Intellectual futurism, 09 Nov 2007
I read this book a little while ago and while it can be heavy going in places especially where political dogma features heavily, many many of the concepts and ideas put forward as to what might happen in the next 200 years are not only plausible but will keep you thinking for months afterwards.

I've not read anything quite like it before. Highly recommended.

Cheers, GH

Best future history ever!, 13 Feb 2003
I am quite new to this genre of writing, but have already read several books based on alternate historys and possible futures. This book is simply the best i have read by far. The content is scientifically enough based to make it believeable and yet not overly so, so as to keep the book interesting. This book arrived from amazon in the morning and i'd finished it by bedtime. Amazing read and especially good if you are new to this style of writing.

Magnifique!!!, 17 Dec 1998
Dr. Warren Wagar creates an exciting adventure into the world of plausible futures. He colorfully combines fact and narrative to strengthen the possibility of a nuclear disaster in the year 2044. Wagar warns of the power of the capital intensive market leading to a monopolistic rule. He skillfully conveys the destructive consequences of a few multi-national corporations yielding control over the disempowered working class. Overall, the story was a fantastic, well-constructed thriller intended to stimulate interest into the ever-growing field of futurism.

Enjoyable on many levels, it gets you thinking for months, 30 Sep 1998
ASHOTF is one of the best books I have ever read, and the most influential (Structure of Scientific Revolutions and A History of the Balkans are the others), it doesn't leave you.

Enjoyably at the end of every section, there are personal notes from "ancestors" of the authors. Also included are some major political characters from obscurity to leadership, as well as the define and fall of nations. ASHOTF manages to perfectly meld a family history, a history of nations, and a discussion on philosophy while seeming to be neither. It makes you see everybody, from your parents to Jefferson, Marx, and Mao, in a new light.

An extraordinarily plausible glimpse into the future, 20 May 1998
I would not be at all surprised if the future contains many of the possibilities outlined in Dr. Wagar's book. More than just an exercise in creating scenarios, the book attempts to ask--and answer--philosophical questions about who we may become as a species. In three sections, Dr. Wagar applies the philosophies of capitalism, socialism, and anarchism, searching out their strengths and weaknesses as means toward the end of human realization. Along the way, many other topics are covered, such as space exploration, genetic engineering, nuclear war in the year 2044, ecological breakdown and renewal, and the transformation of marriage and the family. This is a book in the grand tradition of Olaf Stapledon, but more accessible to contemporary readers. Dr. Wagar has made an important contribution not just to imaginative literature, but to the whole field of human thought and human possibility. You will view the world differently after reading this book.

Intellectual futurism, 09 Nov 2007
I read this book a little while ago and while it can be heavy going in places especially where political dogma features heavily, many many of the concepts and ideas put forward as to what might happen in the next 200 years are not only plausible but will keep you thinking for months afterwards.

I've not read anything quite like it before. Highly recommended.

Cheers, GH

Best future history ever!, 13 Feb 2003
I am quite new to this genre of writing, but have already read several books based on alternate historys and possible futures. This book is simply the best i have read by far. The content is scientifically enough based to make it believeable and yet not overly so, so as to keep the book interesting. This book arrived from amazon in the morning and i'd finished it by bedtime. Amazing read and especially good if you are new to this style of writing.

Magnifique!!!, 17 Dec 1998
Dr. Warren Wagar creates an exciting adventure into the world of plausible futures. He colorfully combines fact and narrative to strengthen the possibility of a nuclear disaster in the year 2044. Wagar warns of the power of the capital intensive market leading to a monopolistic rule. He skillfully conveys the destructive consequences of a few multi-national corporations yielding control over the disempowered working class. Overall, the story was a fantastic, well-constructed thriller intended to stimulate interest into the ever-growing field of futurism.

Enjoyable on many levels, it gets you thinking for months, 30 Sep 1998
ASHOTF is one of the best books I have ever read, and the most influential (Structure of Scientific Revolutions and A History of the Balkans are the others), it doesn't leave you.

Enjoyably at the end of every section, there are personal notes from "ancestors" of the authors. Also included are some major political characters from obscurity to leadership, as well as the define and fall of nations. ASHOTF manages to perfectly meld a family history, a history of nations, and a discussion on philosophy while seeming to be neither. It makes you see everybody, from your parents to Jefferson, Marx, and Mao, in a new light.

An extraordinarily plausible glimpse into the future, 20 May 1998
I would not be at all surprised if the future contains many of the possibilities outlined in Dr. Wagar's book. More than just an exercise in creating scenarios, the book attempts to ask--and answer--philosophical questions about who we may become as a species. In three sections, Dr. Wagar applies the philosophies of capitalism, socialism, and anarchism, searching out their strengths and weaknesses as means toward the end of human realization. Along the way, many other topics are covered, such as space exploration, genetic engineering, nuclear war in the year 2044, ecological breakdown and renewal, and the transformation of marriage and the family. This is a book in the grand tradition of Olaf Stapledon, but more accessible to contemporary readers. Dr. Wagar has made an important contribution not just to imaginative literature, but to the whole field of human thought and human possibility. You will view the world differently after reading this book.

Thought-provoking, 19 Mar 2008
This volume concentrates on US history, and is generally pretty good - the one real dud is an essay on "What if Pearl Harbour hadn't happened?" which concludes that nothing would have been very different except that the Pacific War would have been six months late. The other Second World War essay is a bit more exciting but also concludes that it wouldn't have made much difference if Eisenhower had gone for Berlin.

There are no less than four essays on the Civil War, one of which is James McPherson's reprint from the first volume on "What if the South had won?", but the other three taking interesting tacks: one (by the dubious Victor Davis Hanson) credits Lew Wallace's personal disgrace at the battle of Shiloh with his later creation of the popular epic novel in Ben-Hur; one looking at the potential for insurrection against the Lincoln administration in what we now call the Mid-West, and one speculating (a bit chaotically) about the possibilities for continued insurgency in the context of Andrew Johnson as well as Abraham Lincoln being assassinated.

Two of the pieces are written from the counterfactual perspective first used, I think, by Winston Churchill in his 1931 essay "If Lee had not Won the Battle of Gettysburg". The one on how the Cuban missile crisis turned into a global nuclear war is rather conventional stuff; but Andrew Roberts' piece explaining the origins and course of the 1896 war between the USA and Britain is the pick of the book for me, although I don't quite agree on the likelihood of the US being given Quebec in a peace settlement; much more likely what happened in the 1885 Serbo-Bulgarian War, both sides being returned to the status quo ante.

The other piece that particularly caught my eye was on John Tyler, the first Vice-President to succeed to the Presidency after the death of his running-mate. Tom Wicker points out that Tyler's accession was far from assured by a strict reading of the constitution, and that the policies he pursued in office, in particular on the annexation of Texas, were crucial in their importance to the future of the country and not likely to have been pursued as successfully by any other potential president of the day. Tyler is much more interesting than I had realised, and the story has an exploding cannon as well, which in February 1844 killed numerous senior officials, one of whose grieving daughters found comfort in the arms of the recently widowed President Tyler, who married her four months later. (One of their grandsons is still alive.)

Anyway, a good collection for the history buff.

The Road Not Taken, 04 Dec 2003
History is often written as if outcomes were inevitable, as if the 13 Colonies were ordained to win the American Revolution or the Union to prevail in the Civil War. But history is contingent, and the only way to fully appreciate the significance of a given event is to think about what might have happened if things had turned out differently.

At first, I was a little put off by the "What If?" series of books, thinking the essays were probably more like works of science fiction than reliable articles about history. For the most part, I was mistaken, and I recommend this book and its prequels ("What If?" and "What If2?") to anyone seeking a better understanding of some of history's conspicuous turning points.

The essays generally fall into three categories. The first, which I enjoy the most, explain the historical context of a given occurrence and then engage in limited (but very illuminating) speculation about what might have happened if that event hadn't turned out the way it did. Examples of this type include Theodore Rabb's "Might the Mayflower Not Have Sailed" and John Lukac's "No Pearl Harbor?: FDR Delays the War."

Other essays also offer up the historical context but move on to engage in much bolder speculation. An example is Caleb Carr's "William Pitt the Elder and the Avoidance of the American Revolution," which explores a cascade of assumptions about how the 19th and 20th centuries would have been different if Britain had kept the 13 Colonies (the intriguing conclusion being that the world might have been better off). The problem with this approach is that it assumes that events in the rest of the world would have stayed on more or less the same path notwithstanding a dramatic change in the outcome of the American Revolution. This enables Carr to speculate, for example, on a 19th century summit between Disraeli and Bismarck, but I wonder if either of those two persons would have played the same role in history had the events of the late 18th century been much different than what they actually were.

The final type of essay dives right into the counterfactual world without clearly setting out the historical context. Examples are Andrew Roberts "The Whale and the Wolf, " which immediately launches into a history of a hypothetical Anglo-American War of 1896 and Ted Morgan's "Joe McCarthy's Secret Life," a tongue-in-cheek speculation that McCarthy was really a Soviet spy. For my tastes, the problem with these essays is that they do not distinguish carefully between what did and didn't actually happen, which means that the reader is less likely to learn about history than about the author's speculations.

On the whole, "What Ifs? of American History" is a very entertaining and readable book. If you enjoy it, consider getting the other two "What If" books, as well as Victor David Hanson's recent "Ripples of Battle" (which shares many features with the "What If?" series).

Intellectual futurism, 09 Nov 2007
I read this book a little while ago and while it can be heavy going in places especially where political dogma features heavily, many many of the concepts and ideas put forward as to what might happen in the next 200 years are not only plausible but will keep you thinking for months afterwards.

I've not read anything quite like it before. Highly recommended.

Cheers, GH

Best future history ever!, 13 Feb 2003
I am quite new to this genre of writing, but have already read several books based on alternate historys and possible futures. This book is simply the best i have read by far. The content is scientifically enough based to make it believeable and yet not overly so, so as to keep the book interesting. This book arrived from amazon in the morning and i'd finished it by bedtime. Amazing read and especially good if you are new to this style of writing.

Magnifique!!!, 17 Dec 1998
Dr. Warren Wagar creates an exciting adventure into the world of plausible futures. He colorfully combines fact and narrative to strengthen the possibility of a nuclear disaster in the year 2044. Wagar warns of the power of the capital intensive market leading to a monopolistic rule. He skillfully conveys the destructive consequences of a few multi-national corporations yielding control over the disempowered working class. Overall, the story was a fantastic, well-constructed thriller intended to stimulate interest into the ever-growing field of futurism.

Enjoyable on many levels, it gets you thinking for months, 30 Sep 1998
ASHOTF is one of the best books I have ever read, and the most influential (Structure of Scientific Revolutions and A History of the Balkans are the others), it doesn't leave you.

Enjoyably at the end of every section, there are personal notes from "ancestors" of the authors. Also included are some major political characters from obscurity to leadership, as well as the define and fall of nations. ASHOTF manages to perfectly meld a family history, a history of nations, and a discussion on philosophy while seeming to be neither. It makes you see everybody, from your parents to Jefferson, Marx, and Mao, in a new light.

An extraordinarily plausible glimpse into the future, 20 May 1998
I would not be at all surprised if the future contains many of the possibilities outlined in Dr. Wagar's book. More than just an exercise in creating scenarios, the book attempts to ask--and answer--philosophical questions about who we may become as a species. In three sections, Dr. Wagar applies the philosophies of capitalism, socialism, and anarchism, searching out their strengths and weaknesses as means toward the end of human realization. Along the way, many other topics are covered, such as space exploration, genetic engineering, nuclear war in the year 2044, ecological breakdown and renewal, and the transformation of marriage and the family. This is a book in the grand tradition of Olaf Stapledon, but more accessible to contemporary readers. Dr. Wagar has made an important contribution not just to imaginative literature, but to the whole field of human thought and human possibility. You will view the world differently after reading this book.

Thought-provoking, 19 Mar 2008
This volume concentrates on US history, and is generally pretty good - the one real dud is an essay on "What if Pearl Harbour hadn't happened?" which concludes that nothing would have been very different except that the Pacific War would have been six months late. The other Second World War essay is a bit more exciting but also concludes that it wouldn't have made much difference if Eisenhower had gone for Berlin.

There are no less than four essays on the Civil War, one of which is James McPherson's reprint from the first volume on "What if the South had won?", but the other three taking interesting tacks: one (by the dubious Victor Davis Hanson) credits Lew Wallace's personal disgrace at the battle of Shiloh with his later creation of the popular epic novel in Ben-Hur; one looking at the potential for insurrection against the Lincoln administration in what we now call the Mid-West, and one speculating (a bit chaotically) about the possibilities for continued insurgency in the context of Andrew Johnson as well as Abraham Lincoln being assassinated.

Two of the pieces are written from the counterfactual perspective first used, I think, by Winston Churchill in his 1931 essay "If Lee had not Won the Battle of Gettysburg". The one on how the Cuban missile crisis turned into a global nuclear war is rather conventional stuff; but Andrew Roberts' piece explaining the origins and course of the 1896 war between the USA and Britain is the pick of the book for me, although I don't quite agree on the likelihood of the US being given Quebec in a peace settlement; much more likely what happened in the 1885 Serbo-Bulgarian War, both sides being returned to the status quo ante.

The other piece that particularly caught my eye was on John Tyler, the first Vice-President to succeed to the Presidency after the death of his running-mate. Tom Wicker points out that Tyler's accession was far from assured by a strict reading of the constitution, and that the policies he pursued in office, in particular on the annexation of Texas, were crucial in their importance to the future of the country and not likely to have been pursued as successfully by any other potential president of the day. Tyler is much more interesting than I had realised, and the story has an exploding cannon as well, which in February 1844 killed numerous senior officials, one of whose grieving daughters found comfort in the arms of the recently widowed President Tyler, who married her four months later. (One of their grandsons is still alive.)

Anyway, a good collection for the history buff.

The Road Not Taken, 04 Dec 2003
History is often written as if outcomes were inevitable, as if the 13 Colonies were ordained to win the American Revolution or the Union to prevail in the Civil War. But history is contingent, and the only way to fully appreciate the significance of a given event is to think about what might have happened if things had turned out differently.

At first, I was a little put off by the "What If?" series of books, thinking the essays were probably more like works of science fiction than reliable articles about history. For the most part, I was mistaken, and I recommend this book and its prequels ("What If?" and "What If2?") to anyone seeking a better understanding of some of history's conspicuous turning points.

The essays generally fall into three categories. The first, which I enjoy the most, explain the historical context of a given occurrence and then engage in limited (but very illuminating) speculation about what might have happened if that event hadn't turned out the way it did. Examples of this type include Theodore Rabb's "Might the Mayflower Not Have Sailed" and John Lukac's "No Pearl Harbor?: FDR Delays the War."

Other essays also offer up the historical context but move on to engage in much bolder speculation. An example is Caleb Carr's "William Pitt the Elder and the Avoidance of the American Revolution," which explores a cascade of assumptions about how the 19th and 20th centuries would have been different if Britain had kept the 13 Colonies (the intriguing conclusion being that the world might have been better off). The problem with this approach is that it assumes that events in the rest of the world would have stayed on more or less the same path notwithstanding a dramatic change in the outcome of the American Revolution. This enables Carr to speculate, for example, on a 19th century summit between Disraeli and Bismarck, but I wonder if either of those two persons would have played the same role in history had the events of the late 18th century been much different than what they actually were.

The final type of essay dives right into the counterfactual world without clearly setting out the historical context. Examples are Andrew Roberts "The Whale and the Wolf, " which immediately launches into a history of a hypothetical Anglo-American War of 1896 and Ted Morgan's "Joe McCarthy's Secret Life," a tongue-in-cheek speculation that McCarthy was really a Soviet spy. For my tastes, the problem with these essays is that they do not distinguish carefully between what did and didn't actually happen, which means that the reader is less likely to learn about history than about the author's speculations.

On the whole, "What Ifs? of American History" is a very entertaining and readable book. If you enjoy it, consider getting the other two "What If" books, as well as Victor David Hanson's recent "Ripples of Battle" (which shares many features with the "What If?" series).

An interesting academic study of alternative history, 06 Jan 2007
Rosenfeld has created an interesting academic study of the fascination we have with the idea with "What if?" This books obviously focuses on the idea of if Hitler had won the war. More specifically; If Hitler had won the war (and also if Britain had made peace with Germany, if Hitler had escaped at the end of the war and various questions around the Holocaust.

As Rosenfeld himself points out these hypothetical questions can never be satisfactorily addressed because Germany lost the war, Hitler killed himself and the tragedy of the Holocaust did happen. But nonetheless these ideas do fascinate a large number of people and Rosenfeld brings together all the novels, programmes and films that have covered this idea, people like Harris, Turtledove and Deighton and numerous historians, and he examines their impact and how the portrayal of the Germans has shifted over the years.

An interesting study for anyone interested in this genre of fiction or modern history.

Intellectual futurism, 09 Nov 2007
I read this book a little while ago and while it can be heavy going in places especially where political dogma features heavily, many many of the concepts and ideas put forward as to what might happen in the next 200 years are not only plausible but will keep you thinking for months afterwards.

I've not read anything quite like it before. Highly recommended.

Cheers, GH

Best future history ever!, 13 Feb 2003
I am quite new to this genre of writing, but have already read several books based on alternate historys and possible futures. This book is simply the best i have read by far. The content is scientifically enough based to make it believeable and yet not overly so, so as to keep the book interesting. This book arrived from amazon in the morning and i'd finished it by bedtime. Amazing read and especially good if you are new to this style of writing.

Magnifique!!!, 17 Dec 1998
Dr. Warren Wagar creates an exciting adventure into the world of plausible futures. He colorfully combines fact and narrative to strengthen the possibility of a nuclear disaster in the year 2044. Wagar warns of the power of the capital intensive market leading to a monopolistic rule. He skillfully conveys the destructive consequences of a few multi-national corporations yielding control over the disempowered working class. Overall, the story was a fantastic, well-constructed thriller intended to stimulate interest into the ever-growing field of futurism.

Enjoyable on many levels, it gets you thinking for months, 30 Sep 1998
ASHOTF is one of the best books I have ever read, and the most influential (Structure of Scientific Revolutions and A History of the Balkans are the others), it doesn't leave you.

Enjoyably at the end of every section, there are personal notes from "ancestors" of the authors. Also included are some major political characters from obscurity to leadership, as well as the define and fall of nations. ASHOTF manages to perfectly meld a family history, a history of nations, and a discussion on philosophy while seeming to be neither. It makes you see everybody, from your parents to Jefferson, Marx, and Mao, in a new light.

An extraordinarily plausible glimpse into the future, 20 May 1998
I would not be at all surprised if the future contains many of the possibilities outlined in Dr. Wagar's book. More than just an exercise in creating scenarios, the book attempts to ask--and answer--philosophical questions about who we may become as a species. In three sections, Dr. Wagar applies the philosophies of capitalism, socialism, and anarchism, searching out their strengths and weaknesses as means toward the end of human realization. Along the way, many other topics are covered, such as space exploration, genetic engineering, nuclear war in the year 2044, ecological breakdown and renewal, and the transformation of marriage and the family. This is a book in the grand tradition of Olaf Stapledon, but more accessible to contemporary readers. Dr. Wagar has made an important contribution not just to imaginative literature, but to the whole field of human thought and human possibility. You will view the world differently after reading this book.

Thought-provoking, 19 Mar 2008
This volume concentrates on US history, and is generally pretty good - the one real dud is an essay on "What if Pearl Harbour hadn't happened?" which concludes that nothing would have been very different except that the Pacific War would have been six months late. The other Second World War essay is a bit more exciting but also concludes that it wouldn't have made much difference if Eisenhower had gone for Berlin.

There are no less than four essays on the Civil War, one of which is James McPherson's reprint from the first volume on "What if the South had won?", but the other three taking interesting tacks: one (by the dubious Victor Davis Hanson) credits Lew Wallace's personal disgrace at the battle of Shiloh with his later creation of the popular epic novel in Ben-Hur; one looking at the potential for insurrection against the Lincoln administration in what we now call the Mid-West, and one speculating (a bit chaotically) about the possibilities for continued insurgency in the context of Andrew Johnson as well as Abraham Lincoln being assassinated.

Two of the pieces are written from the counterfactual perspective first used, I think, by Winston Churchill in his 1931 essay "If Lee had not Won the Battle of Gettysburg". The one on how the Cuban missile crisis turned into a global nuclear war is rather conventional stuff; but Andrew Roberts' piece explaining the origins and course of the 1896 war between the USA and Britain is the pick of the book for me, although I don't quite agree on the likelihood of the US being given Quebec in a peace settlement; much more likely what happened in the 1885 Serbo-Bulgarian War, both sides being returned to the status quo ante.

The other piece that particularly caught my eye was on John Tyler, the first Vice-President to succeed to the Presidency after the death of his running-mate. Tom Wicker points out that Tyler's accession was far from assured by a strict reading of the constitution, and that the policies he pursued in office, in particular on the annexation of Texas, were crucial in their importance to the future of the country and not likely to have been pursued as successfully by any other potential president of the day. Tyler is much more interesting than I had realised, and the story has an exploding cannon as well, which in February 1844 killed numerous senior officials, one of whose grieving daughters found comfort in the arms of the recently widowed President Tyler, who married her four months later. (One of their grandsons is still alive.)

Anyway, a good collection for the history buff.

The Road Not Taken, 04 Dec 2003
History is often written as if outcomes were inevitable, as if the 13 Colonies were ordained to win the American Revolution or the Union to prevail in the Civil War. But history is contingent, and the only way to fully appreciate the significance of a given event is to think about what might have happened if things had turned out differently.

At first, I was a little put off by the "What If?" series of books, thinking the essays were probably more like works of science fiction than reliable articles about history. For the most part, I was mistaken, and I recommend this book and its prequels ("What If?" and "What If2?") to anyone seeking a better understanding of some of history's conspicuous turning points.

The essays generally fall into three categories. The first, which I enjoy the most, explain the historical context of a given occurrence and then engage in limited (but very illuminating) speculation about what might have happened if that event hadn't turned out the way it did. Examples of this type include Theodore Rabb's "Might the Mayflower Not Have Sailed" and John Lukac's "No Pearl Harbor?: FDR Delays the War."

Other essays also offer up the historical context but move on to engage in much bolder speculation. An example is Caleb Carr's "William Pitt the Elder and the Avoidance of the American Revolution," which explores a cascade of assumptions about how the 19th and 20th centuries would have been different if Britain had kept the 13 Colonies (the intriguing conclusion being that the world might have been better off). The problem with this approach is that it assumes that events in the rest of the world would have stayed on more or less the same path notwithstanding a dramatic change in the outcome of the American Revolution. This enables Carr to speculate, for example, on a 19th century summit between Disraeli and Bismarck, but I wonder if either of those two persons would have played the same role in history had the events of the late 18th century been much different than what they actually were.

The final type of essay dives right into the counterfactual world without clearly setting out the historical context. Examples are Andrew Roberts "The Whale and the Wolf, " which immediately launches into a history of a hypothetical Anglo-American War of 1896 and Ted Morgan's "Joe McCarthy's Secret Life," a tongue-in-cheek speculation that McCarthy was really a Soviet spy. For my tastes, the problem with these essays is that they do not distinguish carefully between what did and didn't actually happen, which means that the reader is less likely to learn about history than about the author's speculations.

On the whole, "What Ifs? of American History" is a very entertaining and readable book. If you enjoy it, consider getting the other two "What If" books, as well as Victor David Hanson's recent "Ripples of Battle" (which shares many features with the "What If?" series).

An interesting academic study of alternative history, 06 Jan 2007
Rosenfeld has created an interesting academic study of the fascination we have with the idea with "What if?" This books obviously focuses on the idea of if Hitler had won the war. More specifically; If Hitler had won the war (and also if Britain had made peace with Germany, if Hitler had escaped at the end of the war and various questions around the Holocaust.

As Rosenfeld himself points out these hypothetical questions can never be satisfactorily addressed because Germany lost the war, Hitler killed himself and the tragedy of the Holocaust did happen. But nonetheless these ideas do fascinate a large number of people and Rosenfeld brings together all the novels, programmes and films that have covered this idea, people like Harris, Turtledove and Deighton and numerous historians, and he examines their impact and how the portrayal of the Germans has shifted over the years.

An interesting study for anyone interested in this genre of fiction or modern history.

only 4 or 5 good stories out of 16!, 11 Jul 2001
This collection of 16 short stories was profoundly disappointing, if only because I expect better from something with Turtledove's name on it. There is a certain expectation when reading alternate history that either the the events and/or people being tinkered with are so familiar that they need no introduction, or that a small introduction will be given to set up the story (not to mention maps). Unfortunately that was not the case here, as a number of the stories used rather obscure incidents and people as their basis, and there was no corresponding supplementary material. It also doesn't help expectations when the jacket copy is about scenarios that aren't in the book. Add some rather tepid writing in a number of cases, and the book got rather tedious.

If you're going to borrow it, there are a few stories worth checking out. Lillian Carl's "The Test of old," focusing on the Romans vs. Boadica, was one of the better stories, albeit somewhat roughly told via the memoirs of an old Roman. S.M. Stirling's, "The Charge of Lee's Light Brigade," has a somewhat interesting premise at least: that Gen. Lee of Civil War fame, instead fights with C.S.A. along with other British forces at Balaclava in a very different Charge of the Light Brigade. Somewhat slyly, Stirling seems to have inserted George MacDonald Fraser's legendary scoundrel and rouge "Flashman" in the story as an homage to the great Scottish writer, which works rather well as Flashman does campaign there in "Flashman at the Charge." Another of the best stories is William Sanders' "Billy Mitchell's Overt Act," in which a military aviation pioneer manages to thwart the attack on Pearl Harbor. Told as a series of excerpts from books, interviews, and testimony, he manages to weave a very engaging tale. The final story, R.M. Meluch's "Vati" is probably the best of the bunch, showing what might have happened had a more imaginative and forceful man taken over German air operations and sped up production of jet aircraft, thus preventing D-Day. It's something the Germans did manage to do at the end of the war, but by then was too little, too late.

As for the rest: "Tradition," by Elizabeth Moon (who's "Deed of Paksenarrion" trilogy I love), suffers from an unknown main character, British WWI Rear Admiral Cradock, a slightly obscure setting, the Mediterranean (more interestingly treated in the historical fiction of John Biggins), and the need to have detailed maps at hand to follow the action. Brad Linaweaver's rather silly "And to the Republic For Which It Stands" imagines an alternate Caesar. Lois Tilton's "The Craft of War" is annoyingly written as a dialogue between Socrates and a student about Sun Tzu's "The Art of War." Jody Nye's "Queen of the Amazons" is a terrible Crusader piece fortunately followed by a competent as usual WWII piece by editor Turtledove. Unfortunately, one then segues into an utter piece of dreck, Esther Friesner's "An Old Man's Summer" featuring the rambling reminisces of a dying Eisenhower. Bill Fawcett's "The Last Crusader" establishes the fun premise of Napoleon as a Cardinal, but doesn't take it anywhere. Even though it didn't particularly engage me, Janet Berliner's "A Case For Justice" is worth mentioning for taking as it's subject, the South African leader Jan Smuts. William Forstchen's "A Hard Day For Mother" folds a cliché "brother vs. brother" Civil War tale into the battle for Round Top Hill at Gettysburg. David Weber's "The Captain From Kirkbeam" is the first of two seafaring stories, his being about a commander trying to blockade French ships from sailing into the Chesapeake Bay during the War for Independence. "Vive L'Amiral," by John Mina imagines Nelson as fighting on the French side, rather than the British, with rather different results, of course. Brian Thomsen's "Bloodstained Ground," is a rather cheezy and weak attempt to show a drunken Samuel Clemens uncovering the hidden truth about "President" Custer and what really happened at Little Big Horn.

So, maybe four or five stories worth reading all told, mixed in with a few more interesting premises, and a lot of bad and just plain boring ones. You're better off checking out Robert Cowley's "What If?: The World's Foremost Military Historians Imagine What Might Have Been."

Some stories illogical and not thought out, 03 Apr 2000
Having read stories by the various authors I thought that a collection of short stories would have contained the best that was on offer, unfortunately I found that, like the curates egg, only some parts were good. There was no story in the book that was outstanding, There were none that was not at some time entertaining. When I read a book I expect to be entertained, certainly in a fiction I do not expect to have to conduct research for my own endings, which I had to do with two of the stories. This was not what I expected and I feel a bit cheated by the whole thing.

Good tales - but author let down by publisher, 31 Mar 2000
The publishers should hang their heads in shame over this one. Look at the cover artwork -- no Romans/Carthaginians-in-tanks stories are actually in the book. Also the lack of explanatory notes which should have accompanied the tales make it harder for the non-history buffs to work out why the alternate endings are just so important. The only good thing about this was it made me go back to my own reference books and check out the American War of Independence, and the flight of the Goeben in the Med at the beginning of WWI - among others. The other point is that too often with some of the stories, they end as a rather flat fleshing-out of a 400-word synopsis. But, yes, I'd still recommend it

It sucked, not a collosal screw-up, but still horrid., 25 Jun 1999
Well there are a couple of good stories in there. The Napoleon being a Cardinal, Nelson siding with Napoleon, Hitler getting jets, and USSR almost collapsing but fighting Nazis in 1947.

Still most stories ran from obscure bull-sh*t to "lets stop being a writer and summate". It featured some interesting premises, but used the familiar device of stopping the story to explain to the reader what happened and how and why.

If you want the truth, only four stories were any good. "The Last Crusdader" by Bill Fawcett. "A Hard Day for Mother" by William R. Forstchen. "Vive l'Admiral" by John Mina. And "Vati" by Meluch.

That's 4 good stories out of 16. Better odds than Vegas, but still a major stink-bomb.

Some deep stuff, but too deep?, 07 Jan 1999
Although the stories in this anthology are on average much better than the stories in the alternate history anthologies edited, e.g., by Mike Resnick a few years ago, the casual reader is nevertheless going to run into trouble when reading this collection. The problem is that the various authors have done too good a job, while the publisher has totally screwed up.

In other words, several of the stories in this anthology are based on "too" obscure historical what-ifs. Unfortunately, as has become well-known by those who closely follow science fiction, it turns out that the introductory notes that were supposed to be included with the stories were left out by the publisher! >So... there is some decent stuff in here. But unlike other recent alternate history collections, the reader is going to have do some more thinking about the stories in order to gather a better appreciation of what the authors put into the tales.

Intellectual futurism, 09 Nov 2007
I read this book a little while ago and while it can be heavy going in places especially where political dogma features heavily, many many of the concepts and ideas put forward as to what might happen in the next 200 years are not only plausible but will keep you thinking for months afterwards.

I've not read anything quite like it before. Highly recommended.

Cheers, GH

Best future history ever!, 13 Feb 2003
I am quite new to this genre of writing, but have already read several books based on alternate historys and possible futures. This book is simply the best i have read by far. The content is scientifically enough based to make it believeable and yet not overly so, so as to keep the book interesting. This book arrived from amazon in the morning and i'd finished it by bedtime. Amazing read and especially good if you are new to this style of writing.

Magnifique!!!, 17 Dec 1998
Dr. Warren Wagar creates an exciting adventure into the world of plausible futures. He colorfully combines fact and narrative to strengthen the possibility of a nuclear disaster in the year 2044. Wagar warns of the power of the capital intensive market leading to a monopolistic rule. He skillfully conveys the destructive consequences of a few multi-national corporations yielding control over the disempowered working class. Overall, the story was a fantastic, well-constructed thriller intended to stimulate interest into the ever-growing field of futurism.

Enjoyable on many levels, it gets you thinking for months, 30 Sep 1998
ASHOTF is one of the best books I have ever read, and the most influential (Structure of Scientific Revolutions and A History of the Balkans are the others), it doesn't leave you.

Enjoyably at the end of every section, there are personal notes from "ancestors" of the authors. Also included are some major political characters from obscurity to leadership, as well as the define and fall of nations. ASHOTF manages to perfectly meld a family history, a history of nations, and a discussion on philosophy while seeming to be neither. It makes you see everybody, from your parents to Jefferson, Marx, and Mao, in a new light.

An extraordinarily plausible glimpse into the future, 20 May 1998
I would not be at all surprised if the future contains many of the possibilities outlined in Dr. Wagar's book. More than just an exercise in creating scenarios, the book attempts to ask--and answer--philosophical questions about who we may become as a species. In three sections, Dr. Wagar applies the philosophies of capitalism, socialism, and anarchism, searching out their strengths and weaknesses as means toward the end of human realization. Along the way, many other topics are covered, such as space exploration, genetic engineering, nuclear war in the year 2044, ecological breakdown and renewal, and the transformation of marriage and the family. This is a book in the grand tradition of Olaf Stapledon, but more accessible to contemporary readers. Dr. Wagar has made an important contribution not just to imaginative literature, but to the whole field of human thought and human possibility. You will view the world differently after reading this book.

Thought-provoking, 19 Mar 2008
This volume concentrates on US history, and is generally pretty good - the one real dud is an essay on "What if Pearl Harbour hadn't happened?" which concludes that nothing would have been very different except that the Pacific War would have been six months late. The other Second World War essay is a bit more exciting but also concludes that it wouldn't have made much difference if Eisenhower had gone for Berlin.

There are no less than four essays on the Civil War, one of which is James McPherson's reprint from the first volume on "What if the South had won?", but the other three taking interesting tacks: one (by the dubious Victor Davis Hanson) credits Lew Wallace's personal disgrace at the battle of Shiloh with his later creation of the popular epic novel in Ben-Hur; one looking at the potential for insurrection against the Lincoln administration in what we now call the Mid-West, and one speculating (a bit chaotically) about the possibilities for continued insurgency in the context of Andrew Johnson as well as Abraham Lincoln being assassinated.

Two of the pieces are written from the counterfactual perspective first used, I think, by Winston Churchill in his 1931 essay "If Lee had not Won the Battle of Gettysburg". The one on how the Cuban missile crisis turned into a global nuclear war is rather conventional stuff; but Andrew Roberts' piece explaining the origins and course of the 1896 war between the USA and Britain is the pick of the book for me, although I don't quite agree on the likelihood of the US being given Quebec in a peace settlement; much more likely what happened in the 1885 Serbo-Bulgarian War, both sides being returned to the status quo ante.

The other piece that particularly caught my eye was on John Tyler, the first Vice-President to succeed to the Presidency after the death of his running-mate. Tom Wicker points out that Tyler's accession was far from assured by a strict reading of the constitution, and that the policies he pursued in office, in particular on the annexation of Texas, were crucial in their importance to the future of the country and not likely to have been pursued as successfully by any other potential president of the day. Tyler is much more interesting than I had realised, and the story has an exploding cannon as well, which in February 1844 killed numerous senior officials, one of whose grieving daughters found comfort in the arms of the recently widowed President Tyler, who married her four months later. (One of their grandsons is still alive.)

Anyway, a good collection for the history buff.

The Road Not Taken, 04 Dec 2003
History is often written as if outcomes were inevitable, as if the 13 Colonies were ordained to win the American Revolution or the Union to prevail in the Civil War. But history is contingent, and the only way to fully appreciate the significance of a given event is to think about what might have happened if things had turned out differently.

At first, I was a little put off by the "What If?" series of books, thinking the essays were probably more like works of science fiction than reliable articles about history. For the most part, I was mistaken, and I recommend this book and its prequels ("What If?" and "What If2?") to anyone seeking a better understanding of some of history's conspicuous turning points.

The essays generally fall into three categories. The first, which I enjoy the most, explain the historical context of a given occurrence and then engage in limited (but very illuminating) speculation about what might have happened if that event hadn't turned out the way it did. Examples of this type include Theodore Rabb's "Might the Mayflower Not Have Sailed" and John Lukac's "No Pearl Harbor?: FDR Delays the War."

Other essays also offer up the historical context but move on to engage in much bolder speculation. An example is Caleb Carr's "William Pitt the Elder and the Avoidance of the American Revolution," which explores a cascade of assumptions about how the 19th and 20th centuries would have been different if Britain had kept the 13 Colonies (the intriguing conclusion being that the world might have been better off). The problem with this approach is that it assumes that events in the rest of the world would have stayed on more or less the same path notwithstanding a dramatic change in the outcome of the American Revolution. This enables Carr to speculate, for example, on a 19th century summit between Disraeli and Bismarck, but I wonder if either of those two persons would have played the same role in history had the events of the late 18th century been much different than what they actually were.

The final type of essay dives right into the counterfactual world without clearly setting out the historical context. Examples are Andrew Roberts "The Whale and the Wolf, " which immediately launches into a history of a hypothetical Anglo-American War of 1896 and Ted Morgan's "Joe McCarthy's Secret Life," a tongue-in-cheek speculation that McCarthy was really a Soviet spy. For my tastes, the problem with these essays is that they do not distinguish carefully between what did and didn't actually happen, which means that the reader is less likely to learn about history than about the author's speculations.

On the whole, "What Ifs? of American History" is a very entertaining and readable book. If you enjoy it, consider getting the other two "What If" books, as well as Victor David Hanson's recent "Ripples of Battle" (which shares many features with the "What If?" series).

An interesting academic study of alternative history, 06 Jan 2007
Rosenfeld has created an interesting academic study of the fascination we have with the idea with "What if?" This books obviously focuses on the idea of if Hitler had won the war. More specifically; If Hitler had won the war (and also if Britain had made peace with Germany, if Hitler had escaped at the end of the war and various questions around the Holocaust.

As Rosenfeld himself points out these hypothetical questions can never be satisfactorily addressed because Germany lost the war, Hitler killed himself and the tragedy of the Holocaust did happen. But nonetheless these ideas do fascinate a large number of people and Rosenfeld brings together all the novels, programmes and films that have covered this idea, people like Harris, Turtledove and Deighton and numerous historians, and he examines their impact and how the portrayal of the Germans has shifted over the years.

An interesting study for anyone interested in this genre of fiction or modern history.

only 4 or 5 good stories out of 16!, 11 Jul 2001
This collection of 16 short stories was profoundly disappointing, if only because I expect better from something with Turtledove's name on it. There is a certain expectation when reading alternate history that either the the events and/or people being tinkered with are so familiar that they need no introduction, or that a small introduction will be given to set up the story (not to mention maps). Unfortunately that was not the case here, as a number of the stories used rather obscure incidents and people as their basis, and there was no corresponding supplementary material. It also doesn't help expectations when the jacket copy is about scenarios that aren't in the book. Add some rather tepid writing in a number of cases, and the book got rather tedious.

If you're going to borrow it, there are a few stories worth checking out. Lillian Carl's "The Test of old," focusing on the Romans vs. Boadica, was one of the better stories, albeit somewhat roughly told via the memoirs of an old Roman. S.M. Stirling's, "The Charge of Lee's Light Brigade," has a somewhat interesting premise at least: that Gen. Lee of Civil War fame, instead fights with C.S.A. along with other British forces at Balaclava in a very different Charge of the Light Brigade. Somewhat slyly, Stirling seems to have inserted George MacDonald Fraser's legendary scoundrel and rouge "Flashman" in the story as an homage to the great Scottish writer, which works rather well as Flashman does campaign there in "Flashman at the Charge." Another of the best stories is William Sanders' "Billy Mitchell's Overt Act," in which a military aviation pioneer manages to thwart the attack on Pearl Harbor. Told as a series of excerpts from books, interviews, and testimony, he manages to weave a very engaging tale. The final story, R.M. Meluch's "Vati" is probably the best of the bunch, showing what might have happened had a more imaginative and forceful man taken over German air operations and sped up production of jet aircraft, thus preventing D-Day. It's something the Germans did manage to do at the end of the war, but by then was too little, too late.

As for the rest: "Tradition," by Elizabeth Moon (who's "Deed of Paksenarrion" trilogy I love), suffers from an unknown main character, British WWI Rear Admiral Cradock, a slightly obscure setting, the Mediterranean (more interestingly treated in the historical fiction of John Biggins), and the need to have detailed maps at hand to follow the action. Brad Linaweaver's rather silly "And to the Republic For Which It Stands" imagines an alternate Caesar. Lois Tilton's "The Craft of War" is annoyingly written as a dialogue between Socrates and a student about Sun Tzu's "The Art of War." Jody Nye's "Queen of the Amazons" is a terrible Crusader piece fortunately followed by a competent as usual WWII piece by editor Turtledove. Unfortunately, one then segues into an utter piece of dreck, Esther Friesner's "An Old Man's Summer" featuring the rambling reminisces of a dying Eisenhower. Bill Fawcett's "The Last Crusader" establishes the fun premise of Napoleon as a Cardinal, but doesn't take it anywhere. Even though it didn't particularly engage me, Janet Berliner's "A Case For Justice" is worth mentioning for taking as it's subject, the South African leader Jan Smuts. William Forstchen's "A Hard Day For Mother" folds a cliché "brother vs. brother" Civil War tale into the battle for Round Top Hill at Gettysburg. David Weber's "The Captain From Kirkbeam" is the first of two seafaring stories, his being about a commander trying to blockade French ships from sailing into the Chesapeake Bay during the War for Independence. "Vive L'Amiral," by John Mina imagines Nelson as fighting on the French side, rather than the British, with rather different results, of course. Brian Thomsen's "Bloodstained Ground," is a rather cheezy and weak attempt to show a drunken Samuel Clemens uncovering the hidden truth about "President" Custer and what really happened at Little Big Horn.

So, maybe four or five stories worth reading all told, mixed in with a few more interesting premises, and a lot of bad and just plain boring ones. You're better off checking out Robert Cowley's "What If?: The World's Foremost Military Historians Imagine What Might Have Been."

Some stories illogical and not thought out, 03 Apr 2000
Having read stories by the various authors I thought that a collection of short stories would have contained the best that was on offer, unfortunately I found that, like the curates egg, only some parts were good. There was no story in the book that was outstanding, There were none that was not at some time entertaining. When I read a book I expect to be entertained, certainly in a fiction I do not expect to have to conduct research for my own endings, which I had to do with two of the stories. This was not what I expected and I feel a bit cheated by the whole thing.

Good tales - but author let down by publisher, 31 Mar 2000
The publishers should hang their heads in shame over this one. Look at the cover artwork -- no Romans/Carthaginians-in-tanks stories are actually in the book. Also the lack of explanatory notes which should have accompanied the tales make it harder for the non-history buffs to work out why the alternate endings are just so important. The only good thing about this was it made me go back to my own reference books and check out the American War of Independence, and the flight of the Goeben in the Med at the beginning of WWI - among others. The other point is that too often with some of the stories, they end as a rather flat fleshing-out of a 400-word synopsis. But, yes, I'd still recommend it

It sucked, not a collosal screw-up, but still horrid., 25 Jun 1999
Well there are a couple of good stories in there. The Napoleon being a Cardinal, Nelson siding with Napoleon, Hitler getting jets, and USSR almost collapsing but fighting Nazis in 1947.

Still most stories ran from obscure bull-sh*t to "lets stop being a writer and summate". It featured some interesting premises, but used the familiar device of stopping the story to explain to the reader what happened and how and why.

If you want the truth, only four stories were any good. "The Last Crusdader" by Bill Fawcett. "A Hard Day for Mother" by William R. Forstchen. "Vive l'Admiral" by John Mina. And "Vati" by Meluch.

That's 4 good stories out of 16. Better odds than Vegas, but still a major stink-bomb.

Some deep stuff, but too deep?, 07 Jan 1999
Although the stories in this anthology are on average much better than the stories in the alternate history anthologies edited, e.g., by Mike Resnick a few years ago, the casual reader is nevertheless going to run into trouble when reading this collection. The problem is that the various authors have done too good a job, while the publisher has totally screwed up.

In other words, several of the stories in this anthology are based on "too" obscure historical what-ifs. Unfortunately, as has become well-known by those who closely follow science fiction, it turns out that the introductory notes that were supposed to be included with the stories were left out by the publisher! >So... there is some decent stuff in here. But unlike other recent alternate history collections, the reader is going to have do some more thinking about the stories in order to gather a better appreciation of what the authors put into the tales.

Cold War Not So Hot, 18 Aug 2003
I'm a big fan of alternative history titles, in particular those supposedly written as text books after the event. Cold War Hot, however, proved to be one of the most disappointing I have read.
The premise is pretty straight forwards - how the Cold War could have turned out differently - but this appears to have generated pretty uninspired scenarios. Starting chronilogicaly the first 'event' considered is an exchange between Western fighter escorts and Soviet aircraft during the Berlin airlift, which results in the USAF pasting the Russians. Later chapters consider Soviet/US hostilities in Med, resulting in the US giving the eastern block a sounder thrashing than it recieved (notice the pattern forming here?). Things also get pretty outrageous - a Soviet cruiser is effectively knocked out by a F4 launched Sidewinder air-to-air missile! Why then 3, not 1 star? For me the work is almost worth it for the Quebec sepratist scenario which, in my opinion, is what alternative history should be all about: well researched, plausible (read the authors notes) and reaches its goal without too much suspension of disbelief. Incidently this is also one of the few scenarios which actually appears to signifcantly affect the course of the cold war (in the others, things tend to return to the historical path so have little real impact. The exception is the Invasion of North Vietnam scenario although as the author states this results in North-South Korea situation should this be classed, as argued, a US victory?). All in all a missed opportunity - try 'What If' or the 'Hitler Options' first - but one for students of Cold War politics rather alternative history.