Premiering in March on HBO: The Plot Against America (miniseries)

[Dennis Donovan]

It's based on the 2004 novel by Philip Roth:


I hadn't read the book, but the miniseries looks intriguing!

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9308346/

Characters live in an alternative history in which Franklin D. Roosevelt was defeated in the U.S. presidential election of 1940 by Charles Lindbergh.

The timing of its release may be coincidental, or someone is trying to send a message; it CAN happen here.

[FoxNewsSucks]

1. That looks really good,

I really liked Man in the High Castle, and alternate-history SciFi. But this looks far more relevant to what's going on today

[Ilsa]

2. At first I thought it was a docudrama of one of

Malcolm Nance's books. But this should be very interesting.

[gibraltar72]

3. It has happened here.

[hurple]

4. It's not coincidental

Believe that.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

5. That was a truly bad book.

Philip Roth does not understand the rules of alternate history, and this book was dumb and unsatisfying. I suppose it's possible the mini series might be better, but I have better things to do with my time.

[Behind the Aegis]

7. Why?

I am enjoying it so far, at chapter 3. I find it interesting the use of the stamp collection as a literary device.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

9. What I'm remembering of the ending.

I don't want to be a plot spoiler, and it may be that I'm misremembering it. But it was a complete let down.

Alternate history is one of my absolute favorite genres. If you want to read a very good one, try Harry Turtledove's Guns of the South. He's written a bunch of others, but that is far and away his best.

"If the South had won the Civil War" is the commonest starting point for alternate history. The original is Bring the Jubilee by Ward Moore. Excellent, although since it came out in 1953 it might feel a bit dated to a modern reader.

Another starting point is something about WWII being different. There are tons of those. One good series is by Jo Walton, Farthing, Ha'Penny and Half a Crown. In it, Britain comes to terms with Germany early in WWII, and the country is now essentially a satellite of Nazi Germany. Chilling.

The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley Robinson has the bubonic plague killing off 99% of Europeans in the 14th century, leading to Islam becoming the dominant world religion and of course a very different interaction with indigenous people when they find what we call the New World.

Another excellent and little known book is Making History by Stephen Fry. The birth of Hitler is prevented. I liked it.

Anyway, if overall you like the alternate history thing, there are lots and lots of books out there. I've not even scratched the surface with the ones I've mentioned.

[JHB]

11. Reread Turtledove's "Southern Victory" series in the current context

Particularly the Rise of Jake Featherston and the Freedom Party, willing to stop at nothing to make the Confederate States great again.

To give context for everybody else, between 1997 and 2007 Harry Turtledove published a series of 11 books following an alternate history where the South was able to force a political end to the war after gaining recognition by England and France. The main portion of the series follows a cast of characters through the Great War that breaks out in 1914 and has the USA and CSA going at each other just as their allies were in Europe, through to the end of a 2nd Great War in the 1940s.

After the CSA's defeat in the first Great War, there arises a NASDAP-like party in the CSA called the Freedom Party, and the guy who takes control of it is an embittered guy who didn't get what he thought was due, a mean streak a mile wide, never forgets a slight, and always hit back twice as hard if he was attacked. While the phrase is never used as a slogan, there are multiple occasions where he talks about making the Confederate States "great again."

It's dismaying rereading it and seeing these traits and words in today's context.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

12. Turtledove used to be a really good writer.

I'm aware of his many series that involve the Civil War ending differently. Guns of the South is stand alone and works very well. I read his Supervolcano series, which is straightforward science fiction involving a super volcano going off in Yellowstone or thereabouts, killing millions of Americans and altering the climate quite seriously. The characters are, for the most part, incredibly unsympathetic. They're southern Californians who spend the rest of the books pissing and moaning about the cold. After a while, I was simply hoping they'd freeze to death.

Do not waste your time reading Joe Steele, which posits that Stalin's parents emigrated to America and so he was born here. Unfortunately, he is EXACTLY the same person here as he was in Soviet Russia, which simply is not believable. I stopped reading about a third of the way through.

A lot of his earlier stuff is quite good, and I recommend The Case of the Toxic Spell Dump and A World of Difference. Also, his short story collections are generally good.

I met Jo Walton at one of my science fiction things, and aside from finding her a great person, we had an interesting conversation about alternate history. I told her an idea I had for one such. Russia, starting with Catherine the Great, moves slowly in the direction of a British-like monarchy, although the order of the Czars remains the same. Hence the Russian Revolution never occurs, and in fact Anastasia marries the man who became King George VI. I do love that idea but I am no where near good enough a writer to write that. More to the point, Jo made a very strong case for once you change one thing that alters history, a lot of other things change also. That's why I find good alternate history so compelling, and why for me the Roth book just didn't work.

[Behind the Aegis]

6. Reading the book now.

I am stealing a new word, "Kosherizing: a Jew who makes it easier for anti-Semites to claim they aren't anti-Semites."

[Vinca]

8. We'll have to keep an eye open for it. It looks like an interesting series.

[smirkymonkey]

10. Looks frightening, but I really want to see it.

I think it's important to watch.

[Behind the Aegis]

13. This might be on interest as well given the topic of the miniseries.

This weekend (my 18th anniversary of meeting my now husband), is Viral: Antisemitism in Four Mutations and it is being released in AMC Theaters. My husband said, given it is a documentary, it will likely coming to streaming services quickly, they release things like this in the theatre in order to qualify for awards. Here is an article about it....

New documentary featuring Bill Clinton examines anti-Semitism in US and Europe

A new documentary featuring experts on anti-Semitism, as well as former President Bill Clinton, examines anti-Semitism in the United States and several countries in Europe.

“Viral: Antisemitism in Four Mutations,” which is set to be released this month, focuses on the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting, former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and the anti-Semitism scandal in his British political party, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s campaign against Jewish liberal financier George Soros and anti-Semitic attacks in France.

Director Andrew Goldberg told Newsweek that he believes anti-Semitism is on the rise because of a polarized political environment that’s amplified by social media.

“I see today’s society becoming more fractured and angrier,” he said. “The eruption of anger is at an all-time high. I don’t think we’d be at the level of anti-Semitism now without Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. All these communities give people a sense of alignment with one another.”

The documentary features Brad Orsini, Pittsburgh’s Jewish community security director, who conducted a training for the Tree of Life*Or L’Simcha congregation before the shooting took place in October 2018. Along with Clinton, it features Holocaust historian Deborah Lipstadt, conservative columnist George Will and other experts.

more...

[Dennis Donovan]

14. I found the trailer for it:

I'm very interested in it - thanks for the heads up!