Most Helpful Customer Reviews
|
|
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Episode II of a fantasy World War Two, 23 Jul 2006
"Darkness Descending" is the second part of Harry Turtledove's reworking of the World War Two story set on a planet where technology is based on magic rather than machines.
Dragon riders replace aircraft, Behemoths replace tanks, East and West have been transposed, Eurasia has been moved to the Southern hemisphere so that Scandinavia becomes equatorial, and names and superficial national characteristics have all been changed. But this is real history, not alternative history. Again and again the terrible events of the book are based on real historical incidents.
Some of the changes to racial characteristics are impishly amusing, such as the fact that the people who correspond to the Finns live in an equatorial climate and look like Zulus, while the Saraha Desert becomes "the land of the Ice people," the Gyongyosian people who correspond to the Japanese are physically large, and the Kuusamans who correspond to Americans have epicanthic folds.
Other changes are rather more biting - the "Kaunians" who correspond to Jews are tall, blue-eyed, and blonde.
What Turtledove appears to be trying to do with this series is to study how different people responded to a time of great evil. Some people were sucked into taking part in that evil, some fought against it, others just tried to live through it. The changes to the names and characteristics of the participants seem to be intended to give the reader an opportunity to leave behind some of our emotional baggage about the holocaust so that we can try, not to justify the wrongs which people did in terrible times, but to understand how it could have happened.
All but two or three of the characters in the first few books books are fictional - Hitler is King Mezentio of Algarve, Stalin is King Swemmel of Unkerlant, and Marshal Rathar gradually morphs into Zhukov. This actually makes the story more exiting, as the characters are presented well enough that you care about them: we all know how World War II turned out but the readers has no such certainty about the fate of the fictional characters.
The six books of the series each corresponds very roughly indeed to about a year's real historical events. The second book, "Darkness Descending", covers events corresponding to those between the opening phases of Operation Barbarossa, Hitler's attack on Russia in 1941, to just before the launch in May 1942 of Operation Blue, Hitler's drive on the Caucasian oilfields.
The series is best read in the correct sequence. All the books of this series have the word "Darkness" in the title, but the publishers refer to it as the "Derlavi" series, this being the name given in the books for the great continent which corresponds to Eurasia. The full sequence of books in their correct order is:
"Into the Darkness"
"Darkness Descending"
"Through the Darkness"
"Rulers of the Darkness"
"Jaws of Darkness"
"Out of the Darkness".
Bottom line: the mood is as black as the titles indicate, but the series is a very exciting read.
|
|
|
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Second Second World War, 25 Jun 2001
As all Harry Turtledove fans know his ability to create new and alarmingly graphical portrails of war in a fantasy word, is nothing short of masterful. This book is no different, continuing the lives of up to 16 characters, the war on mainland Delavai (Europe) continues. Algarve are forced to take up Blood Magic in order to advace into snowy Unkerlant (Russia). Algarves Mages are made to slaughter thousands of Kaunians in ways depicting the Nazis of Germany. Where as in Unkerlant the king is forced to retaliate with the murdering of his own peasants. As This goes on one of the outer-islands, Kuusamo, are forced into war and their top Theoretical mages undertake something resembling the Manhattan Project. Will This be the end?
|
|
|
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Still an excellent read, 8 Jan 2004
Turtledove's third installment in the series is still excellent. I still have the feeling of being in WWII.Ealstan and Vanai are still on the loose. Vanai discovers a magic that changes her looks from Kanaian to a more acceptable look. Unkerlant are still resisting Algarve, though things look bleaker for them. Lagoa discover a magical weapon they can use. Underground movements are still active, though betrayal threatens. The story still moves from one place to another and one has to keep tongue in cheek.
|
|
|
Most Recent Customer Reviews
|
by Harry Turtledove
by Harry Turtledove
by Harry Turtledove
by Harry Turtledove
by David Gemmell
With an Amazon.co.uk Gift Certificate, you can get them what they want (even if you don't know what that is). 
Amazon Home