Revisions

By Isaac Szpindel and Julie E. Czerneda

Book Overview

Some of today's top science fiction writers explore the futures that might have been, including original stories from Julie E. Czerneda and other great names in the genre. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0756402409
• ISBN13: 9780756402402
• Release Date: August 2004
• Publisher: Daw Books
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 0.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 4.2" x 6.8"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Excellent alternate history anthology. Recommended.

I have an uneasy relationship with short story anthologies. On the plus side, they give me a cross section of stories about a topic or premise in which I'm interested. And I can read one or two of stories before I conk out at night, which is good for time management. But by definition, anthologies are a mixed bag. I have come to expect that I'll find a few great stories, several that are decent, and a few time-wasters. I also expect that I'll have read at least a few of the stories before because the premise of any given anthology will usually bring one "classic" to mind. That's not bad, but it does mean that I'm paying for a story I already own. I'm happy to report that ReVisions breaks the rules -- in the best way. The premise is excellent, the stories are all new to the anthology, and I didn't find a single clunker. ReVisions is an alternate history anthology with a tiny twist: in which scientific breakthroughs were made in a different time or place. How would history have played out differently if the printing press were created by the Sumerians or if the laser was developed 50 years earlier? (I stole those examples off the back of the book, so they aren't quite spoilers, or anyway no more so than it would be for you when you picked it up yourself. It's hard to be specific here because I don't want to spoil your pleasure in figuring out the scientific difference in each tale.) It's a great idea, and it works well. The 15 short story authors are excellent, too, and I found this book when I was searching for more from some of my favorites. I'm sure they're familiar to you, too: Julie Czerneda, Isaac Szpindel, Geoffrey Landis, Laura Anne Gilman, Kage Baker, Doranna Durgin, James Alan Gardner, Robin Wayne Bailey, Kay Kenyon, Mike Resnick, Susan R. Matthews, Cory Doctorow, Charles Stross, Jay Caselberg, Peter Watts, John G. McDaid. None of them are in the universe(s) for which the authors are most famous (i.e. this isn't a "Company" story from Kage Baker) so you get to see the writers doing something different. And they do it well. Several of the stories are truly great, and most of the rest are a solid "good." I confess that I was ho-hum about "Unwirer," by Doctorow and Stross, and about Caselberg's "Herd Mentality," but you might disagree. Besides, if the worst in this collection is "okay," that's far better than most anthologies. I'm really glad I took the time to read ReVisions. I heartily recommend it to any fan of alternate history, or anyone who likes these authors.

Excellent!

These are not your typical, predictable "what if someone went back in time and gave General Lee machine guns?" type of historical revision tales. Instead, they are based in real science, and speculate about how real, historical (or scientific) events could have changed the world if they happened in a just slightly (and realistically) different way. Brilliantly written, and very fun to read.

delightful what if alternate history tales

This fifteen short story collection contains what if alternate history tales that will delight genre fans. Each tale takes a key scientific or technological element and changes when it occurred so that it either intersects at an earlier pivotal moment in history such as the Sumerians inventing the printing press in BC or never materialized such as Galileo fails to release his findings. The tales are all well written and the explanation of the REVISION point is fun to follow to ascertain whether the reader agrees with the author's logic. Intriguing are those with a modern aspect to include Tesla inventing a laser in the nineteenth century, Livingstone bringing AIDS out of Africa in the nineteenth century and the government pushing aquanauts over astronauts and banning the Internet. Mindful of the Marvel Comics What If series, this terrific collection will have the audience thinking of new ones such as what if an underpaid over paid book reviewer was given a guitar instead of Narnia? Harriet Klausner