Baen Books, 2012, 343 p.

I spotted this when the good lady was returning Irène Némirovsky’s Jezebel to the local library. As a sucker for altered histories I thought I’d give it a whirl.

The set up here is that Japan won the Battle of Midway. Hawaii is withering on the vine, Japanese forces have invaded Alaska, raided the Panama Canal and occasionally bombard the US west coast. The sole substantial US aircraft carrier remaining is the Saratoga.

The novel focuses mainly on US Navy officer Tim Dane (who speaks and reads Japanese as a result of a pre-war visit there) though other characters – particularly his nurse girlfriend, Amanda Mallard – are given viewpoint scenes. The plot involves the lack of knowledge the Japanese have of the Saratoga’s whereabouts. A sub-plot involving a German saboteur, Wilhelm Braun, a former official in their embassy in Mexico, folds into the main narrative towards the end. We are given two token sympathetic Japanese characters (one belatedly sympathetic) and one German, Johann Klaas; but neither are all the USians in the book noble, good and true.

The scenario doesn’t really tell us anything new about the Pacific War nor illuminate history to any great degree. Effectively we spend the book waiting on the inevitable (given the author’s nationality and the publisher’s address) US victory.

I must say that for me Japanese Admiral Yamamoto’s tactics in the final battle of the book did not quite ring true; but had it been otherwise the novel would have had to continue well beyond its 343 pages.

This is the sort of thing that Harry Turtledove seems to perform effortlessly. Conroy’s prose is as efficient and his characterisation may (I would put it no higher) be slightly better but the immersion in the milieu feels less deep. I doubt I’ll read any more by him.

Pedant’s corner:-
There are several instances of omitted or repeated words. Britain is named as “England” (though the adjective used for the UK’s forces is “British.”) In a scene involving Johann Klaas, his name is mistakenly given as Braun in one sentence.

ROC, 2005. 519p

A Churchill reference for the title this time rather than a Roosevelt one but it remains the same Turtledove.

The inhabitants of Hawaii are still coming to terms with the Japanese occupation which occurred in Days Of Infamy. Food is scarce, much of Hawaii’€™s land is now given over to growing rice, but for the US POWs it is less than scarce; plus they are being worked to death. Despite the harassment by submarine of the supply shipping from their home islands – at one point Turtledove alludes to the US breaking of Japanese codes which makes this easier – the Japanese forces are confident of holding off any further US attempts to retake the islands. On all sides, Japanese, native Hawaiians and US citizens alike, there is a sense of marking time – or holding on – until the inevitable renewed US attack. Meanwhile in the US there is a steely determination to regain the islands.

The lack of jeopardy to the characters which seemed to pervade Days Of Infamy is more than made up for here. In retrospect that may have been because the former book was an exercise in setting up this one, characters needed to be in place. End Of The Beginning explores the earlier book’s ramifications, one of which is that the fate you always felt Turtledove had in store for Jane Armitage (which was not so much foreshadowed as put up in lights) indeed comes to pass.

The US onslaught, when it comes, is of course overwhelming. (Admiral Yamamoto’€™s knowledge – and fear – of US industrial might and Japan’€™s relative lack of preparedness to withstand it is discussed more than once.)

The naval battle scenes are reasonably convincing and seem to pass quickly. The treatment of the Japanese resistance on Oahu feels a bit perfunctory, though. We hear about it but don’€™t witness much of it.

SPOILER ALERT.
Turtledove is undoubtedly correct in not ignoring the Japanese enslavement of “comfort women.”€ Also reflecting the nineteen forties there is an element of misogyny – and maybe racism too – in the post-liberation treatment of the woman of Chinese origin who kept house in their brothel in Wahiawa. While two males suspected of being guilty of collaboration escape relatively freely, she does not.

Overall the book is curiously readable. Whether it was more familiarity with the characters and scenario or due to more incident it seemed to flow more freely than Days Of Infamy. But both books are marshmallow reading, very little thought is required.

Roc, 2005. 520p

Once more from the sublime (Lavinia) to the ridiculous. This book covers what might be termed the natural twentieth century US Altered History scenario but which I don’€™t believe anyone else has tackled. What if Japan had not just raided Pearl Harbor but actually invaded and taken Hawaii?

Days Of Infamy has the usual Turtledove modus operandi familiar from his Great War, American Empire, Settling Accounts, World War and Colonisation series which all had multi-stranded narratives, each thread from a different viewpoint character. The twist this time is we get a few Japanese to follow.

The format has the usual faults, too. The cuts between viewpoints make the flow jumpy, some characters are merely irritating and others appear solely in order to push the story on. Some of them indeed are more or less the same cardboard people from those other series (Fletch Armitage for instance is only a transplanted Sam Carsten) and too often they repeat thoughts they’ve had previously.

Offstage, the Japanese still over-run Malaya and Burma – though surely that would have been a serious overstretch (which arguably was the case in reality, even without Hawaii) – but Turtledove has of course rearranged some things to suit his narrative. Here, for example, General Yamashita is on Hawaii and not at Singapore. He gets to say similar things at the US surrender of Hawaii as he did in the real 1942, though. There is too, a nice twist on the Doolittle Raid, now launched on Hawaii and not the Japanese home islands.

Most of the viewpoint characters are actually rather uninteresting but the beach surfer type is an unusual choice of voice. In the Great War series I remember Turtledove killing off at least one of his narrators. A major fault with Days Of Infamy is you never feel any of the narrators are in real jeopardy. Only incidental characters die.

There’€™s only one more in this series though.

At least so far.