The only thing I fangasim harder for would be Babylon 5. If you give me an episode number, I can give you a title, a plot synopsis, and how many episodes FROM that we get another Walter "Nuclear Wessals" Koenig episode.
However...just because I'm a dribbling fanboy does not mean that I can't recognize the huge flaws in Turtledove's writing. Cause he has them and hoo-boy, if you're not ready, they can be a game breaker.
Firstly, he writes big books. Big books, with lots of characters, over long periods of time. This leads to repetition. Lots and lots of repetition. I swear, you will hear similar lines of dialog done again and again and again. You will read the same scene again and again and again, with only minor changes. There's a good reason for this: People do the same thing again and again. That's part of what makes them good people. And Harry Turtledove always writes great people...the only problem is a great portrayal of a person does not always equate to a character that will leave you riveted to the book!
Don't get me wrong! Turtledove has plenty of exciting action scenes, taut conversations, and erotic sex scenes to keep you interested...assuming you know when to skim!
Second Problem! This guy really likes his World War 2. I mean, seriously, his three most epic series are...
World War 2 with ALIENS
World War 2 with THE CONFEDERACY!
World War 2 with MAGIC (my favorite)
and, of course, who can forget his one shots...
World War 2 but the Nazis Won!
World War 2 but the Japanese invaded Hawaii
World War 2 but...um, wait, I think that's it.
OH WAIT, this perfectly segues into the thing I was actually going to talk about!
Nazis and Unicorns! Warning! Spoilers ahead!
After the Downfall begins with, well, the Downfall bit. The massive red army is smashing into Berlin in an orgy of rape, death and violence. Yeah, Nazi Germany was evil, but by this point, it was kind of like kicking a dog after all of its legs were bitten off. Oh and its one million people doing the kicking.
The main character, Captain Hasso Pemsil (Or Tha Playa as I shall be calling him) has a handful of soldiers around him, almost no ammo and almost no cover. The Reds are getting closer and the best place that he and his men have to hide is a musem of ancient artifacts.
Needless to say, they're up Styx creek without a paddel. And no, I didn't bring up Greek references for nothing! For this Musem holds this ancient rock called something or other, which I'm sure is some Greek legend reference. Long story short, Tha Play sits down on the rock and, to his shock, vanishes.
Then the rest of his men get shot so no one knows that he's vanished.
And since the rock is neither a Nazi to shoot nor a woman to rape, the Reds ignore it and Berlin collapses.
That's the Downfall...and now we get the AFTER bit!
Tha Playa arrives in a marshy forest that looks almost exactly like Russia, except with less angry Russians trying to k- and holy shit, a super hot blond bombshell being chased by three subhuman jews. At least that's what Tha Playa sees.
So he does the logical thing and uses his fancy gun to mow down the jews. The hot blond bombshell, who turns out to be named Velona, does something rather odd. She takes off her clothes and spreads her legs.
Tha Playa, still a bit shell shocked, thinks that this is rather odd.
Then he realizes, oi! Hot girl! And gets right too it.
Did I mention this is seven pages in?
Seven.
Seeeeveeeeen!
Anywho, Tha Playa, between boning the Goddess (Oh yeah, she's a Goddess) learns that he's in a magical world of magic, wherein the blond folks have arrived and started taking over the lands of the short jew-looking people. And they're having a fairly grand time of it all, except for this one annoyingly hard to destroy nation of jew-looking people. Realizing that he can use his furteristic German Brain to aide his fellow blondies, Tha Playa soon gets a job as head of the magical SS in the blondie's court.
He also learns he has magical powers. Sweet.
However, Tha Playa is having second thoughts. For one thing, he's had time to think about it...and, well, the subhuman russians hadn't really been very subhuman. Everything he had been taught was that Russians were weaker than Germans. And therefor, Germany should not have lost to them. If Germany had lost to them...then...QUESTION MARK.
While bemusing this, he begins to actually feel...kinda bad for the Jew-looking folk. I mean, the blondies are just real assholes to them.
Tha Playa is conflicted! But then, a nice war comes along to distract him: The king he's working for decides to use Tha Playa's might German Tactics to crush the Jew-looking people's homeland once and for all!
And, at first, the German Tactics (applied to horses, rather than tanks) work great.
But then those annoying Jew-looking people do the logical thing and set a trap that would only work against bunched up calvery all charging right at you. Tha Playa falls into the trap, most of the army is killed, then routed...and Tha Playa awakens in a Jew-Looking People jail!
Over time, he learns the other side of the story, grows to realize that the way people look has almost no bearing on their actual personality, discards his old Nazi beliefs of racial hygine and social darwinism, and falls in love with a hot jew-looking people girl, who has more personality, spunk and intellegence than the blondie goddess anyway.
The story ends with Tha Playa settling down with the jew-looking people girl and helping that nation develop gunpowder, to help level out the playing field, so to speak.
On the whole, what did I think of this book?
I fucking LOVED IT!
Why? Firstly, it was a unique idea excecuted well. Secondly, it was a redemption story and I love redemption stories. Thirdly, the characters were well drawn and realistic. Tha Playa is ernestly likable even when he's in racist mode, the Goddess has a perfect air of being both increadibly hot and ever so slightly annoying. And, of course, a shout out MUST go to the jew-looking people girl, who steals the show by being my...FAVORITE CHARACTER OF THE BOOK!
The book also gains bonus points for not killing my FCOTB off. Yeah, I often pick favorite characters that...die...
When that happens, books loose points.
Grr
Okay, fourthly, the book was a nice change of pace from Turtledove's normal works. He's only got a few characters, and a shorter time frame, and so it feels much less repetitive, while still having that classic Turtledove detail that always makes me snuggle his books while reading them.
And, lastly, there's lots and lots of awesome awesome sex...
Highs: Redemption story that feels realisitc. Sex.
Lows: Maybe too much sex for prudes. The fantasy names are impossible to remember.
Bottom Line: Worth a looksie if you're new to Turtledove. If you're a fan, grab it!
Score: 4 Swasitcas
RANDOM SIDE NOTE!
I must say: Turtledove has shockingly few gay character. You'd think that at least one would pop up one of these days...but nope! No gay people!
However, I think I know why. When he wrote his WW2 with Aliens story, people asked why there were no 'view point characters' that were Japanese. And Harry Turtledove explained that he could not write from their perspective, as he did not understand them yet....so later, he wrote a series which had many Japanese characters and nailed them.
I think Turtledove needs to simpyl study up more on gay characters, to try and figure out how to get in their heads. Cause, well, Turltedove is so nicely well rounded in his representation of the world, its a shame to see him miss out on this increasingly important one!
See ya guys next time.
The main character, Captain Hasso Pemsil (Or Tha Playa as I shall be calling him) has a handful of soldiers around him, almost no ammo and almost no cover. The Reds are getting closer and the best place that he and his men have to hide is a musem of ancient artifacts.
Needless to say, they're up Styx creek without a paddel. And no, I didn't bring up Greek references for nothing! For this Musem holds this ancient rock called something or other, which I'm sure is some Greek legend reference. Long story short, Tha Play sits down on the rock and, to his shock, vanishes.
Then the rest of his men get shot so no one knows that he's vanished.
And since the rock is neither a Nazi to shoot nor a woman to rape, the Reds ignore it and Berlin collapses.
That's the Downfall...and now we get the AFTER bit!
Tha Playa arrives in a marshy forest that looks almost exactly like Russia, except with less angry Russians trying to k- and holy shit, a super hot blond bombshell being chased by three subhuman jews. At least that's what Tha Playa sees.
So he does the logical thing and uses his fancy gun to mow down the jews. The hot blond bombshell, who turns out to be named Velona, does something rather odd. She takes off her clothes and spreads her legs.
Tha Playa, still a bit shell shocked, thinks that this is rather odd.
Then he realizes, oi! Hot girl! And gets right too it.
Did I mention this is seven pages in?
Seven.
Seeeeveeeeen!
Anywho, Tha Playa, between boning the Goddess (Oh yeah, she's a Goddess) learns that he's in a magical world of magic, wherein the blond folks have arrived and started taking over the lands of the short jew-looking people. And they're having a fairly grand time of it all, except for this one annoyingly hard to destroy nation of jew-looking people. Realizing that he can use his furteristic German Brain to aide his fellow blondies, Tha Playa soon gets a job as head of the magical SS in the blondie's court.
He also learns he has magical powers. Sweet.
However, Tha Playa is having second thoughts. For one thing, he's had time to think about it...and, well, the subhuman russians hadn't really been very subhuman. Everything he had been taught was that Russians were weaker than Germans. And therefor, Germany should not have lost to them. If Germany had lost to them...then...QUESTION MARK.
While bemusing this, he begins to actually feel...kinda bad for the Jew-looking folk. I mean, the blondies are just real assholes to them.
Tha Playa is conflicted! But then, a nice war comes along to distract him: The king he's working for decides to use Tha Playa's might German Tactics to crush the Jew-looking people's homeland once and for all!
And, at first, the German Tactics (applied to horses, rather than tanks) work great.
But then those annoying Jew-looking people do the logical thing and set a trap that would only work against bunched up calvery all charging right at you. Tha Playa falls into the trap, most of the army is killed, then routed...and Tha Playa awakens in a Jew-Looking People jail!
Over time, he learns the other side of the story, grows to realize that the way people look has almost no bearing on their actual personality, discards his old Nazi beliefs of racial hygine and social darwinism, and falls in love with a hot jew-looking people girl, who has more personality, spunk and intellegence than the blondie goddess anyway.
The story ends with Tha Playa settling down with the jew-looking people girl and helping that nation develop gunpowder, to help level out the playing field, so to speak.
On the whole, what did I think of this book?
I fucking LOVED IT!
Why? Firstly, it was a unique idea excecuted well. Secondly, it was a redemption story and I love redemption stories. Thirdly, the characters were well drawn and realistic. Tha Playa is ernestly likable even when he's in racist mode, the Goddess has a perfect air of being both increadibly hot and ever so slightly annoying. And, of course, a shout out MUST go to the jew-looking people girl, who steals the show by being my...FAVORITE CHARACTER OF THE BOOK!
The book also gains bonus points for not killing my FCOTB off. Yeah, I often pick favorite characters that...die...
When that happens, books loose points.
Grr
Okay, fourthly, the book was a nice change of pace from Turtledove's normal works. He's only got a few characters, and a shorter time frame, and so it feels much less repetitive, while still having that classic Turtledove detail that always makes me snuggle his books while reading them.
And, lastly, there's lots and lots of awesome awesome sex...
Highs: Redemption story that feels realisitc. Sex.
Lows: Maybe too much sex for prudes. The fantasy names are impossible to remember.
Bottom Line: Worth a looksie if you're new to Turtledove. If you're a fan, grab it!
Score: 4 Swasitcas
RANDOM SIDE NOTE!
I must say: Turtledove has shockingly few gay character. You'd think that at least one would pop up one of these days...but nope! No gay people!
However, I think I know why. When he wrote his WW2 with Aliens story, people asked why there were no 'view point characters' that were Japanese. And Harry Turtledove explained that he could not write from their perspective, as he did not understand them yet....so later, he wrote a series which had many Japanese characters and nailed them.
I think Turtledove needs to simpyl study up more on gay characters, to try and figure out how to get in their heads. Cause, well, Turltedove is so nicely well rounded in his representation of the world, its a shame to see him miss out on this increasingly important one!
See ya guys next time.
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