Worldwar: Tilting the Balance by Harry S. Turtledove

Ok, so I wasn't all that enthused about the first book in this series by Turtledove, but the selection was slim at the library, and I'd kinda gotten caught up in a couple of the characters' stories, so I decided to keep on reading.

In this second book, The Race, a bunch of lizard men bent on conquering Earth, has been brought somewhat to a standstill by the unorthodox tactics of humans around the globe, and the advent of winter, which the cold-blooded lizzies can't tolerate as well as the mammals. The former Axis and Allies have managed to capture some of The Race's war machinery, and are trying to comprehend its technology - solid state circuitry, ceramic alloys, hydrogen fuel, and have also captured a sample of plutonium, from which the Germans, Russians, Americans and Japanese are feverishly trying to create an atomic bomb which they can use to stop the relentless lizards.

The lizards have another unforeseen problem in their conquest. Many of their males have become addicted to ginger. This earth spice has an effect similar to cocaine on their metabolism - a feeling of excitement, invincibility and euphoria. It is also immediately physically and psychologically addictive for them. Understandably, soldiers under the effects of ginger suffer from impaired judgement in combat, which isn't helping their cause.

Turtledove manages to kill off some of our favorite humans in this book, though I won't spoil it by telling you which ones. This book still leaps around the globe quickly, changing POV at will, but the sections are now longer, I think, possibly because he's managed to downsize the POV pool by attrition.
Anyway, a solid but uninspiring read.

Worldwar: In the Balance by Harry S. Turtledove

Quite a while back, I purchased and read Turtledove's The Case of the Toxic Spell Dump, which I really enjoyed. I've kept an eye out ever since for another book in the same venue, but haven't run across one. What I have seen from him, however, is a ton of alternate history novels, in various series. I'm not a huge fan of alternate history, with the notable exceptions being Stirling's Drakon series, and Frankowski's Conrad books (more of a Connecticut Yankee thing, actually), so I haven't ever read any of them.

Well, any port in a drought, so to speak. The pickings were slim at the library last week, so I figured I'd try one. Worldwar is a tale of alien invasion, set in the middle of World War II. A lizard-like race of alien invaders shows up, figuring the internal division of Earth's population will make them easy pickings. Actually, they miscalculated from the start, as their most recent probes showed earth natives at the spear and club level of weaponry.

While the alien invasion doesn't totally eliminate all of the Axis' and Allies' opposition towards one another (they all appear to be planning to turn upon one another as soon as the lizards are defeated), most of the nations on Earth quickly turn the bulk of their energies to fighting the invaders. Ok, as far as alternate history mingling with the alien invasion meme is concerned, this is a reasonably amusing read, but there's basically no new ideas, no new plot devices, no new anything. It's merely a way to kill some time without destroying brain cells.

I think I've mentioned before how much I dislike multiple POV books. This is probably the most extreme MPOV novel I've ever read. However, given the premise, it's the only real way to handle things in a novel of this scope. The novel follows the fortunes of several minor league ball players in the US who get "drafted" to fight the aliens, and end up in widely varied locations. There are Jewish victims of Nazi oppression and abuse, Polish freedom fighters, a Soviet pilot and foreign secretary, a couple of German panzer crewmen, British radar operators, Chinese villagers, American scientists and even lizard POWs whose stories get told.
Call me a fool, but I enjoyed this one just enough to pick up the next in the series, Tilting the Balance. Of course, it was another lean day at the library.

The Misplaced Legion by Harry Turtledove

Review written January, 2000

Well, this is the first book I've read by Turtledove, and it seems to me that it has some promise. This is the first in a series called the Videssos Cycle, and I'm hoping that as I continue to read through the cycle, things will continue to improve. If not, I'll let you know.
 
The book begins with a legion of Roman soldiers who have invaded Gaul being sucked into some sort of interdimensional portal because of the clash of two druidic swords weilded by their leader and the leader of the Gauls. They arrive in the land of Videssos, where magic works, and the Videssians are involved in a titanic conflict with the barbarians who worship the evil god of darkness and cold - while they, of course, worship the god of light and warmth.
 
The empire of Videssos has some wonderfully scheming courtiers and bureaucrats, and while the Romans rapidly hire on as mercenaries for the current emperor, it's not automatically apparent that they've made the right choice. Turtledove has chosen to use some Greek-sounding names for most of the Videssians, and sometimes it's a little tough identifying the players without a scorecard, but the plotting keeps things interesting during the first two-thirds of the book, which would otherwise be seriously lacking in action.
 
We really don't get a taste of battle till the very end of this novel, but I've got to assume there's a lot more in store in the rest of the series. Turtledove seems to shy away from graphic depictions of either violence or sex, so these books make the "G" rating for younger readers.
 
Bottom line - not awesome, but amusing, so if you can pick up a copy at the used bookstore, it'd probably be best for all concerned.

The Case of the Toxic Spell Dump by Harry S. Turtledove

I'd been searching the used book stores here in town, trying to find the next book in the Videssos Cycle, by Turtledove, and had little success. Actually, none whatsoever. So, when I saw a standalone novel by Turtledove that I figured I could read without feeling too guilty, I grabbed it.
 
The Case of the Toxic Spell Dump is just pure fun. If you like puns and figuring out twisted references in a slightly skewed reality, this book is for you. The underlying assumption of this novel is that magic has taken the place of technology in the world from the very beginning, in an astonishing case of societal and political parallel evolution.
 
There are telephones that are powered by an imp at each end, sending their messages through the Other Side. There are flyways (freeways) in A.C. (Angel City, the analog of Los Angeles) clogged with magic carpets at rush hour. All medicine is performed by magic potions and healing spirits. Water elementals keep A.C. green via acqueducts from the mountains, Poseidon handles wastewater processing, and most of the gods, demons and other mythological creatures are alive and well.
 
I think it was Clarke's Law that stated that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable in its effects from magic. Well, Turtledove's corollary to that law would seem to be that sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology in its effects, both good and bad. In The Case of the Toxic Spell Dump, we get to learn quite a lot about the side effects of powerful spells used in advanced magical technology.
 
Inspector Fisher of the EPA (Environmental Perfection Agency) gets a tip from a friend in high places that there may be something dangerous leaking from a containment facility in the Saint Ferdinand Valley north of A.C. During the course of his investigation, things begin to heat up rapidly.
 
This is a pretty good yarn, especially if you're into deciphering subtle - and sometimes unsubtle - plays upon words.