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In War Times
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Product Description
During his training, Sam begins to show that he has a knack for science and engineering, and he is plucked from the daily grunt work of twenty-mile marches by his superiors to study subjects like code breaking, electronics, and physics in particular, a science that is growing more important to the war effort. While studying, Sam is seduced by a mysterious female physicist that is teaching one of his courses, and given her plans for a device that will end the war, perhaps even end the human predilection for war forever. But the device does something less, and more, than that.
After his training, Sam is sent throughout Europe to solve both theoretical and practical problems for the Allies. He spends his free time playing jazz, and trying to construct the strange device. It's only much later that he discovers that it worked, but in a way that he could have never imagined.
Product Details
- Amazon Sales Rank: #498056 in Books
- Published on: 2007-05-15
- Released on: 2007-05-15
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Binding: Hardcover
- 352 pages
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. This engaging alternate-universe tale posits a quintessential enigma of civilization: can technology be prevented from doing as much evil as good? Goonan (Light Music) traces the career of amateur saxophonist Sam Dance, a young soldier who receives plans for a strange electronic device from his physics instructor, Magyar Gypsy Dr. Eliani Hadntz, after she seduces him on the eve of the attack on Pearl Harbor. She intends her "time machine"—melding physics and biology—to harness the human mind and rescue Europe from Nazi evil. As Sam experiences successive horrors of WWII, the love of jazz he and his friend Wink share enables them to build increasingly perfected models of Hadntz's device. Sam eventually plants the machines across the globe, hoping the technology will somehow cause various time-shifting realities and save humanity from its herdlike propensity for violence. Paralleling the evolution of modern jazz with the creative ferment of science, Goonan delivers a bravura performance. (May)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From School Library Journal
Adult/High School–This alternate history with multiple threads blends bebop, physics, molecular biology, politics, and ethics into a compelling story of one family's journey through the 1940s, '50s, and '60s. Sam Dance is a soldier who, in early December 1941, has been sent by the army to study physics and other esoteric subjects in Washington, DC. One of his teachers, an Eastern European woman, seduces him and gives him a device–and the plans for it–that she says will change the course of world history. The next day, Pearl Harbor is attacked, and Sam spends the rest of the war trying to figure out what the object exactly does, and what his role is. This novel is full of thought-provoking ideas about people and conflict. Can people be changed at the molecular level to cause them to prevent war? Can societies thrive and prosper without war? What are the connections between music, especially jazz, and physics? Readers with some knowledge of World War II and of the postwar period will probably get the most out of this book, and they will enjoy seeing where events in the novel diverge from what really happened. But any reader who likes alternate histories; strong, appealing characters; and provocative ideas will find plenty to admire in Goonan's book.–Sarah Flowers, Santa Clara County Library, CA
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From Booklist
*Starred Review* This superlative alternate-history novel begins when educated army private Sam Dance is literally seduced into taking possession of something called the Hadnitz Device. According to its inventory, said device can change the course of history. Sam and his buddy in both electronics and playing jazz take this task seriously, and the reader will suspect they are having an effect when the Allies have to fight their way into Paris, and then when the Hiroshima A-bomb is unsuccessful. The latter turns out to mark a point of divergence, in which Sam ends up in something like our time line, and his buddy ends up in the one without the bomb. It falls to Sam and his family to prevent one of the catastrophic turning events of our time, through harrowing adventures and at a formidable price. Goonan's parents may deserve some credit for the outstanding authenticity of the historiography--she thanks them first--but her own thorough research has to take the lion's share. She can take all the credit for a narrative that has hardly a single flaw of pacing, setting, or characterization, and will be intelligible, not to say fascinating, to readers far beyond the ranks of World War II buffs. An authentic classic. Roland Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Customer Reviews
Trying to alter history while stumbling around in the dark
At the outbreak of World War II, Sam Dance's mysterious physics teacher gives him detailed instructions for building a "quantum machine" that can affect human behavior and possibly change the course of history. The next day, he finds out that his brother has been killed in the attack on Pearl Harbor. This event sets his resolve to work on this device that may change the timeline and allow him to alter reality.
Throughout his WWII experiences he and his friend Wink try to build the device in their spare time, sometimes secretly receiving updated instructions. Their first finished device doesn't seem to do anything, but they continue in their attempts to make a better one. After the war, Sam begins to notice some curious anomalies.
This book was well-written, the characters likeable, and many scenes interesting, but I wasn't really able to really get into it or find it a page-turner. The characters seemed a little distant. I believe this might be because they have no agency - they are not controlling the flow of the story but reacting, having no idea whether their device will work and what it should do. When it appears changes may finally be occurring, they are still in the dark and so is the reader (one could argue that this is at least realistic - what character could get their head around everything?). History is finally presented as having nexus points at which it may be altered, but I found the choice of event the book focused on at the end to be a bit predictable.
GOONAN STRIKES HIGH AGAIN
Since following all of Goonan's books, I was thrilled to find she took a new turn toward combining a historical reference with a SF base. The book moved smoothly yet introduced many suprising twists and turns that kept me hooked. Her father, a WWII vet now 85 years old, helped lay the foundation and story line for the book through his experiences in Europe during the war. They have written a winning combination of SF and historical information intertwined with musical descriptions that is sure to be enjoyed by all science fiction readers.
Thoughtful, touching science fiction
Goonan used to do more hard science fiction -- nano- and bio-tech. This is much more alternate history, and damn it, but it's good. Part of it is how well she's researched it (I read a review somewhere that said she used her own father's diary from the war), but a lot of it is how well she integrated what she's learned into the story. It's complex, and rich, and it rewards people who re-read books in a way I haven't seen since Tim Powers' The Anubis Gates.
