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Crusade

by Taylor Anderson

Published by Roc: NY, 978-0-451-46230-5.

Hardback 2008, 388pp, Paperback due soon.

Reviewed by Mark Owings Review posted 6/20/09



This sequel to Into the Storm from the early part of 2008 has a different take on alternate history, in having the split take place before the human race developed, specifically by not having that meteor hit Mexico and kill off the dinosaurs. The crew of the WWII destroyer are still involved in a war between a lemur-descended race and a reptilian one, indeed more so. A Japanese battle cruiser, we now learn, came through at the same time and the commanding officer (much like a stock Japanese from a WWII-era film) has joined the reptiles, though his second in comment (rather like a post-1970 WWII film Japanese) has doubts about this.

We are also given a glimpse, in an excerpt from the third and evidently last of the series bound in at the end, of what happened to the descendants of the humans who crossed over in our seventeenth century, though not why neither the Lemurians nor the reptilian Grik (who supposedly run the rest of the world) seem to know that they are still around. The internal politics and personalities are interesting, though the lack of human women is somewhat ignored – maybe the third volume.

There is less leisure for exploration of this world than in the first of the series, regrettably. I would have liked to see what species were in the new areas that are brought into the story. The battle scenes are at least tolerable to one who tends to be bored at such things. On balance, well worth following up on, at least in paperback.

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