Reviewing William Overgard’s The Divide

First of all, this wasn’t a post that was supposed to be written.

Now don’t get me wrong.  I love The Divide. It is, in fact, one of my favourite alternate history books. Period.  I had something else lined up, a commentary on current politics – and shrewd readers could probably guess about whom and what – but I put that off.

Part of it is due to my immediate situation. I’m still looking for work, and now I’ve moved in with an old
friend who has been both very generous and supportive despite his own situation. Well, misery does love company.

And so, my hurry-up-and-wait review of William Overgard’s The Divide, which comes after missing March’s post.  (My own copy of The Divide, along with most of my other belongings, is currently stashed away in a storage locker.) The novel takes place in an alternate 1976,  where the United States surrendered to Germany and Japan in April 1948. The country is occupied by Japan on the west coast, while across the Rockies in the east, the country is under the thumb of the Nazis. Now you might look at the cover and then at the initial premise and think: “It’s The Man in the High Castle, all over again.” It isn’t: there are major differences between the two books, thematically and plot-wise.

The Divide is more of an action novel, compared to High Castle, which is a slower, more reflective work.   Its plot centers on a group of resistance fighters who are fighting the occupiers and are determined to spoil a historic summit meeting in Denver between the two old allies, who are now Cold War rivals.  You think they wouldn’t have much of a chance of pulling off a revolution, unless they had an Almighty Equalizer. 

That's a mighty big torch you're holding...

But they do.  Buried deep in the Rockies, inside the National Redoubt, are the last hold-outs of the US military and the Manhattan Project, tasked with “relighting the torch of liberty” by President Burton K. Wheeler just before the surrender in 1948.  Over the last thirty years, they've worked to construct the world’s only atom bomb, which is now finally ready. 

I won’t go much further, except to say this is a great, well thought-out read. I find it noteworthy for how Overgard’s book shows how most people just “went along,” which is something to consider in this political year. This book has been long out of print, but if you can find The Divide either on Amazon or in your local used bookstore, I’d recommend picking it up. Definitely for fans of this sub-genre.

Coming up:

I’ll try to have another book review for you. Or something. 
Meanwhile, you can help out a poor unemployed writer by purchasing Elvis Saves JFK! for just 99 cents and War Plan Crimson, A Novel of Alternate History, for $2.99 and now The Key to My Heart, also $2.99 (all are free to preview). All books -- which are already on Smashword's premium distribution list -- are also available through such fine on-line retailers such as Sony, Chapters Indigo, Barnes & Noble and Apple's iTunes Store.  Thanks.

What if Donald Trump Didn't Win the 2016 Election?

October 22, 2021:

The election of Donald J. Trump as President of the United States was never a forgone conclusion.  Yet it happened.  

When he launched his campaign for the presidency in 2015, no one, let alone the candidate himself, thought he stood a chance.  But to everyone’s shock and surprise –including those in the Republican Party – Trump had tapped into a low albeit rising level of anger fueled anxiety. But even by itself, this may not have been enough to put Trump over the top.  Indeed, by the end of March 2016, polls by many different organizations had begun to show his numbers begin to soften, if not collapse. Certainly when he lost the Wisconsin Primary in April, it looked the case. And in the unlikely event Trump had gotten the majority of primary votes, the GOP stood ready to frustrate him through a contested convention, even if it meant losing the election to the Democrats.

But only if. Trump plowed on, despite his slumping numbers. No one had counted on, however, the events of June 31^st, 2016, which remains to this day the single largest mass casualty terrorist attack on the continental United States. As the events of this date have been seared into our collective memory, I won’t recount the tragedy, suffice it to say that sometime earlier, it had been pointed out that such an attack on US soil, then considered highly unlikely, could help catapult the Trump to victory.  Trump had already built a solid base of loyal supporters partly based on the fear of outsider groups such as Latinos and Muslims. The events of June 31^st not only seemed to validate his point of view in the eyes of many, but they also seemed to lend him a degree of prescience.

President Trump at the 2018 dedication of the Mexican Wall.  

Trump, with his mixture of bluster and threats, was handily able to secure the Republican nomination held just two weeks later with the attack still fresh in everyone’s mind. However, although he secured his party’s nomination, he had still to beat the Democratic candidate.

For the Democrats, even so, with Trump as their rival, this should’ve been their election to lose.  However, because of sharp divisions in both Democratic nominees’ camps stemming from a particularly long and hard-fought primary season, this led to a lack of unity under the winning candidate.  There was also the lingering blame for not stopping the terrorist attack that hung over the Democratic incumbent, which led to a massive erosion of support from the party’s traditional base. In spite of this, the election was a close-run thing, with the final victor – Trump – only being declared at 6:37 a.m. on the following morning.

Media pundits and historians often speculate what would’ve happened if Donald Trump had lost the November 2016 election.  Would we have been spared the events of the last six years?  Would the world have been more peaceful and prosperous? We’ll never know.

This is not that story. This is the story of how Donald J. Trump became the 45^th President of the United States of America.  We continue to live in his shadow and in the world, he helped create.

And Finally...

I hoped you enjoyed this bit of political theatre, in itself a bit of what-if, which is my take on current events.  All of this is pure speculation. Keen eyes will note, of course, there is no such thing as June 31st, and my story should not be treated as any attempt at any type of prognostication or warning.  The title of this post is an homage of sorts to the title of "If Lee Had Not Won the Battle of Gettysburg,"  penned by none other than Winston Churchill, which appeared in If it Happened Otherwise: Lapses into Imaginary History, which was discussed earlier in this blog.

I hope to have a book review for you next month. Or something like that.

Meanwhile, you can help out a poor unemployed writer by purchasing Elvis Saves JFK! for just 99 cents and War Plan Crimson, A Novel of Alternate History, for $2.99 and now The Key to My Heart, also $2.99 (all are free to preview). All books -- which are already on Smashword's premium distribution list -- are also available through such fine on-line retailers such as Sony, Chapters Indigo, Barnes & Noble and Apple's iTunes Store.  Thanks.

Book Review: Burning Paradise by Robert Charles Wilson

Imagine you live in a 2014 that has been at peace for the last century.  There was something like the Great War, but it seemed to have ended as almost as soon as it started with the Great Armistice of 1914. After that, peace and prosperity. No Great Depression. No Hitler. No Holocaust.  No Second World War.  No lingering Cold War. No War on Terror. Just humanity, linked arm in arm, marching upwards together to the sunlit highlands. It indeed does sound like a paradise of sorts.

It’s certainly not our world, but it’s the world one Cassie Iverson inhabits. In many ways it’s probably preferable to our own, but as pleasant a world as it may be, Cassie, her parents, and others who are members of the secretive Correspondence Society suspect the awful truth: that human progress has being interfered with – even directed – since the dawn of radio communications, by an alien intelligence with its own indefinable goals. An alien intelligence that would do anything – including murder – to keep its secret.

Burning Paradise is Robert Charles Wilson’s latest alternate history novel. Taken with his earlier novels, Mysterium (1994) and Darwina (1998), it returns to a theme of a false reality – layered or overwritten upon our own by an external entity. It’s a similar theme expressed by Phillip K. Dick in many of his works, such as VALIS (1981).

I definitely recommend Burning Paradise.  Besides being well written, Wilson paints fully realized alternate 2014 with a few choice turns of phrase – no mean feat.  It’s another reason I like Wilson and consider him one of the spiritual successors to Phillip K. Dick. Verdict: very readable and thoughtful fiction.

What's Next?

As I slide another blog posting in under the wire, I note that the eight-episode miniseries based on Stephen King's 2011 novel 11-22-63 (reviewed earlier on this blog) has begun to air on Hulu.  I hope to be able to have a review of at least the early episodes for you soon.

Meanwhile, you can help out a poor unemployed writer by purchasing Elvis Saves JFK! for just 99 cents and War Plan Crimson, A Novel of Alternate History, for $2.99 and now The Key to My Heart, also $2.99 (all are free to preview). All books -- which are already on Smashword's premium distribution list -- are also available through such fine on-line retailers such as Sony, Chapters Indigo, Barnes & Noble and Apple's iTunes Store.  Thanks.

Reviewing Harry Turtledove’s Joe Steele

First off the top: I liked Joe Steele.  It tells the story of rise of one of the 20th Century’s most infamous dictators, Joseph Stalin, but through a distinctly American lens. At his best, Turtledove asks the big questions, the ones that go beyond the superficial and ruminate in your subconscious until you provide your own unsettling answers.

And make no mistake; Joe Steele is one of Turtledove’s best.  It asks what if a certain young Joseph Dzhugashvili arrived in the United States in the early 20th Century, and after changing his name to Joe Steele (Stalin is Russian for “Man of Steel”), he emerged from the rough and tumble world of California union politics to challenge successfully FDR for the 1933 Democratic Party presidential nomination and ultimately be elected President of the United States.  (I will assume - and call me a party pooper - that this novel takes place in a universe where the Natural Born Citizen clause of the U.S. Constitution never came to be... uh, hello, Ted Cruz?)

For Turtledove, who has written some epic multi-volume multi-character alt-history, this is a rather intimate work. It works so very well on this level. The story is told from the viewpoints of two brothers who follow two distinct paths with their own relationships with the titular character, who oddly enough, is not the main character, but looms darkly in the background like a menacing cloud.  

Mr President?

Turtledove’s book has some cautionary echoes of Sinclair Lewis’ It Can’t Happen Here (1935), in which a fascist dictator rises to power as president on a populist ticket, after appealing to traditional American values and pledging to make America strong again.  I’m also reminded, of course how close America did come to an actual fascist coup in 1935, as recounted in my own novel War Plan Crimson, which sees a dictator named Randall Cray placed in the White House.

What is a mark of Turtledove’s craftsmanship is the window Joe Steele provides into current events.  As I read this book during this time of Donald Trump, I was amazed at the parallels I found.  But maybe it’s just me. The populist Republican candidate, who is as of this writing, is leading in the polls, appears to be following the well-trod path of other potential dictators, who also took advantage of times of great uncertainty.  While simultaneously vowing to make the country strong again with nothing but simple slogans, Trump is also cynically creating a climate of fear by blaming The Outsider, be they Mexicans or Muslims. 

As I said, I heartily recommend Harry Turtledove’s Joe Steele.  It is a particularly by turns chilling and intimate look at a nightmare that may yet come to pass.

Coming Up:
I’m still reading Robert Charles Wilson’s Burning Paradise: I can tell you that I’m liking what I’m reading.  I’ll have a full review for you in a future post, where I also plan to look more in depth at Wilson’s earlier alt-history works, Darwinia and Mysterium and the themes that his books share. 

Meanwhile, you can help out a poor unemployed writer by purchasing Elvis Saves JFK! for just 99 cents and War Plan Crimson, A Novel of Alternate History, for $2.99 and now The Key to My Heart, also $2.99 (all are free to preview). All books -- which are already on Smashword's premium distribution list -- are also available through such fine on-line retailers such as Sony, Chapters Indigo, Barnes & Noble and Apple's iTunes Store.   Thanks.

Visitors To and From the Universe Next Door?

The idea that our world, our universe, is one part of a vaster interconnected multiverse has been long posited in both the worlds of science and of science fiction.  Many eminent scientists, such as Stephen Hawking, Neil DeGrasse Tyson, Hugh Evertt, and a host of others, support of this theory.  While the jury is out on whether the science behind the multiverse theory is valid, speculation continues.

Not surprisingly, science fiction writers are among the chief speculators. A staple of alternate universe science fiction has long been when the person from our own universe is inexplicably transferred from our own universe to the universe next door, with the usual hijinks ensuing.  

Benjamin Bathurst, where are you?

Science fiction pioneer H.Beam Piper – known for his Paratime alternate universe series of novels and short stories and his longer Terro-Human Future History – wrote one such short story, He Walked Around The Horses (1948).  He based it on the curious – and true – story of Benjamin Bathurst, a British diplomat who disappeared while travelling through Prussia in 1809.   

Benjamin Bathurst merely joins a long list of people who have similarly dropped off the face of the earth, including Ambrose Small, Judge Crater, Amelia Earhart, and D.B. Cooper, to name just a few.  Foul play? Aliens? Misadventure?  Or did they merely want to drop out of sight for other, more personal, reasons? Or maybe, for just a split second, did the walls between the universes dissolve just enough to allow a person to step through?

The Shoe is on The Other Foot?

The reverse might’ve happened too.  Take the case of a visitor who allegedly arrived at Tokyo’s Haneda Airport one warm day in 1954. To all intents and purposes the bearded man seemed like the rest of the business travelers getting off the plane that day; except for one difference: the passport he presented to the customs officers was for a country that didn’t exist – Taured.

The visitor, who spoke a number of languages, including Japanese and French, seemed understandably puzzled when told his homeland didn’t exist.  His passport clearly showed visa stamps from the countries he had visited, including Japan, yet when the Japanese officials checked, the company he claimed he was meeting with had no record of his appointment nor did the hotel he claimed he was staying at have any record of a reservation. The stranger grew downright upset when he was shown a map of Europe and Taured – which he maintained occupied roughly the same spot as Andorra did on the border between France and Spain  – wasn’t there.

The Japanese officials put the stranger up for the night in a hotel and took his all of his personal documents which included his passport and his driver’s license, while they tried to sort through the mystery.

However, the mystery would remain unsolved. In the morning the stranger had vanished. His documents had similarly vanished from the locked airport security office. The police and airport officials searched in vain for the stranger.

Perhaps this is an urban legend. But... if he existed, where did the stranger go? Perhaps it was all some elaborate joke.  But who exactly was the joke on?  Perhaps he just caught the first flight back to the universe next door, back to Taured.

What’s Next?

I’ve picked up two new books for review on this blog – by that I mean I buy the books; they’re not given to me.  They’re both alternate history books by authors I respect and that I’ve wanted to read for some time. First, there’s Harry Turtledove’s Joe Steele, a retelling of Joseph Stalin's biography in a very different setting; and Robert Charles Wilson’s Burning Paradise, a novel of a quite different 20th Century. 

I'll be sure to update you on both of these books in the new year.  

Meanwhile, you can help out a poor unemployed writer by purchasing Elvis Saves JFK! for just 99 cents and War Plan Crimson, A Novel of Alternate History, for $2.99 and now The Key to My Heart, also $2.99 (all are free to preview). All books -- which are already on Smashword's premium distribution list -- are also available through such fine on-line retailers such as Sony, Chapters Indigo, Barnes & Noble and Apple's iTunes Store.   Thanks.

Movie Review: Six-String Samurai (1998)

Okay, this is pushing the deadline, I know.  But technically, I’m writing this on November 30th, so it's still my November column.  

This month’s column is about the movie, Six-String Samurai, directed by Lance Mungia. I first saw it at the Bytowne Cinema in Ottawa in 1998, when I dragged my then-girlfriend to see it.  I don’t think she much appreciated it; but I certainly thought the mixture of alternate history/post-apocalyptic/50’s rock-and-roll/samurai film appealing.  

A little background here: Six-String Samurai takes place in a world where the Soviet Union clobbered the United States in a nuclear first strike back in 1957.  It is now present day, where the country has been reduced to a wasteland populated by bandits, cannibals, mutants, and the remnants of the Red Army that was sent over after the war.  All that remains is Lost Vegas, which has been ruled over by King Elvis.  But now the King is dead and Lost Vegas needs a new King of Rock and Roll. And so the word goes out and musicians across the land begin the dangerous trek to Lost Vegas for the chance to replace their fallen king. 

Already you can probably see why I liked this film so much and why my girlfriend didn’t.

I digress. Enter Buddy (played by Jeffery Falcon), who plays a mean guitar and swings an even meaner sword, is the titular Samurai of the film. He’s a cross between Toshiro Mifune and Buddy Holly. On his way to Lost Vegas, Buddy must cross the barren landscape with a small boy in tow, fending off attacks by bounty hunting bowlers and Death. All of this is powered by a kick-ass soundtrack that surely must make the guitar gods and the spirit of Akira Kurosawa smile.

It’s really worth seeing.  Over the years, Six-String Samurai has developed a “cult” reputation, as many films that are “out there” seem to do. And that’s really too bad. It’s a disservice to label Six-String Samurai and other films like it as “cult” films, just because there’s no neat slot in the public imagination for them. 

Meanwhile, you can help out a poor unemployed writer by purchasing Elvis Saves JFK! for just 99 cents and War Plan Crimson, A Novel of Alternate History, for $2.99 and now The Key to My Heart, also $2.99 (all are free to preview). All books -- which are already on Smashword's premium distribution list -- are also available through such fine on-line retailers such as Sony, Chapters Indigo, Barnes & Noble and Apple's iTunes Store.   Thanks.

Book Review: Theatre of the Gods, by M. Suddain

It’s been a busy time here at the ol’ radio ranch. Between my continuing job search, working on another writing project  (think crack whores with trust funds…) and learning to play the guitar, I’ve been pressed for time.

And then there’s the barely contained craziness that is M. Suddain’s Theatre of the Gods. If you’ve read my previous post, you’ll remember that my initial impressions were of a book written by the dream team of Douglas Adams, William S. Burroughs, and Jules Verne.  This book is that kind of weird, with a steampunk tinged magic realism fantasy thing, where starships resemble nothing less than huge sailing men-of-war and populations live on the inside of giant Dyson Spheres.

Enter the book’s primary protagonist, M. Franscisco Fabrigas, “philosopher, heretical physicist, and perhaps the greatest human explorer of all ages.” He is charged by his Queen to undertake a voyage of discovery to the universe next door. At this point in his life, this mission is something of a reprieve and a chance for vindication for Fabrigas, who has both been discredited and considered insane because he believes that he comes from a parallel universe that looks exactly like the one he currently occupies. Mix in a cast of characters that include a mysterious green girl, a plucky botanist, a teenaged ship’s captain, a stalwart bosun, and a crew of children, and you have memorable read.  Our heroes naturally face their share of villains, including the Queen’s scheming sisters, beings from beyond, killer plants, varying assassins, and vicious bounty hunters, just to name a few.

There’s a lot of fast and furious stuff going on here. But it’s much to the author’s credit that he effortlessly keeps the story moving along.   Theatre of the Gods is by turns well-written and inventive stuff.  It’s funny and occasionally eye-popping. If you like your science fiction literate with an extra dash of loopiness, then this book is for you.

Following up…

You’ll remember in my last post where I reviewed the latest installment in Charles Stross’s excellent Laundry Files, The Rhesus Chart that I somberly advised you that vampires don’t exist.

Well, I could be wrong. According to a recent report in the online Guardian, scientists are now looking at injecting of the blood plasma of young people into the bodies of the elderly as a possible way to reverse the aging process. But wait: isn’t that the whole raison d'être behind vampires? Said vampires using fresh blood to keep themselves perpetually young?  Vamprism aside, the implications of a society, where in the not too distant future, there is a class of the ultra-wealthy who maintain private blood banks to keep themselves young, are more than a little disturbing.

Through this all, we can be assured of one thing, of course: vampires don’t exist. Yet.

Meanwhile, you can help out a poor unemployed writer by purchasing Elvis Saves JFK! for just 99 cents and War Plan Crimson, A Novel of Alternate History, for $2.99 and now The Key to My Heart, also $2.99 (all are free to preview). All books -- which are already on Smashword's premium distribution list -- are also available through such fine on-line retailers such as Sony, Chapters Indigo, Barnes & Noble and Apple's iTunes Store.   Thanks.