How I Spent Some of My Time Away from McHenry County Blog

The answer is simple.

Reading novels.

Every since I found Harry Turtledove’s “Guns of the South,” I’ve been hooked on a genre of science fiction that I previously did not know existed–

Alternative History

In “Guns of the South,” a time traveler from our time is transported to the South during the Civil War. He brings an AK-47, which the author posits the Confederates are capable of producing. You can imagine what would happen, right?

So “alternative history” takes what has happened, changes the assumptions and runs with them the way students play out geometry problems.

Time travel is not always involved. Turtledove has a series of books based on the assumption that the South won the Civil War. He takes it through World War II.

Next I found Eric Flint’s “1632.” A sphere one mile in diameter is transported from West Virginia to Germany. That mean coal and oil came, too. The clash of cultures with Grantville residents starting a new country, the United States of Europe, has made it to “1634: The Ram Rebellion” with the help of co-authors. A series of “Grantville Gazettes.” mainly written by others spinning out Flint’s “Ring of Fire” thesis, has followed.

Right before I was prohibited for unknown reasons from publishing McHenry County Blog on Google’s Blogger, I discovered S.M. Stirling’s Nantucket series:

“Island in the Sea of Time”
“Against the Tide of Years”

“On the Oceans of Eternity”

I picked one up at Crystal Lake’s Border’s, read the premise:

“During a perfect spring evening on Nantucket a violent storm erupts and a dome of crawling, colored fire blankets the island. When the howling winds subside and the night skies clear, the stars appear to have shifted. The mainland has become a wilderness of unbroken forest, where tools of bronze and stone liter the beaches , and primitive natives scatter in terror.

“A startling phenomenon has occurred: the island of Nantucket has been swept into the long-ago past. With its inhabitants adrif in the year 1250 B.C., there is only one question to be answered: Can they survive.”

It sounded intriguing, so I bought all three.

I finished the last one right before my blog’s domain name was transferred to a new hosting service.

Oh, yes, I also was able to put six inches of extra insulation into the closets under the eaves of our bedroom. It holds heat much better now than it has for the last eleven years.


Comments

How I Spent Some of My Time Away from McHenry County Blog — 3 Comments

  1. I like your new format–however, the print is small and light colored–which makes it difficult to read.

  2. You can enlarge the print size by clicking on the keys control and +.

  3. I had high hopes for Turtledove, but I was disappointed in where he went with things. The next book I want to spend time with is “The War After Armageddon”. Need to get used to the new format, but I like it.

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