''Alternative Histories : Eleven Stories of the World as It Might Have Been'' is an
anthology
In book publishing, an anthology is a collection of literary works chosen by the compiler; it may be a collection of plays, poems, short stories, songs, or related fiction/non-fiction excerpts by different authors. There are also thematic and g ...
of
alternate history
Alternate history (also referred to as alternative history, allohistory, althist, or simply A.H.) is a subgenre of speculative fiction in which one or more historical events have occurred but are resolved differently than in actual history. As ...
short stories, edited by
Charles G. Waugh and
Martin H. Greenberg
Martin Harry Greenberg (March 1, 1941 – June 25, 2011) was an American academic and anthologist in many genres, including mysteries and horror, but especially in speculative fiction. In all, he compiled 1,298 anthologies and commissioned ...
. It was first published in hardcover by
Garland Publishing
Garland Science was a publishing group that specialized in developing textbook
A textbook is a book containing a comprehensive compilation of content in a branch of study with the intention of explaining it. Textbooks are produced to meet t ...
in December 1986.
Summary
The book collects eleven novellas, novelettes and short stories by various authors, together with an afterword by Gordon B. Chamberlain and a bibliography by Chamberlain and Barton C. Hacker.
Contents
* "Hands Off" (1881) (
Edward Everett Hale
Edward Everett Hale (April 3, 1822 – June 10, 1909) was an American author, historian, and Unitarian minister, best known for his writings such as " The Man Without a Country", published in ''Atlantic Monthly'', in support of the Union ...
)
* "
Delenda Est" (1955) (
Poul Anderson
Poul William Anderson ( ; November 25, 1926 – July 31, 2001) was an American fantasy and science fiction author who was active from the 1940s until his death in 2001. Anderson also wrote historical novels. He won the Hugo Award seven times an ...
)
* "
The Wheels of If
"The Wheels of If" is an alternate history science fiction story by American writer L. Sprague de Camp. It was first published in the magazine ''Unknown (magazine), Unknown Fantasy Fiction'' for October, 1940,Laughlin, Charlotte, and Levack, Dani ...
" (1940) (
L. Sprague de Camp
Lyon Sprague de Camp (; November 27, 1907 – November 6, 2000) was an American author of science fiction, Fantasy literature, fantasy and non-fiction literature. In a career spanning 60 years, he wrote over 100 books, both novels and works of ...
)
* "In the Circle of Nowhere" (1954) (Irving E. Cox, Jr.)
* "The Lady Margaret" (1968) (
Keith Roberts
Keith John Kingston Roberts (20 September 1935 – 5 October 2000) was an English science fiction author. He began publishing with two stories in the September 1964 issue of ''Science Fantasy'' magazine, "Anita" (the first of a series of stor ...
)
* "
He Walked Around the Horses" (1948) (
H. Beam Piper
Henry Beam Piper (March 23, 1904 – ) was an American science fiction writer. He wrote many short stories and several novels. He is best known for his extensive Terro-Human Future History series of stories and a shorter series of "Paratime" al ...
)
* "Custer's Last Jump" (1976) (
Steven Utley
Steven Utley (November 10, 1948—January 12, 2013) was an American writer. He wrote poems, humorous essays and other non-fiction, and worked on comic books and cartoons, but was best known for his science fiction stories.
Biography
Utley was bor ...
) and f(
Howard Waldrop
Howard Waldrop (September 15, 1946 – January 14, 2024) was an American science fiction author who worked primarily in short fiction. He received the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement in 2021.
Early life
Born in Houston, Mississippi, ...
)
* "The Curfew Tolls" (1935) (
Stephen Vincent Benét
Stephen Vincent Benét ( ; July 22, 1898 – March 13, 1943) was an American poet, short story writer, and novelist. He wrote a book-length narrative poem of the American Civil War, '' John Brown's Body'', published in 1928, for which he receive ...
)
* "Hush My Mouth" (1986) (
Suzette Haden Elgin
Suzette Haden Elgin (born Patricia Anne Suzette Wilkins; November 18, 1936 – January 27, 2015) was an American researcher in experimental linguistics, construction and evolution of languages and poetry and science fiction writer. She founded t ...
)
* "Interurban Queen" (1970) (
R. A. Lafferty)
* "The Lucky Strike" (1984) (
Kim Stanley Robinson
Kim Stanley Robinson (born March 23, 1952) is an American science fiction writer best known for his ''Mars'' trilogy. Many of his novels and stories have ecological, cultural, and political themes and feature scientists as heroes. Robinson has ...
)
* "Afterword: Alt History in Science Fiction" (Gordon B. Chamberlain)
* "Pasts That Might Have Been, II: A Revised Bibliography of Alternative History" (Gordon B. Chamberlain) and (Barton C. Hacker)
Notes
{{reflist
1986 anthologies
Alternate history anthologies