Showing results by author "Harry Turtledove" in All Categories

More than four centuries ago, the Scepter of Mercy was lost to the king of Avornis, and each subsequent liege has promised—and failed—to return the powerful talisman to its rightful home. Now, young Lanius, the only surviving son of King Mergus, rules, though he is considered illegitimate and must abide by the decisions of regents. Still, the legacy of the missing scepter ultimately belongs to him.

Jack Mitchell, the hardboiled ex-military private eye is asked to help musician Oscar Ricks investigate Grampus Records (which he hopes to do while avoiding the very unpleasant mob that rules this alternate 1940's Lost Angeles where the undead and dead co-exist). Jack's complicated personal life also intertwines with the case, making the issue even more complicated. As he dives deeper into his investigation, he encounters danger at every turn, from physical altercations to supernatural threats.

Menedemos, the young dashing sea captain, and his helper (and cousin) the scholarly Sostratos, are back in their third adventure. This time around the two cousins end up in the Sacred Land, Jerusalem, where they encounter a strange religion. This fascinates Sostratos, who wants to learn as much as he can about the strange monotheists living there. The more worldly Menedemos looks toward more common pleasures, particularly those involving pretty women (not letting small inconveniences like their marriage to other men get in the way).

1945: Russian troops have entered Berlin, and are engaged in a violent orgy of robbery, rape, and revenge! Wehrmacht officer Hasso Pemsel, a career soldier on the losing end of the greatest war in history, flees from a sniper's bullet, finding himself hurled into a mysterious, fantastic world of wizards, dragons, and unicorns!

England has driven the French from Atlantis, giving King George leave to tighten his control over the colonies. The Redcoats have seized the continent's eastern coastal towns, depriving the Atlanteans of the markets where they sell their goods as part of a strategy to bend the colonists to their will.

Once the great Glacier enclosed the Raumsdalian Empire. Now it has broken open, and Count Hamnet Thyssen faces a new world. With the wisecracking Ulric Skakki, the neighboring clan leader Trasamund (politely addressed as "Your Ferocity"), and his lover, the shaman Liv, Hamnet leads an exploration of the new territory in hopes of finding the legendary Golden Shrine.

The glaciers came and covered the world with ice. Now they are in retreat. North of the city of Nidaros, north of the forest, north of the steppes where the nomadic Bizogots hunt, a gap has opened in the ice-wall. And down through that gap come the men who call themselves "Rulers." Their terrifying cavalry rides wooly mammoths. Their bows can shoot arrows farther than those of the southerners.

Publius Quinctilius Varus, a Roman politician, is summoned by the Emperor, Augustus Caesar. Arminius, a prince of the Cherusci, is playing a deadly game. He serves in the Roman army, gaining Roman citizenship and an officer's rank, and learning the arts of war and policy as practiced by the Romans. An epic battle is brewing, and these two men stand on opposite sides of what will forever be known as the Battle of the Teutoberg Forest---a ferocious, bloody clash that will change the course of history.

In April 1864, the Union garrison at Fort Pillow was composed of almost 600 troops, about half of them black. The Confederacy, incensed by what it saw as a crime against nature, sent its fiercest cavalry commander, Nathan Bedford Forrest, to attack the fort with about 1,500 men. The Confederates overran the fort and drove the Federals into a deadly crossfire. Only 62 of the colored Union troops survived the fight unwounded.

For three long years, the militant Chleuh have occupied the Kingdom of Quimper and its great capital, Lutesse. Times are hard since they won the war. There’s not much food or fuel—the Chleuh take anything that isn’t nailed down. People in Lutesse have terrible choices to make. Do they go along with the Chleuh and try to make the best of a bad situation? Or do they try to fight back, hoping the occupation can’t last forever?

Peace in the North has been fragile and tentative in the five years since the terrible Werenight, when the light of four full moons transformed men into beasts. Now cut off completely from the Elabon Empire, the land is in violent dispute, squabbled over by minor barons hungry for greater power. Gerin the Fox is one of the few who stand firm against the encroaching chaos, but his own life has been violently shaken, first by a heartless betrayal and then by the kidnapping of his young son. Having angered a vengeful deity, he cannot look to the gods for support.

The second son of the Baron of Fox Keep, Gerin never wanted title or responsibility, but both were thrust on him when his father and brother were ambushed and slain by enemy Trokmê raiders. Leaving behind the urban bustle of Cassat and his studies in philosophy and magic, Gerin the Fox returned home to accept his place among the other barons of the Northern marches—a region secluded from the rest of the Empire of Elabon.

When Avornis falls, the Banished One will reign supreme. Rival kings Lanius and Grus each covet solitary power, but realize that a kingdom divided cannot stand against the evil god who enslaves the minds of men through their nightmares. Once, Avornis was safe from his dark influence, protected by a powerful talisman supplied by the pantheon of deities who expunged the immortal called Milvago from their ranks. But that was centuries earlier, before the Scepter of Mercy was lost, and only through its recovery can Avornis survive.

In the Hugo Award nominee Forty, Counting Down, computer genius Justin Kloster travels to the past to stop himself from making a terrible mistake. But all actions have their consequences. Then, in Twenty-One, Counting Up, Kloster's college life and romantic dreams are rudely interrupted when the 40-year-old Justin arrives from the future to save him from himself.

In the Hereditary Tyranny of Tartesh, what was once a vast sea basin is now a dried-out, unforgiving desert. When the kingdom's enemies try to shake down the Barrier Mountains and let the ocean in, Trench Park tour guide Radnal vez Krobir must stop them or be destroyed along with everything he holds dear. Down in the Bottomlands received the 1994 Hugo Award for Best Novella.

Frederick Radcliff is a descendant of the family that founded Atlantis's first settlement, and his grandfather Victor led the army against England to win the nation's independence. But he is also a black slave, unable to prove his lineage, and forced to labor on a cotton plantation in the southern region of the country. Frederick feels the color of his skin shouldn't keep him from having the same freedoms his ancestors fought and died for.

A famous naturalist seeks a near-extinct species of bird found only on the rarest of lands in "Audubon in Atlantis." A young American on a European holiday finds himself storming an enchanted German castle in "The Catcher in the Rhine." The philosopher Sokrates plays a key role in the Athenian victory over the Spartans in "The Daimon." Centaurs take a sea voyage aboard "The Horse of Bronze" to a land where they encounter a strange and frightening tribe of creatures known as man.

After the extinction asteroid doesn't strike Earth, the dinosaurs keep evolving... but so do the mammals. We mammals have achieved human-like shapes, but now it's cold-blooded, magic-using reptiles against the hot-blooded, hot-tempered descendants of cats.

In this novel of alternative history from best-selling author Harry Turtledove, the Spanish Armada has conquered England, King Phillip holds the English throne, and Elizabeth I languishes as a prisoner in the Tower of London. Meanwhile, in London, a mysterious stranger approaches young playwright William Shakespeare with an offer that could change the course of history.

After the devastating Werenight that brought the Elabonian Empire to a bloody end, Gerin the Fox has come to be known as the King of the North. Aragis the Archer has no desire to make an enemy of such a man, but his ambition gets the better of him. Now he's about to learn that any threat to Gerin, no matter how small, will be answered in kind. And soon their rivalry will escalate beyond what either could have imagined.