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To coin a phrase, the 20th century has been the best of times, and the worst of times; the century when smallpox was abolished and the century when a new word, "genocide," entered the lexicon of politics. Read the first page
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Customer Reviews
Custer Under the Baobob by William Sanders
Hewn in Pieces for the Lord by John J. Miller
Written by the Wind by Roland J. Green. Two Draka assist the Japanese in the 1905 war against Russia.
The Tradesmen by David Drake. An amoral tale of the Russian front in the Eurasian War.
The Big Lie by Jane Lindskold.
The Greatest Danger by Lee Allred.
Home is Where the Heart is by William Barton.
The Last Word by Harry Turtledove.
A Walk in the Park by Anne Marie Talbott. On Earth/2 (our world), two Draka encounter a Science Fiction fan.
Hunting the Snark by Markus Baur. On Earth/2 a CCTV developer is baffled when his new individual recognition system fails to classify a red-haired shopper as a person.
Upon Their Backs, To Bite 'em by John Barnes. A timeline-travelling civilisation opens diplomatic relations with the Draka. Negotiations do not go according to plan.
The Peaceable Kingdon by Severna Park. On Earth/2 a police psychiatrist interveiws an unusual prisoner.
I liked Stirling's Draka books, but I'm not a big fan of military fiction, descriptions of battles etc. so most of the stories here didn't exite me very much. The ones I liked were The Greatest Danger, which I think best evokes the feel of the books; Upon Their Backs to Bite 'em which has made me want to buy Barnes's Closer books (they have the same hero); and Hunting the Snark which has a nice Twilight Zonish feel to it.
On the whole, this was okay, but it could have been much better. I was disappointed that there was no story by Stirling himself, and also no stories set in the early days of the Draka or during the Final Society, the two time periods that haven't really been explored in the books. And the cover is just ugly!
Featuring works by such speculative fiction luminaries as David Drake, Harry Turtledove, John Barnes, Jane Lindskold, and others, the anthology revisits one of the most intriguing, fascinating, and terrifying alternate realities ever created.
The stories are all of good quality, and cover a wide time spectrum. I particulary liked the stories by Lindskold (who shows us another side of Eric von Shrakenberg) and Turtledove (who gives the Alliance for Democracy just a bit of hope).
The anthology is best read after reading the four Draka novels, much of it will make little sense to those not familiar with them.
The only things that prevented me from awarding five stars instead of four were some minor continuity problems with the Draka novels in a couple of the stories, and the absence of a new story by Stirling himself. But these are just minor concerns.
Stirling has asked many of his fellow writers to make their contributions to the Draka canon. This anthology, which includes stories by such big-name authors as Harry Turtledove and David Drake, is the result. And a worthwhile result it is, for every story is good in it's own right. The first two tell, in bloody detail, how George Custer and Chinese Gordon help the Draka conquer Africa. David Drake tells the tale of gritty, un-glorious military politics during the Eurasian War.
Some of the most interesting stories, however, come later in the anthology. Perhaps the best are those that deal with trans-dimensional travel. This sub-genre may seem hopelessly tired, but these stories give it new life. John Barnes, for instance, pits the hero of his Timeline Wars novels against the Draka. In Anne Marie Talbott's "A Walk in the Park", a woman from our timeline swears that those tall, inexplicably charismatic strangers she sees in the park are just like something out of an SF series she once read.
This is a good choice for any science fiction fan. Fans of the Draka series will understand the background better, but everyone will appreciate the high quality of the writing.
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