Although Orson Scott Card's Alvin Maker series is a fantasy set in a world where magic is real, the world itself is, for the most part, a viable alternate history of what did not become the United States of america that we know.

The turning point is the failure of the attempt to re-instate the British monarchy after Oliver Cromwell's death. The survivors of the royal family fled to the settlement that would become the city we know as Charlotte, NC and called it Camelot. Because of this, the unification of the English-speaking colonies of the New World was both delayed and less dramatic.

David Hackett Fischer, in his book Albion's Seed traces four separate migrations from the British Isles to America in the 17th century, and how the regional differences still seen today can be traced directly to them: the Puritans in New England, the Cavaliers in the coastal South, the Quakers in Pennsylvania, southern NJ and DelMarVa, and Scots-Irish borderers to Appalachia, especially south of Pennsylvania.

Alvin Maker's world has four separate English-speaking "nations" on the American continent. Puritan New England, Royalist Crown Colonies, Independant United States (Pennsylvania, New Amsterdam, New Sweden, and the Iriquois State), and Appalachia.

Instead of some of the later Indian wars, New England, having virtually wiped out the Algonquin nations, and the United States, having embraced the Iriquois are relatively at peace. Appalachia and the Crown Colonies invovled themselves in a series of bloody border disputes. After a number of influential Colonists including, Thomas Jefferson, fled west to aid Appalachia, the Crown assigned General George Washington to root them out.

An idea has been spreading throughout the four nations, however. It is thought that the idea began with a printer from Philadephia named Benjamin Franklin. The idea is that of an "American." That the ties that bind the various colonists are greater than their differences.

When Washington refused to execute Jefferson on the spot, or to bring him to Camelot to face the king's wrath because he could not condemn a fellow American for following his heart, even if he disagreed with his decision, the king realized that he needed to turn away from warfare and toward diplomacy to maintain his power.

As the Midwest was settled, different regions showed more influence from one or another of the parent "nations" (for example, Hatrack River follows a mostly Puritan line), but because of the influence of the other three, there is much more of a truly "American" blending.

Some things are unavoidable, however, and many of the same regional differences that caused the Civil War in our reality (particularly slavery) are causing more and more friction between the North and the South in Alvin's world, as well. Alvin's wife Peggy is a "torch" who can sense probable futures, and all the futures she sees result in a great war between the nations.

Oh cool here it is.

Darn it! I thought no-one had done one about the English Civil War (sulks)

I have become very interested recently in the genre. Although I read Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle a few years ago, it was Harry Turtledove's prodigious output that really got me into alternate history (though if we're really trying to be politically correct, let's call it alternat[iv]e history to placate everyone on both sides of the Atlantic! )

In my view the worst sort of alternate history (with apologies to TomM above - I have not yet read the series he comments on so can not really presume to judge it) is that which comes up with an interesting scenario ("what if...Napoleon won the Napoleonic Wars?; what if...the Roman Empire never fell?" etc.) and then ruins it by casually adding "oh, and magic works too". That's just ridiculous in my view. It's like saying "what if...France won the battle of Agincourt...oh, and they had cars in the Middle Ages as well." If magic really existed, it would already have had tremendous, massive, unbelievable effects on human history. NO WAY would it have happened all exactly the same up to the divergence point in question.

End of rant.

One interesting aspect which I have encountered is the fact that most countries (in the real world) have gone by at least two or three names throughout their history. This means that if you want to write about a country but don't particularly want the people who live there in this world to be annoyed, you can use an alternative name. Here are some I use in the scenario I'm currently working on:

Britain = Albion
France = Gaul
Italy = Naples
Japan = Nihon or Cipangu
China = Cathaia
Australia = Nieuw Holland
Canada: Hudsonia
America (continent as a whole) = Novus Mundus
America (as in USA): Freedonia, Columbia, Alleghania, Appalachia; also United Colonies, Provinces, etc. All these were considered as names for the new country by the Continental Congress (they thought that "America" was too wishy-washy because it encompassed everyone on two continents, and "Americans" in those days usuallly referred to (Native American) Indians. It won in the end regardless due to it being the least disliked name )

In my view the worst sort of alternate history (with apologies to TomM above - I have not yet read the series he comments on so can not really presume to judge it) is that which comes up with an interesting scenario ("what if...Napoleon won the Napoleonic Wars?; what if...the Roman Empire never fell?" etc.) and then ruins it by casually adding "oh, and magic works too". That's just ridiculous in my view. It's like saying "what if...France won the battle of Agincourt...oh, and they had cars in the Middle Ages as well." If magic really existed, it would already have had tremendous, massive, unbelievable effects on human history. NO WAY would it have happened all exactly the same up to the divergence point in question.

Normally I agree with that. If magic is powerful enough to affect history, then what is the point of trying to follow established history or to deviate from it in a "logical" alternate history? But the Alvin Maker series is different. Most people only have "knacks" -- a particular ability related to one phenomenon that is considered a superstition in our world. (For example Alvin's sister has a "knack" for designing live versions of "hexes" (good luck charms such as are painted on a lot of barns in the Mid-west) out of hanging plants on her back porch.

The only two people with real "magic" power are Alvin, who as the seventh son of a seventh son has the power of a Maker, and the Red Prophet the brother of the tribal chief Tecumseh. Alvin's younger brother Calvin is also a maker, since when he was born he had six living brothers, but since he is really an eightth son, his power is only a pale reflection of Alvin's. As powerful as Peggy's "torch" ability seems, she cannot influence any of the futures she sees, and Alvin tries not to interfere with the natural course of events any more than absolutely necessary.

At the end of the book Red Prophet, the title character does call down a curse on the "White Murderer Harrison" and the other combatatants at the Massacre at Tippecanoe, and we are led to believe that because of this curse, White expansion will be halted at the Mississippi (or the Mizzipy, as it's called) for at least a generation, but that is an unusual show of power for this book. Mostly it is only a background to the belief systems of the people.

In fact even the minor "knacks" being discovered can result in a great witch hunt throughout New England, at least until John Adams, as a former chief justice is called out of retirement by his son, the governor John Quincy Adams, to preside over Alvin's trial.

On your alternate names I have a few questions and comments.

France=Gaul
The Frankish kingdom that became France shares only its geographical location with the Celtic kingdoms collectively known as Gaul. And adjectives such as Gallic, when used in reference to France are more literary allusions than literal descriptions. A better name might be Frankland.

Britain=Albion
Albion refers mainly to Strathclyde in the lowlands of present-day Scotland Other contemporary countries include Logres, The Anglo-Saxon kingdoms (Essex, Wessex, Sussex, Middlesex Mercia, Anglia, and Kent) and the Welsh principalities(Gwynedd and Powys). If the history of the island was similar to that in our world until the death of Cromwell, it would be better to use a variant on one of the Anglo-Saxon countries (the way Anglia became England) Maybe you could call it the March (after Mercia) or Kentia. Unfortunately, Saxony and Jutland are already taken, as the continental homelands of these peoples.

Italy=Naples
Unless you are saying that southern Italy (which was long a vassal of France conquered or otherwise orchestrated a unification of the Italian peninsula, it is far more likely to be the result of an expansion of the power of the Papal States (very likely if a strong pope was in office at the time the German Empire chose Protestantism), or of the marine power of Venice. It is also likely that they would have chosen a name for the whole peninsula that harkened back to the good old days of Italian power-- the Roman Empire and earlier. I would suggest Etruria (after the Etruscans).

Canada=Hudsonia
To what extent are the actual historical figures the same in your history? Would there have been a Henrich Hudson? And would his explorations and employers have been exactly the same? Was the canadian wilderness under French rule at one time as it was "here"? You could call it New France (or the equivalent using the name for France you have decided on. And in this case a variant on "Gaul," such as Gallicia" would not be out of place (Compare with Nova Scotia).

TomM: This is probably all in the wrong order...

I take your comments on board re country names. Basically I am just finding some alternative names from real history and then fitting the alternate history around them. In your example of Gaul being inappropriate for (Frankish) France I would point out that Britain is still called "Britain" even though that is a Welsh-Roman name and it has been dominated by Anglo-Saxons, Scots etc. for over a thousand years. I don't think it's implausible that France would continue being called Gaul, especially considering that the Gauls had far more influence on the Franks than the Welsh did on the Anglo-Saxons.

Actually, when I was thinking about what to call England, it occurred to me that the alternative would be a worn-down form of Saxon-land...however, as 'West Saxons' wore down to 'Wessex' and so forth, England would probably end up being called Sexland! Probably not a good idea. At the moment I'm calling it Britannia, which isn't really appropriate for the reasons you mentioned above (particularly when considered in opposition to Wealas [Wales]).

Re Italy vs. Naples: at several points in history the Neapolitan kingdom has ruled sizeable portions of the Italian peninsula, so it did not seem an unreasonable name. In my history Venice is still independent and has a few overseas possessions, including Illyria (Albania). By the twentieth century Naples is a decaying backwater propped up by the Theocratic Iberian Empire (combined Spain and Portugal and their New World empires). Eventually it is conquered in a blitzkrieg-like attack by Venice and the Unione CSS, a semi-legitimate government controlled by various mafias and ruling Sardinia, Sicily and Corsica.

Good idea of Etruria for Italy though; I may look into that. I have wondered what it would be like if Europe was dominated by the Carthaginian Empire rather than the Romans, but that would dramatically change later history too much for the current scenario I have in mind. As for alternate names for the Roman Empire, most of the best ones (Remans, Romulans) have already been taken.

Oh, and most accounts state that Albion is a name haphazardly applied to the whole of Britain, and supposedly derives from Latin albus 'white' - the Romans naming it for the white cliffs of Dover. I've never heard it applied particularly to Strathclyde.

About the Pope and Italy: at least since the 1800s Iberia and its colonies has drifted away from papism towards a form of Catholicism informed by more extreme Hispanic Cardinals, including those who control the Inquisition (which develops into a secret police). Hibernia (Ireland), Caledonia (the Highlands of Scotland), Gaul, Benelux (united kingdom of Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg - not a very appropriate name but can't think of anything better) and obviously Naples itself are all still pure Catholic.

Germany and Scandinavia are almost entirely Lutheran.

What about if the Native Americans were more technologically advanced (Most didn't have the wheel due to lack of modern horses) and were equal to Europe at the time...

Don't discount bio-warfare. Native Americans, being completely isolated from Europe, were no match for the various contagious diseases, primarily smallpox, that the Europeans unwittingly brought with them. In some regions, such diseases killed as much as 90-95% of the native population. I don't see how a greater population or more advanced technological level could have benefited them much.

Well, it could have given them (those Native Americans who survived) an edge in certain pivotal battles, or possibly could have prevented, or at least slowed, Europeans' westward expansion.

Definitely. With the naval technology available at the start of the Age of Exploration, the Europeans really wouldn't have been able to maintain a prolonged conflict with a technologically equal enemy across the Atlantic.

Thande - In my view the worst sort of alternate history is that which comes up with an interesting scenario and then ruins it by casually adding "oh, and magic works too".
Not a fan of Randal Garret's Lord Darcy series, are you?
OK, the alternate history part is mostly background, King Richard didn't die in 1199 and founded a powerful & stable empire. The main parts of the stories are detective work & using magic scientificly.

There was a book, the name of it & it's author escape me at the moment, where England became a powerful nation because it had the most powerful magicians. Unfortunately I don't think the author really worked everything out in advance though. The threat to England is a magician using Arabian magic. My feeling was why hadn't there been prior attacks by actual Arabian magicians.
Also the author tended to undercut her story by using a Sherlock Holmes & Watson inspired leads. And she was just too cute by having famous authors of the time be magicians. IIRC H.G. Wells created a magic spell that let one travel through time.

George O. Smith had a couple of stories set on a parallel world called, IIRC, Annwn. The only book in the series I read was The Second War Of The Worlds. (Oddly enough that also featured Holmes & Watson.) Magic worked there as well.

In comics the JLA/JSA crossover story Crisis On Earth-3 featured an Earth where American Christopher Columbus discovered Europe, Colonial England fought a war of Independence against the United States, & actor Abraham Lincoln shot President John Wilkes Booth.
However writer Gardner Fox simply presented these as differences and how the world developed wasn't really delved into.

In Crisis On Earth-X, Len Wein did a bit more thought. Here the JLA & JSA found themselves on an Earth where the president died in 1944, the governmental balance of power went the wrong way & by the time America had developed an atomic bomb Germany had one too & since neither side was suicidal enough to use them the fighting went on until 1968 when Germany invented a mind-control device and won the war.

Thande - England would probably end up being called Sexland! Probably not a good idea.
Well, maybe if you were doing a humorous adult-themed story. ;-)
Years ago Dave Allen made a funny comment about "Make love, not war. It would certainly have changed Churchill's speech. 'We shall make love to them on the beaches! We shall make love to them in the trenches! We shall make love to them in the air above! We shall never surrender!'" (I've probably misremembered the actual quote, but that was the gist of it.)

Saxland? Saxonia? Saxonviolence?

As for the argument about American Indians & diseases, if the Vikings had continued making trips to Vineland longer than they had in our world the 'Vinelanders' might have been exposed to European diseases sooner & might not have been affected so badly when later Europeans visited.

KAM - I assume JLA is the Justice League of America, but what is JSA?

Some people have thought about the Danish Vinlanders penetrating just a little further into America (in reality they got as far as northern Michigan), giving the Native Americans smallpox resistance, and thus allowing them to repulse the later European colonists...it is a workable scenario. The Pilgrim fathers would have died in Providence if a tribe hadn't taken pity on them (hence Thanksgiving) and most of the colonial/American victories over the Native Americans were through spreading disease than all-out war. Nine-tenths of the casualties of Native Americans were due to disease, if I recall correctly. Though the NAs would have still been less technologically advanced, they would probably have repulsed the Europeans on numbers alone.

There have been several reversed-America scenarios but IMHO they're all pretty absurd because how would Germanic people get to America and then colonise Britain? If they weren't Germanic, then how can you have the same political figures?

Better alternate-Americas include one where the Muslims won the Battle of Tours in the 660s, conquering most of Europe, and thus America was colonised by Muslims; or (a favourite) if China hadn't decommissioned its White Sea Fleet and had colonised western America in the 1400s; or if the Spanish Armada had conquered England in 1588 and thus all of North America ended up Spanish.

One interesting scenario is that in Harry Turtledove/Richard Dreyfuss "The Two Georges" which talks about George Washington settling a peace with King George III in exchange for dominion status for America - the North American Union or NAU. Consequences include that there is no distinction between America and Canada, the Crown's law is enforced by the Royal American Mounted Police (!) and while there is less democracy, there is also less loss of life. There are no Revolutions or World Wars. The downside of this is that, without WW2 to promote technological progress, the world of 1996 is only as advanced as our world in 1930.

Turtledove and Dreyfuss have Martin Luther King Jr. as Governor-General (eqv. of President), while John F. Kennedy is the shadowy leader of an American separatist terrorist group called the Sons of Liberty and Richard Nixon is a used-car salesman (!). One particularly vicious satire is when "King-Emperor Charles III" of Britain (clearly our own Prince Charles) speaks contemptuously of one distant branch of his family still in Germany, with its "loose" princess (who, one can tell from context, is Diana).

The book is very thought-provoking, though not all that popular in the USA (can't imagine why...)

Justice Society of America. The superhero group of the 1940's. The two groups would annually team-up for a story once a year in the pages of the Justice League of America comic book (as opposed to the current book confusingly called JLA. Well, confusing for us old-timers for whom JLA was the usual shorthand for the original book.)

Earth-1 & Earth-2 could be claimed as alternate histories, but the only differences are when certain heroes started fighting crime. ;-)

In Kirk Mitchell's "Germanicus" trilogy the Romans didn't lose the Battle of the Teutoburger Wald in the year 9 (only five years until the big anniversary!) against the Germans. This way they could send more troups to Judea a few years later and Pontius P. could pardon Jesus C. without fearing a successfull uproar by the local population. No cross, no christianity, but the Roman Empire still ruled by the Julians in the present. There were centuries of content stagnation and modern things like gunpowder, engines and electricity are recent inventions in their early stages.

The biggest problem I have with alt histories is that the authors change some event(s) in the distant past, but still have famous people from our reality (albeit changed from our reality) in the present day of the stories. Unfortunately, those people (and everyone you know) would never have been born. That's not to say that people similar to (i.e. based upon) famous people couldn't be used in the stories, but to have the actual famous people appear in the stories is ludicrous and ruins the stories for me. (Worse is using fictional character as real people. Sherlock Holmes, indeed! Sheesh!)

Yeah... sometimes taking in Chaos theory helps... I do that a lot when I (on a more Earth-y scale) contemplate alternate histories and very rarely do those 'famous people' appear, mainly because they're different persons... Even IF those people had the parents of our world, they won (or very rarely) be the same person, similar names but not the same person (again, rarely if it's our counterpart) Kinda like that one sliders episode where Quinn meets his female counterpart (Yeah, I know BILC)... But still... How different would life be if George Washington's parents conceived a girl because of say, a few seconds to hours delay (not that I'm referencing anything) The same thing I think of when I contemplate MY history... messes with one's mind, donut? (Except mine, I'm already nuts)

When it comes to my history, i see a very different histories... i love Chaos Theory...

Funny how the one thing which you're not allowed to do in alt-history is have different children born to the same parents. As this is just the chance of a different sperm reaching the egg, it's quite plausible.

I try to avoid having too many famous people in my alt-history. The only ones offhand who appear are Churchill, JFK, Gandhi, Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwhale, Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly and Norman Petty. And Hitler.

One interesting scenario is that in Harry Turtledove/Richard Dreyfuss "The Two Georges" which talks about George Washington settling a peace with King George III in exchange for dominion status for America - the North American Union or NAU. Consequences include that there is no distinction between America and Canada, the Crown's law is enforced by the Royal American Mounted Police (!) and while there is less democracy, there is also less loss of life.

I'm not sure that an "RAMP" makes since given that the RCMP's (then the Northwest Mounted Police) original mandate was to enforce the law in the Northwest Territories. Otherwise, where does Quebec fit into this? The Quebec Act in 1774 provided for some protection against assimilation.

Of course, one wonders what things would look like had the British lost the Battle of the Plains of Abraham and, more broadly, that war. Along the same lines, there might have been no Acadian Expulsion, in which case Lousiana would be really different today and I would be speaking French now. (I live within a couple minutes of Grand Pre.)

I take your comments on board re country names. Basically I am just finding some alternative names from real history and then fitting the alternate history around them.

One of the reasons Tolkien's Middle-Earth seems more "real" is that the names of people, nationalities and lands seem so much more natural and appropriate. Of course in his case he worked backward from the language to the name to the storyline.

Sometimes there is a reason that one name was rejected in favor of another. Sometimes there is a reason an older name falls out of favor, and when it is brought back it does not name exactly the same thing that it used to. And very often if an old name survives as the primary one, the very fact that the language is changing around it forces linguistic changes in it.

You may take my comments or leave them. I hope you at least consider them, and whether they might help you to improve the natural flow of your tale. If you decide to stay with your original names that's your decision. If you think through to more "natural" names that would be better, whether you examine my particular suggestions or research others on your own.

In your example of Gaul being inappropriate for (Frankish) France I would point out that Britain is still called "Britain" even though that is a Welsh-Roman name and it has been dominated by Anglo-Saxons, Scots etc. for over a thousand years.

I'll concede that point if you'll concede another: "Britain" was the Roman name, not for a people or their land, but for an island. The island had very clear boundaries which have barely changed from that day to this (not counting erosion and other physical forces).

Gaul, on the other hand, is the collective name for all territories occupied by Continental Celts, until they were squeezed out by the expansion of the Roman Empire and the migrations of the Germanic peoples. At one point is stretched all the way to Asia Minor, as the name of the city of Galatia attests.

Julius Caesar begins his memoirs of the Gallic Wars with the sentence All Gaul is divided into three parts. The three parts are 1) a few settlements in the far North of Italy, 2) the Alps, and 3) everything else.

In my history Venice is still independent and has a few overseas possessions, including Illyria (Albania). By the twentieth century Naples is a decaying backwater propped up by the Theocratic Iberian Empire (combined Spain and Portugal and their New World empires).

OK, if Venice is to remain separate and independant, and the Papal States were weak, Naples could have dominated most of the Italian peninsula, even while it was itself dominated by France. I can even see the islands breaking away when Naples broke away from France.

Hibernia (Ireland), Caledonia (the Highlands of Scotland), Gaul, Benelux (united kingdom of Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg - not a very appropriate name but can't think of anything better) and obviously Naples itself are all still pure Catholic.

Hibernia and Caledon/Caledonia fit together nicely. They are basically of the same age and language.

For the low coastal area north of France, you could use a variation on Flanders (or the Flemish peoples), or on Walloons or the "Dutch." Or maybe just call them the Low Lands (This last is fine if none of the action takes place in the country, and it is only mentioned in passing by an English-speaking character.)

A final thought about France: it was almost an accident that when the nobles got together to name Hugh Capet their king they called the kingdom France. Capet was the Duke of France, which included the cities of Paris and Orleans. If a different Duke had been elected might the kingdom be known as Bourbon, or Bordeaux, or some variant thereof?

Thanks for the naming tips, TomM.

For clarification, my world (called Gaia as an alternative to Earth, even though I know that name has already been done to death) is made up of a number of power blocs: some ideological, others purely political.

The most powerful is the (Islamic) Caliphate, which stretches from Egypt and Sudan to what is in our world Pakistan. Despite their superior technology, the Mohammedans have not pursued a territory-grabbing policy because of old treaties and also because those Muslims living outside the Caliphate follow deviant forms of that religion and are generally not accepted by the Caliphate.

The next most powerful is the Commonwealth of Puritan Socialist Republics, AKA the CPSR or the Puritan Commonwealth (pretty obviously this naming scheme is based on the USSR). This consists of the Republic of Albion, the United States of Freedonia and the rest of the old Albionian Imperium (British Empire), now essentially freed and given self-rule (though often with influence behind the scenes to make them fall in line). These countries include Hindustan (India), Khalistan (a Sikh state which is a firm and trusted ally of Albion rather than a puppet state), South Africa (captured from the Benelutch in the Reactionary Wars) and Rhodesia. There are also smaller principalities possessed due to favourable treaty, such as Crimea, Gibraltar and the Falklands, and some occupied enemy territories captured in the last world war: Argentina, China, Japan and a fair-sized slice of formerly Gaulish West Africa.

The third power bloc is sometimes known as the Entente Catholique. It consists almost entirely of Catholic countries. Until the world war Gaul was the major power within it, but after its fall from grace and partition the Iberian Empire is the major power. Iberia is deliberately technologically backward (the cardinals holding supreme power behind the puppet king do not trust their commoners with advanced technology) and is usually fifty years behind other countries: i.e. in the 1960s they are using First World War-type military technology. However, they are not easily defeated because they have (a) numbers and (b) alliance with more technologically advanced countries: the Confederate States of Columbia, the Gaulish remnant ("East Gaul"), Hibernia and Naples. Unlike the other powers, the Entente Catholique has not made significant ventures into space.

The fourth power bloc is the Prussian-Kievan alliance, between the Prussian Second Reich (i.e. Germany) and Kievan Rus, i.e. Russia - thanks to the Mongols being turned back, Kiev was never sacked and Russia is still ruled from Kiev. Ukraine is the centre of culture and Great Russians are considered philistines. Kievan Rus is absolute Tsarist and Prussia is ruled by the Kaiser and Reichs Chancellor. Previously Prussia and the Rus fought over Eastern Europe, but now it is independent they have a common foe.

The final power bloc consists of Benelux and its colonial empire (Congo, the Phillipines, Indonesia, Australia [Nieuw Holland] and New Zealand), the Union of Kalmar (Scandinavia) and its colonial empire consisting of Greenland, Iceland and Chile, and the Hegemony of Lublin in Eastern Europe. The latter successfully broke away from Kiev during the Hellwar (WWI) when the unsuccessful Bolshevik uprising distracted the Kievans from keeping them tied down. The most important countries within the Hegemony are Poland, Finland, Hungary, Lithuania and Bohemia.

There are also a few nonaligned countries, usually small ones, such as the Republic of Venice and Unione CSS.

DEAN WON THE PRIMARIES!!!!

YIPEE!!!!

YYEEEEEEAAAAARRRRRGGGGHHHH!

Good sites:

http://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/

and

http://www.alternatehistory.com

Digging through some old books, found my copy of the Alt-History classic, For Want of a Nail. It uses the American Revolution, Battle of Saratoga as it's Point of Deviation. In it, the Colonists fail, and are absorbed back into the British Empire. Several of the revolutionary leaders escape punishment and lead a large group of the defeated colonists south-west, where they form an independent state near Texas that eventually is assumed into Mexico. For the next couple centuries, the primary world players are the Confederation of North America (the original 13 colonies), the United States of Mexico, Britain, Germany, and a corporation named Kramer Associates that grows to become the dominant technological and industrial force in the world. (A super-Microsoft, almost.)

Personally, I thought the premise fascinating, but the book is written like your most hated history book in school. Long, and droning, and name after name after name. One day I might give it another look, but I'm not in a hurry.

An interesting alt-history is Kim Stanley Robinson's The Years of Rice and Salt.

Essentially, instead of killing off 25% of Europe, the Black Death killed off 99%. China and Islam became the major powers in the alternate history.

Ted Bundy being a politician is lazy dystopia, since he didn't have the megalomania or drive for power that Jim Jones and Charles Manson did.

I'd like to see someone flesh out Gerry Ford getting a full elected term in 1977-81. Such a scenario probably means no President Reagan which is possibly why its unpopular in published AH.

Or maybe it's unpopular because Gerald Ford is such a boring subject?

I had a writer friend who wanted to do a story about the Challenger mission if the space shuttle had not exploded. I don't know if she finished it before she died, but I could never figure out what the story would be. I mean, shuttle goes up, missions get performed, shuttle returns, everyone's happy. Where's the story?

yeah. I hate the cult of Christa McCauliffe.

Cult?

NASA hyped her a lot because they thought sending an "ordinary person" into space would be good publicity. Presumably that is why she's more well-known than any other member of the mission.

Keith, it's just a little insulting the focus on Christa for Challenger and Sharon Tate for the Manson Family murders. It reduces the other victims in both cases to Gilligan Island's "and the rest".

I had a writer friend who wanted to do a story about the Challenger mission if the space shuttle had not exploded. I don't know if she finished it before she died

OMG, Keith, what did she die of? If you don't mind me asking.


but I could never figure out what the story would be. I mean, shuttle goes up, missions get performed, shuttle returns, everyone's happy. Where's the story?

Perhaps the main focus of the story was going to be what happened after they got back to Earth.

Can't remember if I knew what she died of, it happened back in 2000. Possibly diabetic complications.

Perhaps the main focus of the story was going to be what happened after they got back to Earth.

Maybe, but she never explained more beyond the basic set-up.

The story is in absence of the Challenger Disaster, I'd of thought, in which the social and political events that can be directly tied to it happening simply don't happen, and a gradual wave of changes due to these.

If the Challenger had not been destroyed, the problems at NASA that caused the disaster would not have been corrected and a more serious accident could have happened during a later launch.

Good point, Francois.

a more serious accident could have happened during a later launch

I hate to be Keith here, but what could be _more serious_ then the deaths of all the crew that happened in our time line?

If a shuttle launch had gone off course and crashed in the middle of a city, instead of just exploding, for instance.

Given what little we know of the supposed "last casualty of the Civil War", John J. Williams, it's hard to say if he'd ever wanted to go into business, law, or politics, but taking a grab-bag of his contemporaries, he could easily have wound up as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court (Joseph McKenna), Vice-President of the United States (Garret Hobart), or that tomato sauce guy (Henry J. Heinz).

Judibug - I hate to be Keith here

Well, where do you like to be Keith? ;-)

I'm going to point out that there is no feasible way for a Shuttle to have 'gone off course and crashed in the middle of a city'. If a Shuttle launch, or any rocket launch, found itself heading towards a populated area, the range safety officer would destroy the vehicle.

As an addendum to this, like, the worst potential a Shuttle disaster could've been is what nearly happened to Columbia on STS-61-C (the mission immediately prior to STS-51-L), where after a scrub, it was discovered that a broken LOX sensor probe was discovered lodged in the prevalve of one of the engines. If the launch wasn't scrubbed and had seen main engine ignition...

The engine would've exploded (like, to put it into perspective for how powerful the SSMEs were, the hydrogen turbopump ran at seventy-five thousand horsepower. It was more powerful than the Titanic, which had fifty-five thousand horsepower combined), and would likely to have been guaranteed to have seen the Space Shuttle blow up on the pad.

I remember my Dad wondering what would have happened if the Tunguska meteorite had landed on Moscow or St Petersburg.

a good chunk of history from 1908 onwards would be rewritten, especially as there's a good chance Communism wouldn't have come to power.

How would Lee Harvey Oswald's trial have gone? the outcome is certain - a date with Old Sparky - but the fallout of the trial and of Oswald's execution?

In 1968 the aging Portuguese dictator suffers a stroke and is replaced by another university professor Marcelo Caetano as prime minister. He chose to generally follow the policies of Salazar which was his mistake. There were many within the regime who suggested slight changes when he came to power. Portugal was in it's seventh year of a colonial war which was going on in Angola, Mozambique and Portuguese Guinea. In Angola the situation had been stabilized and liberation groups had little effect, in Mozambique they were confined to the remote northern portion of the territory but in Guinea under a unified group they were having an effect and controlled one-third of the territory. By 1974 two-thirds of the Portuguese Guinea were under rebel control and the situation was at a stalemate. It was here that 70% of all Portuguese casualties occured and there was more military spending here than in Angola or Mozambique.

Caetano could have offered independence to Portuguese Guinea in 1969 under a friendly regime as the French had done in many of there colonies. This would have given the Portuguese much needed men and resources to be used in Mozambique (In Angola the liberation groups had done a pretty good job of defeating each other by 1973). He could have accepted more South African and Rhodesian aid in combating the guerillas as well. Finally Portugal's government could have changed to a federal system with Angola and Mozambique as Autonomous States, while the Cape Verde Islands and Sao Tome and Principe could have been upgraded to the same status as the Azores and Madeira Is. Macau and Portuguese Timor could have been autonomous provinces (not large enough to be states). Possibly the restoration of the monarchy could have been in store (as in Spain) say by 1976. Some political liberalization would have been possible but it is doubtful whether Portugal would be an EU member or would have a democratic government.

Natalie wrote:


I don't know where else to put this but since this is the Putting On the Reich Episode, there is a sci-fi cliché about Earth if it is untouched by Hitler.

The real trouble is that we just don't know how many potential leaders there were out there, who never emerged from obscurity because Hitler beat them to it.


It's possible that a more competent leader might have taken over. One that didn't make all the mistakes Hitler did (like invading Russia).

If that had happened, Germany might have won World War IIl.

Once again Natalie is passing off something she didn't write as her own. I direct your attentions to the following:


https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/sfr-yugoslavia-isot-1985-to-1939.833124/#post-65706561

Um, "Paul Schenk" is me.

So you say. Although the profile of that poster says male, not female.

However, your second post comes from someone called "PsihoKekec". So my complaint stands. You took something that you yourself did not write, and posted it here without acknowledging the original author.

Seriously, is commenting that "So-and-so and such-and-such wrote" too much like work?

Blimey, ••• •••••• should really ask me first. He prefers playing "gotcha!".

I am not playing "Gotcha!" I am pointing out the fact that most of what you posted is not yours.

Look to Emily for guidance. When she posts something that she herself didn't write, she always identifies where she got it from (A novel, DWM, etc).

Why can't you do the same?

Am I going to have to ban you Judi/Natalie/whatever other name you picked out of a hat?

Don't post other people's stuff on my boards or I'm adding your ISP to the block list.

I'll delete the stolen posts in a day or two.

I'm still relatively new around here, so forgive my ignorance of NitCentral protocol.. but why would one person need so many different usernames?

That's an excellent question Crane. Natalie has been asked time and time again to not use sock puppets (one of her first was as JFK which some found distasteful). She usually comes up with one of her patented excuses for her behaviour but quite frankly, I'm not buying a lot of it- having a physical disability doesn't give you carte blanche to break the rules....

With sockpuppets you have the freedom from people's pre-concieved notions about your usual identity. You don't have to worry about your actual partly paralysed self any more.

Why would anyone limit themselves to what they imagine other people to think about them? That's insane.

Except for the fact the everyone knows it's you, Natalie, so that it doesn't matter which sock puppet you use.

Swiped stuff, wiped out.

so you blocked her?

Not yet.

Has she posted stolen stuff on any of my boards* since my March 20th post?

* Kitchen Sink, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Comic Books.

I was just thinking of writing a fiction piece where an important figure gets transported to another place on Earth, rather than through time.

For example, at the moment i write this, Skippy the Alien Space Bat transports Trump and Sen. McConnell to the Iranian capital of Tehran.

What happens to the two men next?

Nothing pleasant I would think.

SB:

---

quote:

Hoover dies after March 4th, 1929 but before the Stock Market Crash?

Charles Curtis thus becomes President. Curtis was a progressive Republican, and would be the first minority President as in the real world he was the first minority Vice-President, as Curtis was a Native American of the Kaw Nation

---

From my OWN post elsewhere:

I’m still waiting for someone to do a good Samantha Smith timeline. Like an ISOT that brings her from 1983 to today. Her and Greta Thunberg teaming up would be very significant. Although she’d have to be brought up to speed on the past 38 years and even if she wants to enroll in fifth grade in a modern elementary school it would be a big culture shock.

Natalie, this is your idea, why don't you write about it.

However, I would advise you not to use actual people. Rather make up fictional versions of them instead. Less risk of legal issues that way.

Otto Strasser accepts the
GDR's offer in 1950?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_Strasser

If Gerry Ford had won a full elected term… Ford's well meaning bumbling might have made the Iran crisis worse, especially as Kissinger would be Sec. of State

There's a theory that for every major decision made, an alternate Earth is created where the opposite decision was made. The problem is that with 7 billion humanoids on this planet, the alternative Earths would number in the trillions.

Everybody likes to base such things on important events like the JFK assassination, or Germany developing the atomic bomb first, but who says that the world isn't different because you drove to McDonald's from an different direction, and therefore interacted with different people than you would have from your usual route? Because you went that other way, you slowed down the car behind you, and 5 minutes later he had an accident he never would have, had you taken your usual route. He has to file a police report, maybe go to a hospital, and he misses his date with a woman that he would have married and had kids with-- kids that'll never exist now.

The other thing I've noticed about alternate Earth stories is that they're always about the 'other Earth', and WE are the 'true Earth history'. Why? That's a rather big assumption-- it's like saying we're the only planet with life on it in the universe. Really? Prove it. Or prove that we're on the main Earth that all alternative histories are derived from.
My own personal opinion, considering how weird things have gotten over the past several decades, is that WE are living on an alternative Earth, and are an off-shoot of the Real Earth. We might even be an off-shoot of another off-shoot of the Real Earth.
I know, kinda odd, but that's just me, living in denial that we aren't as crazy-nuts, ignorant, and horrible as we appear to be.

The TNG episode, Parallels, dealt with this idea.

@Steve, "Turn Left"

And the show, Sliders.