The Great War: Breakthroughs

Rating:
Summary: Captures the horror that this war would have been
Review: This is perhaps the best book yet in Turtledove's Great War series, since there is a degree of resolution in the end. Though some have criticized his vast array of characters so far in this series, I like the fact that we have someone to watch in each theater and the homefront. Despite the armistice at the end, there is a somber note to those who have read history. I can't wait for the next book for the answers to the questions. Will the peace terms be as harsh as Versailles? Is Featherston another Forrest, or another Hitler? What will the legacy of the war be? How will society change regarding women and blacks? The depiction of the homefront is at least as interesting as the war itself.

Rating:
Summary: Not nearly his best work
Review: I've liked almost all of Harry's books, but when I finished this one, it seemed a little fishy to me. So I mailed the three books in the series so far to my Dad to read, since he knows more about WWI than anyone has a right to if they weren't actually in it. That turned out to be a mistake, as he read them all over one weekend, called me on the phone, and spent about five hours of long distance time venting and rattling off this huge laundry list of how and why what Turtledove presented in his book couldn't possibly have happened (even assuming the differences between Harry's world and ours). It seems to me if you're going to write alternate history, it should still be realistic enough not to give a historian fits.

I also agree with what one other reviewer wrote (and this is the part that bothered me when I first read the book) in that the characters and story all seem coerced and stiff, like the events in the novel are being forced to fit a mold.

And I agree with what just about everyone has written - the sex scenes are poorly done. I like to see romance bloom between characters - but I didn't see any of that.

Personally, I think Harry is spending too much time concentrating on his Colonization story. Maybe he should have waited until the Great War series was done, so he could devote some more time to researching the war.

Rating:
Summary: Breakthroughs and the Beginning of Turtledove's Modern Era
Review: Harry Turtledove's premise in all of his books is that, no matter how the characters may change, the course of history is too strong to be changed significantly by minor events. This is very true in his third installment of his "Great War" tetralogy. Despite the U.S. defeat in the Civil War and the realigning of alliances at the start of the First World War, both the outcome (he who has the greatest means of production and manpower wins) is still the same. And like the Peace of Paris in our own timeline, the peace conditions imposed by the victors are so harsh that they can't help but sow the seeds of a future, more destructive war.

Breakthroughs is to titled because of the events that happen on the American Front. By massing armor forces, and not using individually to support infantry as happened in our own WWI, the U.S. has both entered the era of modern warfare and tipped the scales of the North American stalemate. Using a rudamentary form of Blitzkreig (I couldn't help but notice suggestion of the advent of the AIR-ARMOR-INFANTRY combination first introduced by Nazi Germany and now by a German-friendly United States), the U.S. is able to smash through C.S.A. and Canadian lines and force their governments to surrender.

But as with the 1919 end of WWI (this war ends in 1917 but at the loss of millions of American lives this time), the Quadruple Alliance has no plans of letting the defeated walk away without paying a heavy price. You can see the bitter resentment of C.S.A. artillerman Jake Featherson (a future Adolf Hitler perhaps?) and the ardant anti-Red Anne Colleton (her pursit of the black communists from the first installment was easily the least interesting parts of this book) playing a role in the fourth and final Turtledove installment.

It wouldn't surprise me that a new Axis is formed between the U.K., France and the C.S.A. based on some strange idea of racial or cultural superiority. After all, the ideas of facism finds its roots in nationalism. And France is the country credited with starting that great idea. We can only wait and see how he decided to play this one. The greatest thing about Breakthroughs is that it is action-packed. There is movement on the lines, not just the endless slaughter and occasional death of a character. The reader is really torn about who to support. True, the Americans are defeating the FORMER slaveholders of the South, but those southerners are allowing blacks to enter the military (albeit in a final act of desperation) while the U.S.A. doesn't and is also granting them citizenship. Who is right and who is wrong? Turtledove does not attempt to answer these questions for the reader.

It is very clear that, like the final installment of the "Worldwar" series, that he is preparing to begin a new generation of stories in this same timeline. The fates of the characters is resolved and sometimes sealed in this book. There are some who will clearly play a role in the next book, which I suspect will take place about 20 years later, but others will disappear.

"The Great War: Breakthroughs" is a fun and quick read. While there are some areas I which he would spend more time on (why couldn't we see what was happening in Richmond the same as we could in D.C.?) and other parts which he should have left alone (who cares about the Dakota prowling around in the south Atlantic? I also resisted the temptation to skip over that tart Anne Colleton's rantings about Scipio and Cassius), it was a good way to conclude the FIRST Great War. But he create a lot of questions as to the future of the divided America that will surely be answered next year.

Rating:
Summary: A great book with some drawbacks
Review: I have been waiting for this book to come out since I finished the previous volume. I could not wait to see how things turn out and Turtledove did not disappoint. I enjoyed the book from cover to cover but I have one complaint. Did so MANY of the better characters have to be killed? I got progressively depressed as person after person who I was rooting for get killed off. Harry probably wanted to capture the horrors of war and present that too us. In that he did really well.

This book, like the rest in the series, is very easy to follow and is so well thought out that it hardly seems "Alternate".

Thanks Harry. I'm looking forward to the next war.

John Silva Chicago, IL

Rating:
Summary: Breakthrough to a Bitter World
Review: Well as the title suggested the breakthroughs came. Mass concentration of armor proved to be the key to breaking the stalemate of trench warfare. Furthermore, the factors of better industrial base, more manpower and resources began to tell on the Quadruple Entente(Britain,France, Russia and CSA) in the long war. Now the war is over and the peace remains to be hashed out. The questions linger what kind of peace will there be ? That is what the great thing about this book was, it raised more disturbing questions, while the simple questions were progressively answered through the book.

The clean, yet tragic, war was ending and a new ugly kind of warfare was being born. War was being fomented on the streets, before the peace had been settled. Turtledove has nicely woven these complex questions into this book, which is definitely the climactic moment of The Great War series. I must agree with some of the other reviewers about the unnecessry sex scenes which only detract from the serious reading.

Nonetheless, I would enthusiastically recommend the book to any fan of history/ alternative history. The book is fast paced and there are many surprises in the book as multiple great characters fall. The next book, which I eagerly anticipate, will further outline the face of the peace to be imposed by the victors. It will explore the themes of hatred, bigotry and sense of betrayal in the CSA which will surely result in another war, a nasty, brutal and merciless war. The next book will surely outline the birth of the impending holocaust to come.

Rating:
Summary: Breakthrough for the American-German Alliance.
Review: First off I'd like to say that I've liked all of the Turtledove books that I've ever read and this one was just as good or better as all of his other books. I did have some problems with this book and the rest in the series. I always wanted to know what was happening in Europe so that I could see the difference between our world and this one. The only real glimpses we got were in the second book when Verdun fell to the Germans, which held out in our world, and when France and the UK threw in the towel. They mention that Germany created the Kingdom of Poland with land taken from the Russians and that Russia was in Revolution, but that was about it. As for the res though I really enjoyed this book. I found it very interesting the way Custer was very similar to George Patton in this book by wanting to mass his Barrels (Tanks) and some of his sayings were almost direct quotes of Patton. I was surprised at how easily Turtledove has killed some of his major charecters in all three of these books. I was glad to see some go but also sad to see others go. Of course I was cheering for the American-German alliance throughout these books. I think it was east to tell that they were winning the war by the end of the second book. I would have liked to have seen all of the CSA and Canada occupied by the USA and all of France by Imperial Germany but I was glad to see them win. I can see possibilities unfold in the future for the universe and that's part of the reason I enjoy Alternate History and especially Hary Turtledove. It can open your mind to speculating what could have happened. Overall I think this book was very enjoyable. I don't think it was as well written as the others and I was disapointed by how many charecters he killed, but that added to the suprise factor. I am eagerly awaiting the final book in this series as I am awaiting all of Turtledove's books.

Rating:
Summary: Predictable, but still good.
Review: In this Alternate Universe, the Union lost the battle of Antietiem and thus the Civil War. In Turtledove's "How Few Remain", the CSA and the USA fight a second war. The USA losses and becomes very good friends with Germany. Now jump to the "The Great War" series.

World War I has going on. Of course, the CSA is allied with England and France, while the USA is allied with Germany. Thus the USA is flighting the CSA and Canada in two fronts and battles in the seas. In "Walk in Hell." the CSA advance into the north has is halted and the USA finally starts pushing the CSA back, even though the Red rebellion has been put down.

We get to see the war through the eyes of those who fight the war and those who have to live through it. From the privates fighting on the ground to the seaman playing cat and mouse with submarine warfare to the flyers of the new areoplane and to those behind, the women who fight for their land or families and one who is now a Congresswoman. And more.

Although, the book is excellent, I have two gripes with it. First, Turtle uses too many characters for my taste. I know it helps to convey all aspects of the war, but at times I was backtracking a bit, due to confusing characters. My second fault is with this book in particular. I know American's can take an idea and run with it, but the USA's use of barrels - tanks - seemed excessive.

Now for the fourth book, they've survived the war, but can they survive the peace?

Rating:
Summary: Best book I've ever read by Turtledove
Review: I've been a fan of Turtledove since his World War series came out years ago, and I've read every alternate history book by him since. I loved the Great War series simply based off the first two novels, and love it even more now that Breakthroughs has come out. Breakthroughs is an amazing book. The action is simply incredible, and I love the use of foreshadowing and the possible linking some of the characters to historical figures in our timeline (Featherston as a young Hitler, Morrel as a Patton/Rommel like-figure, Cartsen/Moss as Billy Mitchell-like figures(?), etc.) I like how Turtledove hints at "the next war" (possible other series?) and also has the characters engaging in "might-have-beens" such as if the US had won the War of Secession. Even though I'm sure that Settling Accounts, the fourth and final book in the series, will not have as much action, it will be very interesting to see the consequences of the mistakes made by USA and Germany in ending the war. I absolutely adore this book and recommend it to anyone interested in the Civil War/World War I/World War II.

Rating:
Summary: Now 'this' was a "Walk in Hell"
Review: The respect I bore for Turtledove's work evaporated in just one afternoon for two distinct yet commingled reasons.

Naturally, any novelist is the sole voice in events which shape the world of the novel. But in a departure from almost all of Turtledove's other works, I found it impossible to suspend my disbelief for more than two, perhaps three paragraphs at a time. The writing seems ponderous, all the events foreordained - as though Turtledove has been swept up in the somewhat disturbing thought processes which occupy the mind of his McSweeney character. Simply put, I knew within the first 10 pages of the book exactly how it would end, and the only surprise I found within the intervening 450+ pages was how terribly coerced the story became. There is not a moment of suspense, not a second of doubt that the book will spiral down to its implausible conclusion.

The absolute implausibility of that conclusion is the second and more important reason I gave this book just one star. I won't reveal what happens for fear of spoiling the ending even more than Turtledove has already; but simply put, even the most casual student of the ghastly mistake we now call World War I can easily see it could only have reached Turtledove's conclusion with a novelist's coercive help. Further, the conclusions he draws regarding Houston and part of Texas go beyond the ludicrous and into the shamefully insulting. I could write 10,000 words on this alone, but space prevents me.

Mr. Turtledove, please let me know when you get back to doing what you do best - writing an alternative history which very well could happen, rather than one which happens for no apparent reason other than that you seem to want it to. Until then, I'll steer clear of your work.

Rating:
Summary: Great Story - Too Many Words
Review: I enjoyed this book, as I did the preceding ones, but I was glad to get to the end of it. I found myself reading to find out what happened more than to enjoy the prose and flow of the writing. Too many "reruns" in conversations and plot lines.

Being a southerner, I was a bit chagrined at the result of the war - this shouldn't surprise anyone because you should see it coming if you read the other two books. I was more irritated with the obligatory sex scenes (please make them stop!), the charicature characters (McSweeney is particularly annoying), and the perpetual reference to army lieutenant colonels as "Lieutenant Colonel", contrary to military practice, was also bothersome. Worst of all was the USS Dakota: Sam and his Italian friend have repeated the same conversation throughout all of the books - enough already! Likewise with George Enos and his Chief on the Ericsson.

I enjoyed the overall story - Harry Turtledove is a master storyteller, and if you appreciate imagination you will like any of his work. I was pleased that not everyone in the story has a happy ending - war rarely leaves everyone whole and happy! I especially appreciate his attention to detail: I drive on Telfair Street in Augusta, GA every day, and it was interesting to see Scipio stop there in his flight from "Miss Anne". Now if only I can find that restaurant! (If you read the book you'll know what I'm talking about).

Overall, I would recommend this for history buffs, Turtledove fans, and folks that have read the first two "Great War" books.