What Might Have Been: Volumes III & IV

Description for WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN: VOLUMES III & IV edited by Gregory Benford and Martin H Greenberg: ALTERNATE WARS: What would have happened if history has been different: If the major events that shaped our times had occurred in a different way - or not at all? In this thought-provoking volume, eleven outstanding science fiction writers and one legendary statesman alter the past in order to better see the present. Froma Trojan War in which Helen surrenders, to a Civil War fought with robots, from a World War I in which Teddy Roosevelt tries to capture the glory of San Juan Hill, to a World War II in which the race is not for atomic weapons but for orbital rockets, these bold excursions in time depict bizarre new worlds - oddly familiar, disturbingly different - a rare glimpse of WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN. ALTERNATE AMERICAS: If There Be Cause" by Sheila Finch. The strangers wore metal clothes and rode on the backs of unknown beasts. Their arrival caused no alarm among most the the People, but Red Deer feared them---most especially, their gray-robed leader, who carried a long stick to which a shorter stick had been joined as a crosspiece. Red Deer had only been medicine woman a short time, and she lacked confidence. Still, she had been granted a vision of the future---a bloody future involving these men. She was certain they were the very ones First Captain, Francis Drake, had warned them about before he sailed away across the Great Sea: Spaniards he had called them. Deceitful. Deadly. And Red Deer tried to remind the elders of his words. But they were too pleased by the strangers' gifts, and soon too intoxicated by the potent drink the visitors freely shared. It wasn't until blood was shed that anyone heeded Red Deer, and the People began to fight back... They're just two of 26 fascinating alternate histories presented here---enthralling, entertaining, thought-provoking tales by Robert Silverberg, Kim Stanley Robinson, Nancy Kress, Poul Anderson, L Sprague de Camp, Greogory Benford, and other talented writers.