I always try to keep a few books on hand to read when I finish the latest book. I especially like alt-history books, and think it might be fun to read some of the very earliest books. Any suggestions?
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Some fun alternative-history suggestions?
- Thread starter Laer Carroll
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Very earliest? Do you mean non recent novels (or very early historical deviations)?
Temeraire is historical Napoleonic deviation...with dragons. So maybe not your thing if you prefer SF. I'm guessin gyou've read Man in thte High Castle already? Esp now that it's a big flashy tv show.
Temeraire is historical Napoleonic deviation...with dragons. So maybe not your thing if you prefer SF. I'm guessin gyou've read Man in thte High Castle already? Esp now that it's a big flashy tv show.
I'm currently reading The Conqueror's Saga by Kiersten White. The first book, And I Darken, was published in 2016, and the second, which I am almost done with, Now I Rise, was just published a few weeks ago. They are YA. These are a re-imagining of Vlad Dracula (Vlad the Impaler) as a girl, and her struggle to claim the Wallachian throne. It takes place mid-fifteenth century, and the second book is split between Lada (the female Vlad) and her brother, who's story tells of the fall of Constantinople by the invading Ottomans under Mehmed II. I like the way Islam is presented in these books.
I liked Mary Robinette Kowal's Glamourist History series (Regency England with magic).
Also, if you don't mind YA, Malorie Black's Noughts and Crosses series.
Also, if you don't mind YA, Malorie Black's Noughts and Crosses series.
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I've always been a fan of dinosaurs, so I can't recommend West of Eden enough. It's set in a world where the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs never hit.
I meant in real life, what were some of the earliest alt-history novels? I'm fairly aware of recent writing, as I'd guess most of are in this forum. But the older material, not that much. I'd like to hear recommendations for those books. (One of the things I like about Amazon is that it has a lot of third-party sellers and used-book stores online selling books no longer in print. And Amazon polices them well. I've never had a problem with them over more than a dozen years.)
The Tem series seems to me to be SF, or at least fantasy that hews very closely to SF in that the fantastic is very realistically worked out. Naomi Novik never explicitly describes the technical basis for how the dragons can fly, but I can easily suspend belief because everything that surrounds the dragons seems so realistic. She follows the guideline Robert Heinlein once suggested: allow only one impossible element of your story.
I do prefer SF, but I'd also love some alt-history fantasy.
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Not a book, but check out QuantumBranching at DeviantArt. B Munro's been making maps like this for years!
The Battle of Hastings has always been of interest to me. I had always wondered what it would have been like if Harold II had won. Another interesting avenue would be if Queen Elizabeth I had had children. Would be interesting to explore.