willis can act(!) And a little gem that a lot of people have never heard of: - “Happy Accidents”, a beautiful little love story about a wonderful “Mister Right” who unfortunately believes that he’s a time traveler. Highly recommended. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/99 "2010-07-09T03:33:50Z")
nm… ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2010, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228/100 "2010-07-09T03:43:28Z")
> [@MonkeyMensch](#): > > \*\*Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency \*\*by Douglas Adams. One of my favorite books and probably my favorite Adams. Even _The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy_ series has a fair amount of time travel. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-travel-fiction/534228.md?page=6)