1636: The Devil's Opera (Ring of Fire)
Germany, 1636. The USE—the United States of Europe—is still in its shaky birthing years. The mysterious appearance of a twenty-first-century American town (Grantville, West Virginia) in seventeenth-century Germany caused a major uproar, but an alliance with Gustavus Adolphus, the king of Sweden, allowed the displaced Americans to forge a new nation, the USE. But now, a few years later, Adolphus has been marginalized, and his successor, the stoutly antidemocratic Axel Oxenstierna, the Swedish chancellor, is hungry for power and has set his sights on the USE. Byron Chieske, the “up-time” American cop, and his “down-time” partner, Gotthilf Hoch, are concerned that some recent cases of sabotage and murder might only be the beginning of a much larger plot. This is the fourteenth book in the Ring of Fire series, and familiarity with previous stories is, if not essential, at least strongly recommended. Series fans, though, can expect to jump right in and pretty much spend the next 560 pages glued to their chairs. Another engaging alternate history from a master of the genre. --David Pitt