Rola

2007 · ref. 87689 — New York: Tor A Tom Doherty Associates Book 2007. First Edition Stated First Printing Stated. Hardcover. Very good/Good. Scott M. Fischer Jacket art. The format is approximately 5.75 pages by 8.5 inches. 288 pages. Signed by the author on the title page. DJ has wear creasing and tear at the bottom front portion. Harry Norman Turtledove born June 14 1949 is an American author who is best known for his work in the genres of alternate history historical fiction fantasy science fiction and mystery fiction. He is a student of history and completed his Ph.D. in Byzantine history. His dissertation was on the period AD 565-582. In addition to his birth name Turtledove writes under a number of pen names: Eric Iverson H. N. Turteltaub Dan Chernenko and Mark Gordian. He began publishing novels in the realm of fantasy starting in 1979 and continues to write with his latest being Or Even Eagle Flew 2021 about Amelia Earhart and World War II. Turtledove published his first two novels Wereblood and Werenight in 1979 under the pseudonym "Eric G. Iverson". He later explained that his editor at Belmont Tower did not think that people would believe the author's real name was "Turtledove" and came up with something more Nordic. He continued to use "Iverson" until 1985. Turtledove won the Homer Award for Short Story in 1990 for "Designated Hitter" the John Esten Cooke Award for Southern Fiction in 1993 for The Guns of the South and the Hugo Award for Novella in 1994 for Down in the Bottomlands. Publishers Weekly dubbed Turtledove "The Master of Alternate History". Within the genre he is known for creating original alternate history scenarios such as survival of the Byzantine Empire or an alien invasion during the middle of the Second World War. The Soviet Union won the Cold War. The Russians were a little smarter than they were in our own world and the United States was a little dumber and a lot less resolute. Now more than a century later the world's gone Communist and capitalism is a bad word. For Gianfranco and his friend Annarita a couple of teenagers growing up in Milan life in a heavily regimented surveillance-rich command economy is just plain dreary. The eventual withering-away of the state doesn't look like it's going to happen anytime soon. Annarita's a hard-working student and a member of the Young Socialists' League. Gianfranco is a lot less motivated--but on the other hand his father's a Party apparatchik. The biggest excitement in their lives is a wargame shop called The Gladiator which runs tournaments and stocks marvelous complex games you can't find anywhere else. Then abruptly the shop is shut down. Someone's figured out that The Gladiator's games are teaching counterrevolutionary capitalist principles. The Security Police are searching high and low for the shop's proprietors who've not only vanished into thin air but have left behind sets of fingerprints that aren't in the records of any government on earth. Only one staffer is left: Gianfranco and Annarita's friend Eduardo. He's on the run and he comes to them in secret with an astonishing story: he's a time trader from our own timeline accidentally left behind when the store was evacuated. The only way Eduardo can get home to his own timeline is if Gianfranco and Annarita can help him reach one of the other time trader sites in this world--and the Security Police will be on their tails all the way there. Derived from a Publishers Weekly article: Turtledove's absorbing fourth Crosstime Traffic novel is the best yet in this SF series. The two main characters are particularly well drawn: 17-year-old Annarita Crosetti and 16-year-old Gianfranco Mazzilli students at Enver Hoxha Polytechnic in a Milan that's part of the quasi-Stalinist Italian People's Republic. Gianfranco is a fairly hopeless student until he discovers a new game shop called the Gladiator where he's delighted to play a game Rails Across Europe that improves his algebra scores. When the security police close down the shop for teaching capitalism the head clerk who's a friend of Gianfranco's and a marooned outtimer goes on the lam. Fans of Turtledove's unambiguously alternative history will find this effort up to his usual high standard. Tor [A Tom Doherty Associates Book] hardcover