レビュー要約

• 題材への踏み込みと構成の明快さが評価される一方、専門性の高さや作風の癖を読み手がどう受け止めるかで印象が分かれる。

レビュー

• Gripping and moving alternate history

  Ian MacLeod is one of my favorite writers, and this book was never published in this country. It does take place in an alternate England and has a gay protagonist, so perhaps both of those factors played a part. Anyone who enjoys science fiction that is also of high literary quality should read this book.. The picture of an England under nazi rule but not after a German victory is totally convincing and the plot takes turns that are a real surprise.

• How long would it take you to realise that Britain was a fascist state?

  An alternative history through the eyes of a gay Oxford don. The premise is that the Germans won the First World War, their March 1918 offensive succeeded and the war ended in the August with the defeat of France and Britain. The Peace Treaty strips Britain of a number of colonies and overseas territories in much the same way that the Germans were in our own history. Britain has a violent period in the 1920s and a former corporal, John Arthur, becomes the leader of a Modernist movement. The story starts in the early part of 1940 when the Empire Alliance has been in power for at least a decade. A number of short victorious wars has restored much of the Imperial prestige lost at the end of the Great War. Although all seems harmonious it is a dangerous time to be different and not to look British. Geoffrey Brook (also Griffin Brooke) has found his way to be an Oxford Professor through his tenuous connection to John Arthur, the Prime Minister. Arthur mentioned Brook as an influence on his childhood when Brook taught him at school. Brook has no recollection of Arthur, but went along with it anyway. Much of the story is told through flashbacks where Brook reminisces of things that have happened to him during his life. Realising that he is dying Brook resolves to find out what happened to a missing acquaintance of his, a Post Office Censor that he had illicit liaisons with in an allotment shed. One night his acquaintance disappears, Brook believes that it is because he is gay and worries that the Knights of Saint George (KSG) will be along soon to arrest him also. However it turns out that the acquaintance was married to a Polish Jew and the whole family has been taken because of that. With nothing really to lose Brook tries to find out where the Jews went, the newsreels said they went to the Summer Isles off the north of Scotland. However there has been no news since. This is the story of a dying man coming to terms with his life, he feels inadequate intellectually and believes he's only got to become an Oxford don because the better men have all been silenced by the Empire Alliance. He worries about the shallowness of his sexual life, and the fear that homosexuality being illegal means that he will be arrested and put in a camp for 'treatment'. It's worth noting that although there are necessary references there is nothing explicit here, the encounters are largely left to the reader's imagination. The author clearly transmits an angst ridden guilt at making the best of each furtive encounter as Brook can never know when he'll next meet someone suitable. There is also a loss of not being able to live life with a lover. There are a number of inter-woven plot threads and this makes for a good story, there are a couple of bits where I guessed what was going to happen, and then was wrong. That made it more enjoyable. WHat I also enjoyed was how the author had taken the consequences of losing the Great War that German suffered and then mapped those on to Britain. Not all of them were completely identical, and it was those changes, making it more rationally British, that I enjoyed. I also wondered how long it would take you to realise that you were living in a fascist state if it slowly happened around you and you weren't one of the people being targeted. Overall both enjoyable and thought provoking.

• An alternative history on what a 1940s fascist Britain could look like - interesting, even if based on an unlikely premise

  Ian McLeod has produced an intriguing alternative history of a 1940s fascist Britain here. He perfectly captures the probable fine differences in implementation and life in such a system between Germany and the UK, even if he uses lots of parallels on how the system came about. While the 'deus ex machina' intervention the author needed to create the basis for this alternative history to come about is at best unlikely, the book still provides a chilling insight on how most of the unsavoury consequences of fascism would have manifested themselves in countries other than Germany, too. The protagonist - a homosexual history teacher promoted to Oxford due to his vague association with the country's supreme leader - is perhaps an unlikely hero but probably quite aptly chosen for being neither the dashing opponent vaingloriously fighting the system, nor an out and out supporter. This is especially so, since he would naturally belong to an actively hunted down group - together with Jews and the Irish. The system is presented as slightly less oppressive than the German one would have been and the atmosphere of the book, even if brooding, is not outright depressive for the most part. I feel the author also manages to excellently portray both the slight unease the population would feel about the persecutions, as well as the justifications they would find for them - all combined with the unwillingness to find out what really happens to the people defined as 'undesirables'. Whether the protagonist's big decision - leading to the grand finale - is credible or not is of course a matter of personal opinion. It is again necessary to get to the conclusion the author desires and is certainly easier to stomach than the course of events leading to the alternate history in the first place. The author also alternates other aspects of the history - such as pulling Bristol cars, Fred Perry clothing or Enid Blyton books forward by up to a decade forward. It may be details but I find it hard to come up with a reason, what in the alternative history would make it so. Irrespective of the small qualms I find this an excellent book. It does what an alternative history is supposed to do - namely plastically portray a situation that we may find difficult to imagine otherwise - i.e. how fascism would really look or feel like if it happened in one's own country and not somewhere abroad, where it is easier to explain away.

• A different and intriguing history

  All is revealed slowly in this alternative history tale. While I found the tale to be quite dark, I appreciated the writing and the portrayal of an alternate world (a sort of "would have" world). This is the first MacLeod book I have read, but it made me curious enough to want to investigate other titles by the same author.

• A stimulating and thoughtfulk read by one of my favourite authors

  Like the best SF, this book examines a situation which could be about to happen or is happening already. Characters are well drawn and believable

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