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The Center Cannot Hold | Rating | |
| A | |||
| Harry Turtledove | |||
| Series | Related Books | ||
| American Empire | How Few Remain, American Front, Walk in Hell, Breakthroughs, Blood and Iron, The Center Cannot Hold, The Victorious Opposition | ||
It's now 1924, and the CSA's economy is finally stabilizing. But the Confederacy's good fortune is the Freedom Party's bad, and membership and votes are both way down. But the party's leader, Jake Featherston, isn't about to roll over and give up. He's still aming to be the country's president, and despite a strengthening economy and a few major scandals, that goal is coming ever close to being in his grasp. The USA is still turning a blind eye to the danger, but the country's blacks are very, very worried.
Even moreso than Blood and Iron, this book is filled with politics. And like that book, it is a great success because it is not a propaganda machine but an object lesson. It demonstrates the outcome of a government that is afraid to use the whip hand while it has it, even when it is more than justified by inhuman actions and unconstitutional tactics within its borders, and treaty violations outside them. It shows what government cutbacks to the military can do, the poor justifications of isolationism and the consequences of following that course, and the results of arrogance in occupational authority. It also shows how a Nazi-like philosophy can possibly prosper when it should be reviled.
There are a lot of parallels between this book and real life. Some of them are brilliant. The insurrection in the Empire of Mexico, and how it is treated by the Confederacy, is inspired as an analogue to Spain and the Nazis. Some, though, are a bit more puzzling; would the Marx brothers or Upton Sinclair even exist in a universe that split off from ours in 1862? Would there be a great statue in the New York City harbor? I doubt the logic of any of that, but most are in truth minor nits left over from previous books, and none really affect the story except to offer a twisted look at what really was and is. The benefits of some parallels generally outweigh the annoying improbabilities of the others.
All in all, this is an excellent book, well worth reading. It is essential that Blood and Iron, at the very least, be read first, though, and preferably all of them. As alternate history goes, this is top-rated material, and any fan of the genre will almost surely love it.
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