The Way It Didn't Happen

In a lot of ways, alternative history fits oddly on the sci-fi shelves, since much of it reads more like historical fiction than anything with spaceships, aliens or ray guns. Authors work in it for several reasons, one of them being the chance to write that kind of historical fiction without worrying about the speedbumps provided by actual events. Sometimes these "allohistorical" novels try to show us something about the way real history worked by shifting actual events to another stage. Harry Turtledove did this with a ten-volume series that gave the Confederacy a victory in the original Civil War and then moved the major conflicts of both World Wars to the American continent, complete with its own horrifying Holocaust.

S. M. Stirling has written several kinds of alternative history novels, and his most recent Black Chamber falls squarely in the first camp: It's a historical spy romp through a tweaked version of World War I that has Teddy Roosevelt back in office when William Howard Taft dies before he can win the Republican Party nomination for president in 1912. Roosevelt makes decisive moves to strengthen America and implement his progressive agenda, and among those moves is the creation of a spy agency known as "the Black Chamber."

A top Chamber agent is the Irish-Cuban Luz O'Malley, who is posing as an Irish-Mexican rebel allied with the Germans (Roosevelt invaded and annexed portions of Mexico) in order to gain information on a secret German weapons plan. Luz has to work with the German agent Horst von Duckler while keeping him at arm's length so he doesn't discover who she really is -- although he's rather delightful to have around. Ciara Whelan, an American working with Irish rebels against England and also aiding the Germans, will play a role as well, but on whose side?

Chamber opens with several high-octane set pieces as Luz cements her faux-alliance with Horst by fending off attacks from "enemy" agents. But once it gets to the actual German weapons plot things bog down considerably, as Stirling over-indulges in flashbacks and musings from Luz about her own history and the state of the world. Her own close ties with Roosevelt allow her to reflect on how his re-election has made almost everything better all the way around. The reality is most of the book between that point and the final act kickoff could be chopped from the book and leave the story arc no worse off. Luz's impossible competence leeches the narrative of suspense and life, and her impossibly 21st century outlook amongst the backward provincials helps not at all.

Stirling can write some great adventure yarns within a tweaked but plausible world, as in The Peshawar Lancers. He can play with fun characters and create a different reality with just a few strong strokes, as in that book and his "Lords of Creation" duology. Why he does neither here in favor of a clunky narrative, drab characters and evangelizing for Teddy-knows-best progressivism (with a dollop of authoritarian sauce) isn't at all clear.