Greenhill Alternate History Series (war, general, facts, events)

[nightbird47]

I just got For Want of a Nail, which is an alternate history written as a summations of the next fifty years, based on the idea that Burgoyne had won the battle at Saratoga and colonial leadership exectued. Years ago, I read reviews of it and was not able to find a copy, and I'm looking forward to reading it.

This is one of a series of alternate histores put out by Greenhill. On the back are three others listed. Disastor at D Day is the German defeat of the Allies and the failure of the landing. Invasion is the actual launching of Operation Sea Lion and the German invasion of Britan. Gettysburg is the victory of the confederates and the concequences.

I love well written alternate histories. To understand what happened we often need to also look at what might have to see the full concequences.

Has anyone read any of these? I believe its a British publisher.

[Grandstander]

I read "Disaster At D-Day" by Peter Tsouras.

Which do you like better in the way of a historical military narrative book? One which attempts to read something like a novel, with lots of attention on individuals and personalities along with the presentation of the events? (e.g...The Longest Day) Or one which is a nuts and bolts parade of just the facts...this unit went here and encountered this enemy unit there and got pushed back here where they were reinforced by that unit over there....etc?

If the latter, then "Disaster At D-Day" might be your cup of tea. It is alternative history written as though it is a textbook presentation of the real history. Everything hinges on plot....how does the author transform victory into defeat? There is no character, no color to the work, it is a dry read.

It has been some time, but my memory of reading it is that I did not finish it, growing bored by the game board style presentation of history.

[nightbird47]

Originally Posted by Grandstander

I read "Disaster At D-Day" by Peter Tsouras.

Which do you like better in the way of a historical military narrative book? One which attempts to read something like a novel, with lots of attention on individuals and personalities along with the presentation of the events? (e.g...The Longest Day) Or one which is a nuts and bolts parade of just the facts...this unit went here and encountered this enemy unit there and got pushed back here where they were reinforced by that unit over there....etc?

If the latter, then "Disaster At D-Day" might be your cup of tea. It is alternative history written as though it is a textbook presentation of the real history. Everything hinges on plot....how does the author transform victory into defeat? There is no character, no color to the work, it is a dry read.

It has been some time, but my memory of reading it is that I did not finish it, growing bored by the game board style presentation of history.

Actually, I like both. If there is too much story, you miss all the little details. I like to study them. A straight forward history with all the nuts and bolts sounds quite interesting. When Harry Turtledove was at LASFS, it was interesting that most of the questions ask about Guns of the South were not character related, but how he wove all the detailes into the cloth so they'd fit but still lead to a different outcome.

[Grandstander]

Originally Posted by nightbird47

Actually, I like both. If there is too much story, you miss all the little details. I like to study them. A straight forward history with all the nuts and bolts sounds quite interesting. When Harry Turtledove was at LASFS, it was interesting that most of the questions ask about Guns of the South were not character related, but how he wove all the detailes into the cloth so they'd fit but still lead to a different outcome.

In the case of Harry Turtledove, he is so excruciatingly untalented when it comes to creating and presenting characters and natural sounding dialogue that he provides readers with no reason to pay attention to him other than his plots. A typical Turtledove "dialogue" will be composed of two cliche oriented characters exchanging wooden cliches which are all preposterously narrative.

Chipper: "I guess those Germans sure got what was coming to them when their Bulge plan failed because they exhausted their fuel supplies well short of their intended goal of the port of Antwerp."
Bubba: "Yeah, bet they will think twice before sending a million men into a surprise offensive in bad winter weather in order to take us by surprise and set the war effort back at least a year."
Chipper: "You said a mouthful with that, Bubba, the chickens sure came home to roost in the Nazis backyard when General Patton disengaged from his front and moved more than 100 miles north in the worst winter conditions anyone has seen since Napoleon took Moscow, and was still able to send his men into a direct attack to relieve the surrounded US paratroopers at Bastogne."
Bubba: "You're sure right as rain about that, Chipper, but we have to keep in mind that the war isn't won yet. General Eisenhower still has supply two million American and British troops on a broadfront advance into the very heart of Germany which will......."

etc etc

My theory is that Turtledove is not an individual, but rather a factory of writers, each assigned one character to follow or one chapter to write, and then it is all thrown together. I base this on:
A) The incredible proliferation of works...how can anyone write as fast as Turtledove seems to be doing, three or four 400 page novels in a year?
B) The astonishing repetition..we get told around 30 times that Soandso has a problem with the sun because he burns so easily, 50 times that a good tank commander stands up in the cupola because he can see better than when using the periscope, but it is way more dangerous, 38 times that a certain officer is able to handle some eccentric superior because afterall, he had been General Custer's aid for years an no one was more eccentric than Custer.....etc etc..All of that suggests individuals writers working with fact sheets about the characters they will be using in their assigned chapter.
C) The wildly varying quality of the writing. The final volume of Turtledove's WW II interupted by alien invasion series featured what I thought was the best Turtledove writing I had encountered...for one half of the book. Then abrubtly it changed to the worst Turtledove writing ever, and stayed that way throught the conclusion. All Turtledove books feature these sorts of quality swings, the one I mentioned was the worst.