'Mem' Review

[Gary Oswald]

Discuss this article by @SpanishSpy here

 

[Charles EP M.]

This does seem an odd use of alternate history (it really does seem a thing that fits now/the future), unless it's just Morrow went "well I went to write something that's also Art Deco & has old film and it's my book" in which case fair enough

 

[Coiler]

I also should note that the marketing blurb treats it as a historical/sci-fi novel (which it is, if the review is any indication) and only mentions the AH aspect in passing.

 

[Gary Oswald]

I kind of think the most common form of AH is steampunk esque stuff where it's set in the past but with sci-fi esque technology. The stuff we write here is the outlier, rather than Mem.

 

[Charles EP M.]

True but I'm used to that meaning the tech is advanced in ways that fit contemporary fiction, cloning in the decopunk past is a new one on me

 

[Coiler]

I kind of think the most common form of AH is steampunk esque stuff where it's set in the past but with sci-fi esque technology. The stuff we write here is the outlier, rather than Mem.

One of the reasons why I've reviewed so little online alternate history on my blog is because a lot of it doesn't have that many real "connections" to other types of fiction. The few I have done have at least a small link to technothrillers/WW3s of some kind, giving me a frame of reference for comparison.

(For "AH as a setting" literary AH, be it Mem or a Robert Conroy potboiler, this isn't an issue at all)