Tag: theater of spies

Book of the Week: Theater of Spies.

Theater of Spies is SM Stirling’s second book in his alt-history Black Chamber series (change point: Howard Taft has a heart attack just in time for Teddy Roosevelt to win the 1912 election instead of vicious racist and would-be totalitarian Woodrow Wilson*). It’s a nice, taut spy thriller, full of in-jokes and historical references and the nagging feeling that the USA in that universe is heading down a somewhat darker road than they realize. It’s fun to watch, mind you, mostly because it’s not my world so by definition it’s an adventure. Check out the series.

Moe Lane

*I’m kind of making it a point to refer to the jackwagon that way from now on.

In the Mail: Theater of Spies.

Theater of Spies is SM Stirling’s latest book set in a world where Teddy Roosevelt ended up winning the 1912 election and is now fighting an even more awful World War I against an exceedingly more awful Germany. Very much a technothriller, only all the cutting-edge tech is from the Twenties and Thirties. It’s an entertaining series, not least because Stirling is having fun tweaking everybody’s noses by having the USA be run by Teddy Roosevelt’s version of the Progressives instead of Woodrow Wilson’s.

Been waiting a while to read this.

Book of the Week: Theater of Spies.

SM Stirling’s Theater of Spies is coming out in May: it’s the second book in a what is rapidly becoming dieselpunk alternate history series with Teddy Roosevelt running a rather larger USA in World War I.  I’m reading it chapter by chapter now on Stirling’s site, and I find the little hints of “they should watch out for these social trends, two decades or so from now” to be quite of interest.  It’s not really surprising to see, if you know anything about early 20th Century American history; but if you don’t, well, the world was a lot different then, and not just in the ways that you might think.