Infinite Possibilities, But Most Mundane

The Mammoth Book of Alternative Histories is what the title promises. Problem being, based on my father's description over the phone, I had been expecting something more similar to What If? which he loaned me a few years ago. Basically, I thought it would be more history, less fiction. I suppose one of the entries being written by Harry Turtledove should have clued me in.

As far as alternative historical fiction goes, the stories are mostly alright. The lead entry, James Morrow's The Raft of the Titanic was a dud, as the idea of the crew of that liner using the life boats as pontoons to hold a massive platform for all the passengers to sit on was, well, that wasn't the ridiculous part. It was the people eventually deciding they liked it there and turning the raft into its own country. I can't believe everyone was on board with that. Certainly I wouldn't have been. Confined to that amount of space with that many people, I'd have thrown myself to the sharks in a month. So not a strong start.

Some of the other stories are better, though they all start to blur after awhile. This one's set in America, but the Mongols rule most of the world, except the English might be getting ready to start something. This one's set in England, but it was conquered by the Mughal Empire when it allied with Portugal during a couple of harsh English winters. The one where Benedict Arnold pulled off his betrayal had an interesting perspective, though it seemed a bit much that descendants of the Native Americans who allied with the Brits would look upon George Washington as a Christ-like figure. I'm probably not doing it justice, so heck out Mark Laidlaw's His Powder'd Wig, His Crown of Thornes if you'd know more.

One thing I found interesting is while there are several stories that focus on either the Romans not going into decline, or on the status of Europe after the Roman Empire had fallen apart, nobody examined the Greeks. Like what if the Persians conquered them, or Alexander lived longer, or anything like that. Perhaps they saw no good fodder for stories.