Rating: 
Summary: You can speed read you way throught this alternate history
Review: "Stars & Stripes in Peril" is Harry Harrison's novel of alternate history in which the British declare war on the United States over the Trent affair. Somehow the British not only end up attacking the Confederate port of Biloxi, they also rape and pillage the Southern town, which results in Union General Sherman deciding to join with Confederate General Beauregard in repelling the invaders. Of course, this fanciful excess is only an excuse to bring the North and South together so Harrison can lay out how "modern" weapons and the blitzkrieg tactics of Germany in 1936 could have been used in 1863 by the Americans to liberate Ireland. To appreciate this novel you must have above average knowledge of the Civil War. For example, you need to recognize the significance of Ralph Semmes serving as Captain of the U.S.S. Virginia, with its twin turrets designed by John Erickson, each housing two large Parrott breech-loading cannons. Harrison certainly does not have time to explain much beyond briefly identifying the various players as this book is more of an elaborate sketch than a full-fledged novel. Lincoln, Lee and the rest of the players are presented as caricatures. Because he is the Father of Modern Warfare, Sherman leads the American Armies, assisted by Lee and Jackson during the invasion of Ireland while Grant is laying siege to a key British port down in Mexico, but you do not get a sense for the true nature of any of these characters. In fact, both Jefferson Davis and Queen Victoria are presented in extremely unflattering fashions. Ultimately these characters are but chess pieces, moved about by Harrison who is obviously more concerned with the invents in his giant game of "what if." In the end, "Stars & Stripes in Peril" reminds me more of MacKinlay Kantor's "If the South Had Won the Civil War," which was essentially a series of events briefly sketched out, than Harry Turtledoves "Guns of the South," with its detailed character study of Robert E. Lee and which remains the best alternative history of the Civil War I have read to date. There are certainly some provocative idea in this book, but Harrison could have advanced them just as easily with a short essay than with this novel.
Rating:
Summary: You can speed read you way throught this alternate history
Review: "Stars & Stripes in Peril" is Harry Harrison's novel of alternate history in which the British declare war on the United States over the Trent affair. Somehow the British not only end up attacking the Confederate port of Biloxi, they also rape and pillage the Southern town, which results in Union General Sherman deciding to join with Confederate General Beauregard in repelling the invaders. Of course, this fanciful excess is only an excuse to bring the North and South together so Harrison can lay out how "modern" weapons and the blitzkrieg tactics of Germany in 1936 could have been used in 1863 by the Americans to liberate Ireland. To appreciate this novel you must have above average knowledge of the Civil War. For example, you need to recognize the significance of Ralph Semmes serving as Captain of the U.S.S. Virginia, with its twin turrets designed by John Erickson, each housing two large Parrott breech-loading cannons. Harrison certainly does not have time to explain much beyond briefly identifying the various players as this book is more of an elaborate sketch than a full-fledged novel. Lincoln, Lee and the rest of the players are presented as caricatures. Because he is the Father of Modern Warfare, Sherman leads the American Armies, assisted by Lee and Jackson during the invasion of Ireland while Grant is laying siege to a key British port down in Mexico, but you do not get a sense for the true nature of any of these characters. In fact, both Jefferson Davis and Queen Victoria are presented in extremely unflattering fashions. Ultimately these characters are but chess pieces, moved about by Harrison who is obviously more concerned with the invents in his giant game of "what if." In the end, "Stars & Stripes in Peril" reminds me more of MacKinlay Kantor's "If the South Had Won the Civil War," which was essentially a series of events briefly sketched out, than Harry Turtledoves "Guns of the South," with its detailed character study of Robert E. Lee and which remains the best alternative history of the Civil War I have read to date. There are certainly some provocative idea in this book, but Harrison could have advanced them just as easily with a short essay than with this novel.
Rating: 
Summary: What a waste of time!
Review: Although I have not read the first book, nothing in the second makes me want to. First, the lame writing. The characters bear resemblance to their historical name-sakes in name only. There are a couple of clever manuevers pulled off in the invasion of Ireland, but there is next to no interesting narration of the events. The battle scenes are like reading a narration of a turn-based military simulation board game--and one with divisions as the smallest unit, at that! Events happen, and we are told how they happen, in the style and detail of a introductory-level history textbook. Little in this book draws me in and inspires me to invest much emotion in either the plot or characters. I find it inconceivable that Britain, wholly dependent on its Navy for its world-power status as it is, would allow its ships to become so outclassed, or that it would seek war when even the crudest espionage service would conclude that America's ships were superior. Lastly, the laughable "happy-ever-after" independent Ireland forming under America's sheltering wing is simply ludicrous. Um, a few hundred years worth of religious animosity evaporates overnight by chanting the "Sepration of Church and State" mantra? Now I'll grant that America's Navy is keeping Britain from invading but surely it will not be able to stop them from smuggling in guns and agents. And once the US finds out its Navy isn't big enough to guard its own two coasts and Ireland (we're ignoring logistics here that it can protect Ireland for any length of time) Britian hops back across the Irish sea and whomps the Irish. I used to think Turtledove didn't do too well with alternate history, but now I see how a really bad AH novel is written.
Rating:
Summary: A Very Silly Book
Review: Harry Harrison has written some pretty good books. This isn't one of them. The writing is stiff and clumsy and the characters, except for a few working-class Irishmen who are pretty well done, speak as no living humans have ever talked. And the historic figures are one-dimensional cartoons. (No doubt Queen Victoria had her weird qualities, but I doubt if she was as loony as Harrison portrays her.) The premises are absurd and do not even make internal sense. And the historic research is inexcusably sloppy. Harrison makes much of the revolutions in military and naval technology going on at the time, and rightly so--but he makes the most grotesque mistakes in this area. For example, a Marine officer is seen clutching a "Colt .45 Peacemaker", a weapon which was not manufactured until 1873, a full ten years after the setting of this novel! Even worse, the Spencer repeating rifle, which features prominently in several important scenes and plot developments, held seven rounds--not, as Harrison repeatedly says, twenty! A few minutes spent thumbing through a reference work on historic firearms, or just checking Internet sites, would have prevented such mistakes. I can only assume Harrison just couldn't be bothered. There are also various mistakes in other areas: a reference to Fort "Sumpter", for example. All in all this level of research would not even be acceptable in a high-school term paper. Despite the absurd premise, this could have been quite a good book. After all, alternative history often rests on improbable premises; suspension of disbelief is often necessary. But the bad writing, the incredible dialogue (you could get the idea that Harry Harrison has never spoken with a native of the American South), and the numerous howlers arising from sloppy research and an all-too-obvious ignorance of military matters, make this a book to miss as widely as possible.
Rating: 
Summary: America's Fictional Invasion Of The British Isles
Review: Harry Harrison's "Stars & Stripes In Peril" excels as a textbook example of what might have happened if the United States had launched a blitzkrieg invasion of Ireland during the early 1860's. Harrison is at his best when he describes the American campaign and its hard fought battles on land and sea. Yet this book does show many of the same problems as its predecessor, especially with regards to character development. Yet there is at least one memorable character, Don Ambrosio O'Higgins, who is more compelling than historical figures such as Lincoln, Lee or Grant. Yet this is a fine page turner, and one I'd recommend for a quick read. If you want a more substantial novel of alternative history, choose any of the ones recently written by Harry Turtledove.
Rating:
Summary: America's Fictional Invasion Of The British Isles
Review: Harry Harrison's "Stars & Stripes In Peril" excels as a textbook example of what might have happened if the United States had launched a blitzkrieg invasion of Ireland during the early 1860's. Harrison is at his best when he describes the American campaign and its hard fought battles on land and sea. Yet this book does show many of the same problems as its predecessor, especially with regards to character development. Yet there is at least one memorable character, Don Ambrosio O'Higgins, who is more compelling than historical figures such as Lincoln, Lee or Grant. Yet this is a fine page turner, and one I'd recommend for a quick read. If you want a more substantial novel of alternative history, choose any of the ones recently written by Harry Turtledove.
Rating:
Summary: Better than the first, but still lacking
Review: Having read both "Stars and Stripes Forever" and "Stars and Stripes in Peril", I must say Harry Harrison's second volume in his alternate history trilogy is certainly better than the first book. Much of what was wrong with the first book is not present in the second text, and "Peril" definitely has more to offer in terms of entertainmen value. However, "Peril" also from many of the same flaws that plagued "Forever", and is still far from perfect. The valid complaints of implausibility that were aimed at "Forever" probably won't be directed at "Peril". Harrison pretty well established his divergence in "Forever"(as clumsily as that was), and "Peril" simply picks up in the new history that Harrison has created. Harrison begins "Peril" with a brief recap of the events of "Forever" in the form of a "memoir" by General Sherman, introducing new readers as well as reminding old readers. Harrison is also very effective at keeping the action in one self-contained book. Though it is the second book in a trilogy, there are really no dangling plotlines that a reader will be plagued by until the next book. Further, Harrrison's plot is extremely entertaining overall. Britain, still steaming over her loss in the first novel, plans to attack the U.S. through Mexico. At the same time, the U.S. is still dealing with several unresolved issues of the brief War Between the States, as the South is forced to adjust to the emancipation of the slaves,a more low-key analog to Radical Reconstrucion in our time line. With British invasion seemingly unavoidable, America looks to take the war to England's backyard. "Stars and Stripes in Peril", as stated, is an entertaining read overall, but it does suffer many of "Forever's" faults. Harrison uses a third-person omniscient narrator to tell his story, which I must admit is not my favorite means narration. What is worse, while Harrison uses this method to further his plot at a rapid pace, he does so at the expense of characterization and effective sub-plots. The reader is allowed briefly into the minds of nearly every character that appears int his novel. The end result, however, is that no single character develops any actual depth, and the reader does not care one way or another who lives or who dies. Another problem is Harrison's clear optimism with regards to America's relationship with the world. In "Stars and Stripes Forever" America cheerfully lets Canada go on her merry way, with no expansionist intent whatsoever, flying in the face of history. In "Stars and Stripes in Peril" America comes into possession of what can only be called an overseas empire, and again, Harrison, despite history, has his Americans let it go. While certainly idealistic, it just doesn't hold water. Finally, though another conflict with Britain made sense for this book, Harrison certainly leads the reader to believe that the final book will feature the ultimate conflict between America and Britain. I must say that this idea has lost a great deal of luster. I would rather see new challenges to America's rising power in the world, rather than see yet another volume of America trounce on Britain yet again. Ultimately, Harrison tells and entertaining yarn, that, much like a summer blockbuster film, gets a great deal of mileage out of a cool, larger-than-life concept. Taken in this way, it works just fine. Taken any other way, and it begins to wither. Still, I will read the third book when it comes out, and I am vaguely curious to see how this history could play out over time. For all of its flaws, it is, as I said, a cool concept.
Rating:
Summary: And now for something completely different...
Review: I agree with other reviewers that Mr. Harrison's ideas are interesting, but the manner in which they are put forth are very mediocre and flat. What I noticed most was how in a number of scenes, the author would have two people conversing, and then either change the identity of one of the characters or change their military rank in mid-conversation. It leads me to believe that Mr. Harrison's proof-reader was either not very diligent or didn't exist...or perhaps he gave up. For example, in a conversation between General Bragg and a major of the 29th Connecticut, the general refers to the major as a major, until he says something to the effect of, "grab your bag captain." This happens several other times. In his previous book in this series, a conversation between President Lincoln and Secretary of State Seward became a conversation between Lincoln and Secretary of War Stanton. This book and it's series is a quick, breezy read. They should not be taken for anything else but that. The historical element to this series is paper thin. The laughable way the author puts American leaders on a pedestal and the British in the gutter reminds me of a really bad World War Two movie where all the Americans are big strapping boys from the Midwest and Brooklyn, while all the Japanese are buck-toothed, wear coke bottle bottom eyeglasses, and speak pidgin English. Bad Britain, bad, bad Britain.
Rating:
Summary: waterlogged
Review: I am truly glad I did not purchase this one at full price. I only regret what I wasted buying it. I thought the first novel of this series was pathetic. This one is not up to that standard. The story line of this one is as waterlogged as the Merrimac's engines the author arranges to have salvaged and put into another ship, and just as bad in performance. It gets nowhere for me.
Rating:
Summary: waterlogged
Review: I am truly glad I did not purchase this one at full price. I only regret what I wasted buying it. I thought the first novel of this series was pathetic. This one is not up to that standard. The story line of this one is as waterlogged as the Merrimac's engines the author arranges to have salvaged and put into another ship, and just as bad in performance. It gets nowhere for me.
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