Return Engagement : Book One of the Settling Accounts Trilogy

Rating:
Summary: Yet another version of WWII, but a good one
Review: Re-fighting World War II with different endings has long been a staple of alternative history, but Harry Turtledove does the theme even better with this book, starting a new trilogy that is actually the 8th book in the series. Positing a Confederate victory at Antietam that resulted in an independent CSA, Turtledove's first book of this series describes a rematch war in the 1880s, won again by the Confederates. We jump ahead 30 years from there to World War I, when the CSA is on the side of England, Japan and France against the USA and Germany. Three novels take us through that war, won by the US this time. Imposing crushing sanctions on the defeated Confederates, the US inadvertently gives rise to a fascist movement that elevates a racist ex-artillery officer, Jake Featherston, to the presidency of the Confederacy. This takes place during books 5-6-7 of the series, as a Socialist administration in the US under Upton Sinclair and his fictional successor ignore Featherston's military buildup. Now we finally come to Book 8, and the start of World War II with Featherston's sneak attack on the US.
Like all of Turtledove's books, we spend much less time in the war rooms of generals and presidents than we do in the lives of everyday people caught up in events. We see some characters depart (Confederate schemer Anne Colleton, a welcome loss), others continue onward (US fighter pilot Jonathan Moss, embittered by the murder of his Canadian wife by a terrorist bomb) and others emerge in their own light (US sailor George Enos Jr, son of George Sr, whose US Navy ship was torpedoed after the armistice in 1917 by Confederate sub captain Roger Kimball, Anne Colleton's lover, who in turn was shot dead later on by George Sr's widow, who then was accidentally shot dead by her own lover, the journalist who ghosted her account of Kimball's execution---somehow, it all ties together eventually).
I enjoy Turtledove's work and am looking forward to further books in the series. One of the most interesting aspects for me is watching for real historical figures to appear, sometimes in very different settings than they did in "our" world. Ronald Reagan, for instance, is a radio announcer calling pro football games in Iowa. Joe Kennedy Jr, brother of the future president, appears in the US Army as a fellow officer of Moss; Joe Sr had a less than honorable appearance earlier in the series as a slimy political hack in Boston. Louis Armstrong appears as the leader of an all-Negro band from the South which defects to the Union side by pulling a daring escape from occupied Ohio. There's even a quick reference to the Marx Brothers, portrayed as the comedy troupe known as the Engels Brothers.
Perhaps the author's two most famous "real" characters were Abraham Lincoln, who appears in Book 1 as a disgraced ex-president who has converted to Marxism (and has a memorable confrontation with a young Theodore Roosevelt), and George Armstrong Custer, who appears in the first several books and plays a key role in the defeat of the Confederacy with daring armored attacks through Tennessee in 1917.
A couple things irritate me about this angle, though. Earlier in the series, Woodrow Wilson appears as the president of the Confederacy at the start of WWI. The real Wilson was not a Southerner, if I recall. Douglas MacArthur also plays a role in both WWI and now in the new conflict, although Turtledove for some reason refers to him as Daniel MacArthur.
Also, much time is spent with Featherston, obviously this time-line's equivalent of Adolf Hitler (who himself makes an unnamed but obvious appearance earlier in the series as the virulently anti-Semitic adjutant of a visiting German officer). I don't mind this, as I consider Featherston's character interesting, but hardly any time is spent with US presidents, except as they come into contact with other characters. The only exception is the fictional Hosea Blackford, Sinclair's vice president who happens to be married to key character Flora Hamburger, congresswoman from New York City.
Well, one can nit-pick all one wants, but the bottom line is that Turtledove's work is entertaining and provocative. I look forward to further installments of the series, and seeing who pops up next. With baseball virtually non-existent in this universe, will we see Ted Williams as a fighter pilot? With Socialists running the White House and FDR filling the role of a mid-level bureaucrat, will we see Harry Truman outfitting Confederate officers from his haberdashery in Missouri? Stay tuned.

Rating:
Summary: Another Turtledove Gem
Review: Harry Turtledove has been one of my favorite authors for years now, and he just keeps getting better and better. This latest novel in his panaramic reworking of America in the wake of a Confederate Civil War victory is another winner.
As the Freedom Party, a pseudo-fascist political party in the Confederacy opens fire against the North, it seems like the world is about to be dragged into another world-wide conflict. The Confederacy drives north, cutting the U.S. in two. America scambles to catch up, and stem the tide of Confederate forces threatening to conquer. Turtledove has developed dozens of characters throughout the series, and many of them come to their final scene here. War is hell. The tone of the novel is frighteningly realistic, and I have always thought that this scenario he has developed could be all too real. Many authors have implied that the U.S. and C.S. would be friends if they had gone their seperate ways after the Civil War. Turtledove shows that they would have become mortal enemies. I find his premise much more believable. Turtledove continues to create wonderful scenes and characters for us to follow, and I can only hope that there are a dozen books left in this series. If not, I am sure he will come up with another premise just as engaging.

Rating:
Summary: Ahh can't buhleave ah read this thang!
Review: Here we are, yet another in this seemingly interminable conflict, wor(l)ds without end, Amen. The Turtledove ouevre is flawed, principally by pitiful characters. They are one-dimensional, symbolic instead of real, utterly predictable. Featherstone, the Southern leader (a Hitler-like creation) plots nefarious deeds and sounds half-mad in his harangues about enemies. He is, though, a prototypical Southerner as viewed through through Turtledove's cloudly lens. The dialect is so awful it's good - think Sharon Stone playing Aunt Jemima or Anthony Hopkins as Colonel Sanders. ALL Southerners sound the same- right off the plantation. Depth of character is, how to say this kindly, not a Turtledove strong point.

The author is, at heart, a moralistic. His views on politics, history, literature and society may be flawed but he holds forth in black and white terms. We have caricatures, not characters, each representing some quality - heroism (Roosevelt), evil (Featherstone), curmudgeonly (Stalin), prophetic (Churchill), fighter for justice (John Brown, Mao)...It's the same with minor characters. Hosea Blackford and Flora Hamburger (there are no "Bob Smiths" around) are right out of a Harlequin romance. Complexity of character is not something associated with this series.

Character is only the tip of iceburg. Eventually, one must face this gawdawful story that crawls with the speed of molasses and tortures the reader with endless repetition (some from previous books). Does the author think we can't remember from one moment to the next? Back to character - a common complaint - there are just too many, especially as none are memorable. The cameos by "real" people (Roosevelt, Churchill, Hitler) are staged, as phony as a Hollywood marriage.

Finally there is a total lack of logic. How many times does the North have to be attacked before it wakes up? Despite its blue state advantages (educated, liberal, scientific) it seems to breed military and political idiots stymied by the most mundane events and obvious military thrusts. This is such a failure in nerve, imagination, reason and prose that I would not wish it on my worst enemy.

Rating:
Summary: This isn't just a rehash of WW2
Review: I write this partially in response to the people that have said that there is no way that the CSA could hope to beat the US and that their early victories are likely contrived. My response is that after looking at this I'm actually thinking that this might be closer to the Korean War, at least in the American Theater and, if not, then things are likely to be difficult. To anyone that wonders how the CSA could win/get so many victories it isn't just blitzkrieg tactics and artisit license, the following things are essential factors

1) The CSA has been gearing up for this for quite some time. Tractor factories have been prepping to mass produce barrels, Featherston has been constantly whipping the country up into a state of frenzy, and key people have been positioned.

2) The US is actually in pretty bad shape right now if you stop and think about it. The CSA has them cut up the middle, Canadians are likely revolting in pockets, Utah is a war zone (both of which split up the army) the US navy is tangled up with the Japanese, British, French, Confederate, and Mexican navies. They also weren't geared up in terms of production, there will be no great arsenal of democracy. The country needs more people at home to help keep in going, building buildings, war plant work, food production, etc.

3) This ties in with 2, Germany is getting knotted up in Europe, if they fall Britain and France can send more men and supplies to the CSA and can also focus fully on the US. Therefore the US likely needs to come up with some way of helping Germany, thus splitting forces further or getting overwhelmed later on.

4) The CSA has superior leadership, Featherston has the personal charisma and magnetism that makes him so powerful as a leader. With Patton commanding Barrel divisions, Potter running intelligence, Goldman making people say and think what the country wants them to... In the US we have Al Smith, not so good a speaker, the guy we need is secretary of war. McArther is probably going to cause more trouble than good for the country, not to mention that the nation is full of apathetics or people afraid of fighting.

5) The CSA is getting manpower to spare, the Empire of Mexico is sending in troops to act as support, also remember that Featherston planned this out in far advance, he made the country advance and mechanize not to modernize it as much as to make it possible to beat the tar out of the US.

6) CSA troop experience is probably higher. Most of the Great War veterans are in their cups by now, that is if they're still alive. Most US footsoldiers are raw recruits getting their baptisms of fire. The CSA troops on the other hand are a mix of people that fought in the Empire of Mexico as aids, put down the uprisings when they began sparking up again, it gave them practical combat experience, something that can be intensely valuable in a soldiers power.

7) CSA is better equipped, I'm sorry but in a war if you're using bolt action while the other guy is spraying ammo no matter how much bigger you are more of your guys go down, not to mention that seeing all their buddies fall is bound to be demoralizing.

8) This is my final point, almost everyone seems to be thinking that the CSA/USA thing is Germany and France, no, the US is closer to Russia. A larger country, more people, but the equipment isn't as good as their counterparts. Russia drove the Nazis out, but only after incredible loss.


Rating:
Summary: Open rant to Harry Turtledove
Review: Let me start off by saying Harry Turtledove has long been a guilty pleasure of mine. That said, I will now start a rant that has been building for some time.
1. I don't care if Sam Carsten sunburns! I don't care if folks make fun of Scipio / Xerxes' tuxedo! Damn'it Harry, these things are ANNOYING! If you think these repetitive character traits are cute, just put them in once a novel and let it go.
2. How come every time someone states the obvious they are treated like a genius? No wonder the North is getting it's butt kicked.
3. Use some imagination. Don't take actual historical events from our timeline and just plug in different place names and people. Sure, things might go down similarly to actual events. But exactly? Would the Confederates have developed a Stuka dive bomber right down to the sirens on the gull wings without outside influence?
4. All Southerners are not straight out of Faulkner. Some normal people live there too.
5. If you're going to write in accent, get the accent right. Texans and Georgians do not sound the same. You've seen too many movies!

Whew! That said, I'm still buying the damn books. There must be something good about them.



Rating:
Summary: Finally the war is here
Review: Love the charecters or hate them(mostly love them in my chase) I decided I was going to give Dr. Turtledove one more shot before hanging him up for good.

This book while it is still flawed is no where near as flawed as the previous two installments something actually happens in this book.

Its good in some ways it can seem a blan rehash of world war 2 but in a lot of ways it is not. I know you fans have been patient and some of you(like me) had given up but give Harry one more shot.

That cliffhanger at the end was really what made the book worth it for me.

Overall-The books not that bad, the author seems to be pulling out of a tailspin.

Rating:
Summary: very annoying writing
Review: Mr. Turtledove writes as though he is paid by the word, shoveling out boring dialogue and worse prose. This is the third book in this series I have read; if it weren't for the fascinating idea of the alternate American history, I couldn't have done it. James Whitmore quoted Harry Truman telling a story about a black man in 1920's Missouri. The man told Harry his boss gave him a bottle of whiskey as a gift. Harry asked him, "Well, how was it"? The man replied, "It was just about right. If it was any better he wouldn't have given it to me and if it was any worse, I wouldn't have drunk it". If this book were written any more poorly, I wouldn't have read it.

Turtledove's writing is putrid. He would do better by teaming up with a competent writer; he has interesting ideas and plots.
It is like a typical Star Trek movie. Take a great idea and ruin it by letting William Shatner or Jonathan Frakes direct it.

Rating:
Summary: I'm an addict and I need help!
Review: Ok, I've read much of Harry Turtledove's books and short stories and he shows he's got talent. But this is ... well, let's try boring. Why?

1. Characters. He seems to want to say the same things about the same characters each time. Ok, Mary Pomeroy is an angry terrorist bomber. Chester Martin's wife doesn't think the war matters to her or her husband. Sam Carsten is always focused on his sunburn. The Mexican gentleman always thinks whatever the leaders say makes sense to him. At least he isn't going on and on anymore (like in the other series) that General Dowling is really fat! Do we need a rehashed and flat description of the cahacter each time we read of them? Are they all so one-dimensional? This isn't a movie, it's the 7th book of the series, there's time to flesh these people out.

2. Can we at least have ONE good argument? There are so many times in this book where Character A says one thing, Character B makes a contrary point and we read something like this, "Character A couldn't say that he liked what he was hearing from Character B but couldn't say he was wrong either." C'mon, someone please tell the other character they were wrong, just once, no one is this agreeable!

3. I get the feeling he picked up a WW2 history book, kept the basic events and changed out some names and locations. We have Stukas, we have war breaking out June 22, 1941, we have a CSA preesident modeled on Hitler whose long on fight and short on imagination, we have the US fooling around with hush-hush radioactive stuff in Eastern Washington, we have death camps for blacks and a final solution, it goes on and on. I can accept that there would be a war between these two fictional powers but let's extrapolate, let's create something new and novel here.

I've seen Harry Turtledove do better, much better. I've seen it in many books but it isn't in this one. Perhaps that's inevitable. A series is not a good forum to showcase talent as things generally get stale over time and I wonder if it's gets boring to write after awhile.

So why am I buying these books? I think I'm addicted, I have after all read all the others of the series and it's hard not to break away now. I am starting to get better though, I got this from a Christmas gift and if I do read the others it'll probably be from the library.

Rating:
Summary: ...so bad, yet I bought it
Review: Okay a lot was already stated by the previous reviewers. I'm just going to voice my main points about this book.

1) Maybe it's because I read the previous books in the story. Maybe it's because my expectations changed. But what annoyed me to no end throughout this book was:
HORRIBLE WRITING!! It's outrageously bad. Each and every character talks in the same way, they use the same phrases. Is there no editor for Mr. Turtledove?? The book could be made half as long, and much more enjoyable to read, if only the endless references and the in-between-the-lines stuff in the dialogues was left out. Come one, no one needs the references, it's not as if anyone who wasn't hooked on the prequels would bother reading this kind of book.

2) The battle scenes are soooooo bland and boring! Some people say Turtledove gets better when he writes about war. No, he doesn't! He doesn't know jack about it, and the absolute unbelievability makes it only harder to read. For example, Morell is said to be the commander of the armored US troops in Ohio. How comes he never actually does any commanding - he doesn't even have a staff, he just drives an ordinary tank, shoots up Confederate tanks and every now and then says something over the radio. (Which Turtledove insists on calling "wireless". Argh.) What could have made for a wonderful Stalingrad-esque action - the Confederate push into that industrial Ohio town, where one of the characteres observed US troops rushing from their train cars right into battle - is left unused. There is one scene on it, and that's it. And the US fighter pilot (Moss) sure does a lot of fighting, but it's all the same and no different from the stuff he did in the Great War books. He hops into a plane, takes off, shoots down a few confeds, and lands. Repeat until book it over. You'd expect that there would be more briefings, that he would communicate with the radar ("Y-Range"... aaargh) installations, and that someone would tell this officer what's actually going on. Oh and the only general among the characters also never does much real commanding. He sits in an office, like some clerk, answers the telephone by himself and asks his lieutenants idiotic stuff that no general would ever, ever say to a subordinate, like "Damnation. I was counting on those troops to go into the counterattack against the eastern prong. If I hold it up till they do come in... well, what the devil will the enemy to do me in the meantime?" Aaaaaargh.

Did I also mention that troops are mever mentioned by unit name, only by "the reinforcements you asked for", "our armor", "these troops on the other side of town"? This all makes for absolutely unbelievable war scenes. Turtledove (or his editors) should find someone who knows how to write this stuff for the next book.

3) The US and CS are at war, but nothing goes on. Huh? Well, okay, Philadelphia is bombed, and there is news about the war on the newsreels, and everyone says "oh things are so hard now that the US are cut in two and we need to ration gas" but there is zero noticable effect on the civilians. No war bond rallies (that might have gone some way to give an impression of war mentality, and there could have been cameo appearances), no kind of "tightening the belt" that you'd expect when total war breaks out, and none of the spy hysteria that happened in our history in both Britain and America. Especially in the Confederate States there is none of this, althougn you'd expect political life to become much more hysterical.

4) It's all so predictable. In the beginning of the book, a prison camp administrator complains that marching the the prisoners into a swamp and shooting them is so tedious. He then hears that one of the wardens committed suicide through the exhaust gases of his car. And still it takes him all throughout the book to come up with the idea of mobile gas chambers... This way of writing is so incredible tedious, you wonder if Turtledove thinks his audience is a pack of idiots, to quote from Jake Featherston.

Overall, the book fell miles short of what even someone experiennced in Turtledove's books would have expected. There are a few okay scenes... but the general impression was that this book showed all too clearly that Turtledove doesn't know jack about WW2. Well, he has three kids to bring through college, so it's no wonder he writes anything that his publishers pay for.

Rating:
Summary: BANG! then wimper...
Review: So the first book of the WW2 trilogy begins in Philidelphia with Flora Blackford having been woken up early in the morning of 06/22/41 by Jake Fatherston's bomber squadrons paying the defacto capital the first of many unwelcome visits.

It ends with Flora being woken up barely a year later after enduring yet another bombing raid by our Confederate friends, being summons to congress and told that President Al Smith is dead after well placed CS Airforce bombs had taken out Powel House.

In between, the lives of our srinking Great War cast play out their respective soap operas...

Jake Fatherston is revelling in the glory of revenge against the USA by cutting that country in half with a spectacular Barrel push through Ohio and up to Lake Eire. Setting up and succeeding in making Utah a rebellious state again. And the beginning of the end of the Negro problem with death camps.

Caught up in the whirlwind of this new war are Clarence Potter, the cunning CSA intellegence general, Tom Colleton a sucessful colonel, now alone without his annoyingly selfish sister, Anne, who was taken out by a well placed USAAF fighter bomber's ordanince. Jefferson Pinkard, the prison manager, faced with the growing problem of mass slaughter at his camp invents through fate a more "humane" way of dealing with the negro problem. Hipolito Rodruegez has a near miss with electricity in what will soon become a less boring life as he has been sent as a guard to a new super camp that will be eventually run by his old WW1 buddy, Jeff. Scipio continues his depressing life of a black man in the CSA, whatching all around him as the world falls apart. I'm amazed that he has lived this long.

Up North, life is no better. Jonathan Moss returns to the air a widower and seeks revenge on the CSA with his flying skills but in this first book he eventually gets shot down...on the wrong side of the line. All three top brasses in the US Army are left in limbow with failed counter attacks and a rebellious Utah to deal with. No doubt more from messers Dowling, Morell and MacAurther in the next book. Mary Pomeroy starts her one woman war against the USA. Mort, her husband, figures this out and tells her to be carefull. Leonard O'Doull continues with the Quebec storyline has a MASH doctor in the front line.

At sea, USA and Japan are at it again. George Enos Jr eventually ends up in the Navy and with his famous name, fits in nicely with navy life. However Sam Carsten and his beloved USS Rememberance part company when the US Navy lose the battle of Midway and the ship is sent to the bottom while Sam finally becomes a full LT. Watch this space...

Back on land Al Smith is trying to hold his country together and with the help of FD Roosevelt, fends off questions by Flora Blackford reguarding large amounts of money being spent on a super secret project way up in Washington state. As news of atrocities leak back to her of the plight of CSA negros, she soon discovers that her own country dosen't care much for them either. All this dosen't matter for Cincinattus Driver who is now stuck in CSA Kentucky and has the misfortune of running into Luther Bliss and his saboutage operations. Still Driver is one of the most cunning characters in the whole series and Bliss may not know what's installed for him...

Overall a big book that I found somewhat empty in plot, but it is just the beginning. I would have liked to see some new faces for a new war and I do miss the humour of a Gordon MacSweeny character. The Atomic Bomb is obviously on it's way. The USA is developing it, and know doubt Jake Featherston will rethink his attitude towards the scientists he turned away with the same idea. As for his Negro Pogrom, the horror is just starting to unfold...

Four Stars, but only just!