Customer Reviews

Two Georges

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(31)
3 star:		(14)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(14)

 

 

This is one of those popular fictional stories that leave you asking the question- Was the United States such a good idea? It really dosen't matter.

The idea of the late twentieth century storyline in this book being based on our 1930's tecnology was a little bit unbelievable.

The North American Union would have been an independent Commomwealth country by now, Philidelphia probibly the capital city, although the fictional Victoria could have been created at the start of the 20th century ( after that Queen's death)as Canberra in Australia had. Being peacefull, non-violent, understanding of others, the NAU would've still developed on the lines that run parallel to our USA reality ie: a superpower that even Russia and Germany would never have touched. Which in the end would have pushed aside Great Britain as the heart of a global empire.

Aviation, Radio, Television, Computer technology, Entertainment and all the things that we take for granted today would still have existed in the NAU late 20th century, you can't stop human development.... Anyhow the storyline WAS good and apart from silly little things such as cross country airship travel (more useful for overseas services)and some stupid names for cities (New Liverpool? England would have kept L.A. although Astoria instead of Chicago does have a nice ring to it.), proved to be a good read.

Based on an assasination attempt on the visiting King Charles by Irish trouble makers, the plot soon thickens into a more broader storyline that involves a young detective, a very clever woman and an adventure that is enjoyable to follow.

From the start, famous people of our reality are represented in this storyline and are all linked together with a great and sometimes humorous plot. All over a stolen painting with a nasty surprise inbedded in it.

No doubt to that fact that Harry Turtledove's excellent record of mastering alternate history was used.

The Two Georges is a fine story in the genre of the alternate history, set in the North American Union which, as a British domain, comprises almost the entire continent. In this story the famous painting of George Washington and King George III in the act of reconciliation is stolen, placing in jeapordy the Union which Washington helped to create.
The story can stand alone on its merits as a detective novel, as North American Mounted Police Colonel Thomas Bushell deals with intrigue and the machinations of the Sons of Liberty, the terrorist group descended from the 18th century revolutionaries who are still trying to make America independent. However,the premise upon which this alternate timeline is based is slim at best, there being many more issues at play in Colonial America than George Washington or King George III combined could have dealt with. The impression one gets is that the world has been a safer and more stable place over the last couple of centuries, wit only some friction among the great powers, an impression which would be hard for a serious historian to consider. Granted that the novel could not have discussed much of what has happened over the last 200 years without being too artificial or taking away from the story at hand, but it might have tried to give a better idea of the state of the world, recent events, etc.
I thought the technological disparity between the 20th century of The Two Georges and our own to be a valid premise. Overall, a good read!

This book starts out well, giving a glimpse into what the world would be like without an American Revolution. It was fun just to look at his alternate world map. However, the pace of the book was very slow. This book might have made a decent short story, but not a novel. The characters are not that inspiring. I was also dismayed to see the few remaining patriots portrayed as racist terrorists. I find it hard to believe that even had the revolution of 1776 failed, colonies would not have sometime later fought for their freedom. Portraying the British as the good guys was more than a bit disconcerting.

Turtledove and Dreyfus have combined to take a potentially fascinating alternate history situation, the American Revolution that never happened, and bury it under a slow moving and unsuspenseful story and pedestrian writing. The characters have little depth or believability, and not surprisingly, the dialogue is cornball. The biggest disappointment is that more details aren't presented on the alternate history, the why's, how's, and effects. The inclusion of the "Tricky Dick" character was a cheap shot that's hard to believe anyone would consider humorous or clever. Advice: pass on this one, and pick up a copy of Turteldove's The Guns of the South instead

Books written by more than one author can be very good or very bad. Most novels by Harry Turtledove just have his own name on the cover, but the two collaborations to which he has contributed - this one with Richard Dreyfuss, and "Household Gods" with Judith Tarr - are very good indeed.

All the action in "The Two Georges" takes place in the late 20th Century in a world where the argument between the American colonies and the British government had been peacefully resolved two hundred years before. Hence the area which in our world became the USA has a huge amount of autonomy but is still part of the British Empire.

The authors do not go into great detail about how the bargain between George III and George Washington (the "Two Georges" of the title) had been struck, but the story is set in a fascinating depiction of the kind of North America which might have resulted. They suggest things which might have been both better (Native Americans get a fairer deal, a rather less violent society) and worse (lower technological growth, significantly less democracy) in such a world.

The core of the book is a detective story in which a precious work of art, a painting of "The Two Georges" (Washington and George the Third") has been stolen. The gritty, well-crafted hero is trying to track down a group of terrorists who he suspects will turn out to be - gulp - American patriots. This must take some courage to try to sell in the US market.

Most of the characters in the book are fictional, but the authors have some light-hearted fun allocating alternative roles to a number of people from our universe. I particularly enjoyed the depiction of Richard Nixon as America's leading used car salesman.

I would particularly commend it to anyone who enjoyed S.M. Stirling's more recent book, "The Peshawar Lancers" - if you liked that book you will like this one, and vice versa.

Well, it was fun, but a serious AH it isn't. I've done rants on my website about people from this world showing up on others barely changed in spite of POD's dating back centuries. Well this book has characters named Richard "Tricky Dick" Nixon (used car dealer), Sir Martin Luther King, John F. Kennedy, etc...

And it's more of a tour of an Altered America than anything else - the mystery isn't a biggy and the suspense level is minimal.

It's worth a read, but don't expect High Art.

I asked Harry recently why all these people from our world kept showing up in the Two Georges world, and his answer was because The Two Georges is "Alternate-History-Lite."

So now you know...

Many people have complained that - apart from its "AH-Liteness" - the world shown in The Two Georges is just too utopian. A typical "The British Empire Rules All And All is Right With the World" AH.

Well, having just reread the book (what can I say, I was bored), I've noted that while it does suffer from the "eternal empire" syndrome (where empires once started seem to just keep on running), the world is far from utopian.

Technology has been retarded at least fifty years worth. And while this doesn't affect our main - middle-class - characters too much (apart from long, long waits every time they want to make a long-distance phone call), when you're poor in TG-World, you're pretty much living at a Third-World level, even in the "Greatest and Richest Empire Ever." It's no surprise (and even the characters notice this) that the main source of "rebels" in North America is from the poorer regions.

Regions, I might add, which are in serious need of some sort of EPA-like organization.

And for all their talk about how most people support the King & Empire, they do have what amounts to a low-level and permanent rebellion going on in North America - and, I wouldn't be surprised, in other areas of the Empire. This is as if all the OTL right-wing loonies living in shacks actually did make up a noticeable percentage of the U.S. population - and were actually organized!

Speaking of "low-level" - there's been a low-level border conflict going on with France/Spain since, well, apparently forever. And it's sufficiently "hot" that military people having been shot at/shot is not all that unusual. It also appears that the government is doing its best to keep this all rather quiet.

And the government does lots of other things that aren't "quite cricket" as well. Our Hero gets a handful of "fill in the blanks" warrants which - while incredibly convenient for the plot - are at best of iffy legality. And "rubber-hose" confessions are apparently commonplace, if "officially" not encouraged.

Now, while race relations seem better than on OTL, looking deeper, I doubt it. Oh, Blacks and Whites and Indians (both kinds) are all equal before the law (though interestingly, even in "New Liverpool" we don't see any Asian population), they all seem to be nestled into narrow areas of what's "proper" for them to be doing (mind, I may be reading lots more into this than actually exists). And I saw no indications that anyone would even think of marrying outside their "race."

And of course the Irish remain the "scum of the Earth" to most of the proper British citizens in this ATL...

Yes, hardly a utopian world and - in many ways - it may be worse than this one!

Many of the following negative reviews seem to disagree with Turtledove's and Dreyfuss' portrayal of American society in a world were the American Revolution never took place. These readers question the different societal mores, conventions, level of technology, and racial integration that this different America possesses. Let us not forget, however, that the very premise of alternate history states that the world would not be the same if certain historical events had occurred differently. By leaving our prejudices aside and reading between the lines, we can actually conclude that Tutledove's and Dreyfuss' alternate America seems plausible enough. Although the plot at times moves at a snail-like pace, the storyline eventually gains momentum and finishes up with a bang. Ultimately speaking, this novel embraces the reader with its gallant characters, creative storytelling, and thought-provoking implications.

"The Two Georges" depicts a world in which the American Revolution never happened and all of North America remains a part of the British Empire. The geographical area that we know of as Canada and the United States of America (minus Alaska, which, in this time-line, remains a part of Russia) is a dominion called the North American Union (NAU), whose capital is a city called Victoria, located on the Potomac River. It is set in the year 1996 of this alternate history. In this world, the geopolitical landscape is filled with empires, the main ones being the British, Russian (headed by the czar), Franco-Spanish, and Ottoman Empires. In fact, there are few areas that have not been absorbed by one empire or another. The imperialists of the late 19th and early 20th century of our own history would have loved this world!

The technology of this world seems comparable to that of about 1890 to 1920 in the current time-line, with some touches of the `30s ("airships") and the `50s ("televisors") thrown in. Steam-powered cars ("steamers") are common in the streets of New Liverpool (the alternate Los Angeles); the internal combustion engine doesn't seem to have been adapted to ground transportation. Airplanes do exist, but they are World War I-like biplanes that are mostly used by the military and "gentlemen" scorn their use for civilian travel, considering their speed (200 mph or so), when compared to that of airships, to be unseemly. In this alternate time-line World War I and World War II did not happen, and thus, the technological innovations that occurred because of them did not happen, as well.

Socially and politically, the world depicted seems somewhat utopian. When a murder is committed early in the book, one character comments that this brings the total number of murders for the year in New Liverpool to five - "...and this is only June!" By comparison, in our time-line, Los Angeles had about forty-five murders per month in 1996.

There seem to be no racial or ethnic tensions. Blacks are the clerks and bureaucrats of choice in both business and government. People of Nuevespanolan (Mexican) and Native American (Cherokee and Iroquois) descent are well and seamlessly integrated in the society, as are immigrants from other parts of the British Empire, such as those from India and China.

The society seems to be more rigidly stratified by socioeconomic class. This, in my opinion, is not surprising for two reasons. First, since the head of state of the British Empire is the King-Emperor, His Majesty Charles III, the royalty remains a functioning and controlling part of society; it has not atrophied as it has in the current history. Second, Britain has always been a rather class-conscious society and if the colonial bonds had been maintained, the societies of the New World, being under British domination, would likely have evolved in a similar fashion.

The authors managed to introduce into their alternate world analogs of historical personages with whom we are familiar. There is the largest used car salesman in the North American Union who calls himself "Honest Dick." Because his wares are so prone to breakdowns, he is known colloquially as "Tricky Dick." The publisher of a pro-independence newspaper based in Boston, but with nationwide circulation, turns out to be a rich, aging philanderer named John F. Kennedy. Also, the Governor General of the NAU, the King-Emperor's chief colonial administrator for North America, is Sir Martin Luther King!

The story begins with the world-famous painting entitled, "The Two Georges" being somehow stolen from the California Governor's mansion, where it is on display. The painting shows George Washington and King George III coming to an agreement that defused the dissatisfactions of the American colonists and prevented their grievances from erupting into revolutionary violence. The painting has become highly symbolic of the unity and amity between Britain and North America.

The job of recovering the painting falls on Col. Thomas Bushell, the commander of the Royal American Mounted Police (who for some reason are called RAMs (Royal American Mounties) rather than RAMPs) in California. He is assisted by his adjutant, Capt. Samuel Stanley, who is black.

It turns out that the painting has been stolen by members of a revolutionary cabal called the Sons of Liberty, whose ultimate goal is to separate North America from the British Empire and establish an independent republic. One of their slogans is, "George Washington was a traitor!" The ideology of the Sons of Liberty is anti-black, anti-Jewish, and anti-immigrant. To this reader, the organization seems like an alternate history version of the Ku Klux Klan!

The thieves demand a ransom payment of fifty million pounds sterling from the NAU government for the safe return of "The Two Georges". Col. Bushell and Capt. Stanley race hither and yon over the territory of the NAU, tracking down leads. They are deathly afraid that the colonial government will pay the ransom - and, even worse, that the painting will be destroyed anyway.

I did find the book to be imminently believable. But that's only to be expected since Harry Turtledove is the acknowledged master of the alternate history genre. The book has a Victorian feel about it, which, I suppose, was intentional. However, have no fear! The book is not filled with the convoluted sentences and arcane vocabulary that one might expect in a "Victorian" novel.

Some readers have complained that the novel is a "slow read" and I would have to agree. I've read everything that Harry Turtledove has written in the alternate history genre and I must admit that I've never had to struggle - trudge would be a good word - to get through any of his other books as I have through this one. Nevertheless, the world depicted by the book is a fascinating one and that - along with the usual twists and turns of the standard mystery novel - kept me going.

I've gotten a chuckle out of the fact that some Canadian readers seem to feel almost a longing for the world of "The Two Georges". Of course, the Canadian experience with the British Empire has, in our current world, been different than that of the United States. And, even more important, each nation's political history and traditions since the late 18th century have been vastly different. So, of course, some Canadians and Americans might have a vastly different take on the book.

In conclusion, the alternate history novel "The Two Georges" is definitely worth reading!

This book came highly recommended to me by a friend because he knew my interest in history, alternative history, the Colonial period and the possibilities of alternate endings to the Insurrection of the colonists from the lawful Crown of England.

The book was just that. An alternative plot surrounding a series of historical events. For those that are complaining about the content on one way or another it seems obvious that they were wanting a different sort of book and in some ways so was I, but that was not the point of this book and I recognize that.

The characters of this book were very real to me and I could see the setting and the conflicts very clearly. It is easy, of you are interested in this sort of thing to get sucked into the story and the plots and sub plots that this story creates.

I loved the solution to the story and the way that the plot was tied together at the end into a cohesive ending that did not leave you with any questions. Yes, things could have been added or removed or the plot could have been different but then it would not be this book and the intent of the authors would not be honored. All in all I really liked this book and it was sort of the opening of the door to alternative history as a genre for me.

First the negative, which will be short. I wish Turtledove and Dreyfus had included something about how the the colonies and Britain settled their differences. Nonetheless, a satisfying and interesting alternative based on the lower technology but much more fair and egalitarian society that might exist if the revolutionary war hadn't been fought (or was if fought and lost). The authors keep you guessing throughout the chase across a recognizable 'America' with interesting characters, and charming love story and a surprise villian. Highly recommended.