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I don't get the appeal of ISOTs. Like, at all.
Likewise. I read the original ISOT series (though it took several goes to finish the third volume). Since then, I’ve bounced off every one I’ve tried to read, Ring of Fire included.I don't get the appeal of ISOTs. Like, at all.
There’s still excellent writing, but the level of participation in the vignette contests has dropped considerably.Thank you, I was quite pleased when I got into a four-way tie for fourth place with it.
This community used to have excellent writing be common-place.
I don't get the appeal of ISOTs. Like, at all.
Likewise. I read the original ISOT series (though it took several goes to finish the third volume). Since then, I’ve bounced off every one I’ve tried to read, Ring of Fire included.
Same applies to self-inserts, “you wake up as” and so forth. Just can’t get into them.
Both - the level of research and the fact that characters aren't cardboard stereotypes. "What would polarising free-marketeer Mrs Thatcher do if the country was transported to 1730" - er, she'd form a National Government with Labour and reinstitute rationing, because that's what any PM who isn't completely mad would do in such a crisis.I was honestly much the same until I read @iainbhx's Azureverse. I don't know if I enjoyed it because its a good ISOT or because its a good deconstruction of ISOTs and their tropes, though.
Yeah I would say as a general rule ISOTs are better the more focus is on the reactions of the wourld outside the ISOTed area/people to new ideas and the history that would have been rather than the people from the future getting to change things as they like.I can enjoy (and have written) an ISOT that is more about people grappling with a disruptive black swan event rather than a case of wish fulfillment.
Self-inserts are a harder sell for me.
Both - the level of research and the fact that characters aren't cardboard stereotypes. "What would polarising free-marketeer Mrs Thatcher do if the country was transported to 1730" - er, she'd form a National Government with Labour and reinstitute rationing, because that's what any PM who isn't completely mad would do in such a crisis.
Yeah I would say as a general rule ISOTs are better the more focus is on the reactions of the wourld outside the ISOTed area/people to new ideas and the history that would have been rather than the people from the future getting to change things as they like.
The Man Who Came Early, IIRC.I can't remember the name now, but there's also a good ISOT where a serviceman is sent back to medieval Iceland and pretty much every ISOT trope is deconstructed, with him dying without really changing much; essentially how it's most likely to actually go if one person got ISOTed.
My other favourite thing in the Azureverse is where Paddy Ashdown meets Ben Franklin and they have a long discussion in which Ashdown tries to explain to Franklin how things are different, and the moment of realisation is Franklin saying something like "Oh, there's a Tory government? No wonder things have gone to pot."Thatcher wasn't stupid. In 1730, the odds of a female PM would be about the same as the world turning into a disc. Everything she knew about politics would be wrong ... And i've probably just given this more thought than it deserves.
Personally, I've always liked the interaction between future concepts and the past.
The Man Who Came Early, IIRC.
I think it's a 50s one.
I can't remember the name now, but there's also a good ISOT where a serviceman is sent back to medieval Iceland and pretty much every ISOT trope is deconstructed, with him dying without really changing much; essentially how it's most likely to actually go if one person got ISOTed.
To the extent there is I think it would be to do with the different ways different parts of the past would find modern society alien.@OwenM is right, it's "The Man Who Came Early" by Poul Anderson. A US military policeman stationed on Iceland in 1956 is kicked a thousand years back in time, and it does not go well for him.
It's a dark and sobering story about what an alien place the past really is, but it's also a story that I don't know how much point there would be in telling again.
To the extent there is I think it would be to do with the different ways different parts of the past would find modern society alien.
I always wanted to see a time travel story where stereotypically very conservative or old-fashioned people from past eras, reactionary monarchs and the like, wholeheartedly embrace our era's values, because any other change pales into insignificance if it comes together with knowing they won't lose half their children to infant mortality.
I always wanted to see a time travel story where stereotypically very conservative or old-fashioned people from past eras, reactionary monarchs and the like, wholeheartedly embrace our era's values, because any other change pales into insignificance if it comes together with knowing they won't lose half their children to infant mortality.
Ah yes realism the most important thing way it comes to stories where places are magically sent back to the pastThat would be a fun story to do. How realistic, on the other hand, I don't know.
Chris