1635

By: Virginia DeMarce

Narrated by: George Guidall

Length: 13 hrs and 4 mins

Publisher's Summary

Though the Thirty Years' War continues to ravage 17th-century Europe, history as it once happened has been strongly deflected by the new force that is rapidly gathering power and influence: the United States of Europe, an alliance between Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden, and the West Virginians from the 20th century, led by Mike Stearns, who were hurled centuries into the past by a mysterious cosmic accident - the Ring of Fire.

The USE has know-how of 20th-century technology, but the American traditions of freedom and justice are having an even stronger impact on Europe, and the rulers of Europe are powerless to stuff the Grantville genie back into the bottle.

Eric Flint is the author of the New York Times best seller 1634: The Galileo Affair (with Andrew Dennis) - a novel in his top-selling Ring of Fire alternate history series. His first novel for Baen, Mother of Demons, was picked by Science Fiction Chronicle as a best novel of the year. His 1632, which launched the Ring of Fire series, won widespread critical praise, as from Publishers Weekly, which called him "an SF author of particular note, one who can entertain and edify in equal, and major measure".

©2009 Virginia DeMarce (P)2015 Recorded Books

Good narrator dealing with not so great material

This book feels like a few hundred pages of this:

"I heard it from Mary - you know, Chad's brother's uncles old roommate? No, not that Chad, the other Chad. Anyway, Chad's brother's uncle's old roommate was talking to Bill - you know Bill, he is Jason's cousin, the friend of the wife of that guy that got drunk at the Christmas party last year? Anyway Mary was saying that Ted's mother Jane (you remember Jane - Emily went to school with her daughter Liz) - Jane is having a lot of problems with her husband Tom who is out of town with his friend Jack - that's Jack, Peter's friend, not Jack from the club".

Imagine that except the characters all have similar sounding German or Irish names.

This one suffers also because the main line ring of fire series books are so good.

Kudos to the Narrator for doing a good job as always. I feel like the poor guy struggles with the new-character-every-other-page content in this one and it's hard for him to make a clear differentiation between characters.

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Intricate narrative linking some B- team threads

What happens to support the major characters of the Ring of Fire. Who has to bear the brunt of the consequences of the these events, politics, and policies? The administrators, sergeants, and others on the B-team and C-team character list, of course!!! Because this narrative weaves together threads from the previous books, across almost 5 years of action, this book is best read soon after them, or after re-reading them.

Out of order

If you could sum up 1635 in three words, what would they be?

Food for thought

What other book might you compare 1635 to and why?

All

Any additional comments?

This book like the others of the series is a good listen but it should precede the Dreesden Incident. The other book makes significant references to actions that are covered by this book.

Very disjointed story

A lot of material is from earlier Grantville Gazettes. The storyline is very disjointed and very hard to follow along.This is not one of the better books of the series.

Definitely Tangled

This book is the bits and pieces of its sister book that did not fit in the other, but without the assistance of an independent plot to hang them on.

good but a bit disjointed

story is good but moves around so much it can be hard to follow if you are not up to speed with the whole series