New Releases 11/17/15

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Paperbacks

The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick

It's America in 1962. Slavery is legal once again. The few Jews who still survive hide under assumed names. In San Francisco, the I Ching is as common as the Yellow Pages. All because some twenty years earlier the United States lost a war—and is now occupied by Nazi Germany and Japan.

This harrowing, Hugo Award–winning novel is the work that established Philip K. Dick as an innovator in science fiction while breaking the barrier between science fiction and the serious novel of ideas. In it Dick offers a haunting vision of history as a nightmare from which it may just be possible to wake.

The Order of the Forge by Victor Gischler

Before he fathered a nation, young George Washington forged his legend in blood! Imbued with the mystical powers of America's original inhabitants, George--along with his friends Ben Franklin and Paul Revere--must stop an evil governor who wishes to rule an empire!

War of the Worlds: The Anglo-Martian War of 1895 by Mike Brunton

On one terrible night in August 1895, the world changed for ever. Southern England became the landing site of a group of mysterious grey cylinders that came hurtling down from the stars. Nobody could have guessed that these strange objects would herald the most desperate and important conflict in the history of mankind. The war pitted man against machines from space and no quarter was asked for or given on either side. The outcome would be decided by the smallest of things...

This is the essential guide to the Anglo-Martian conflict of 1895, offering unique comparison of the two belligerents, English and alien. It looks at the forces available to each and evaluates their respective tactics and strategies. Finally, it tells the full story of those fateful fifteen days, punctuated by the best and worst possible human experiences. It is a story of hope and despair, courage and terror, victory and defeat.

E-Books

Char by Dale Cozort

It was a routine murder investigation, except that the main suspect was a cave woman from an alternate reality.

Char of the Real People is the ultimate smart outsider, trying to figure out modern society while running from a relentless county sheriff's murder investigation. How much can a cave woman understand about us by the sheer power of her mind? How long can she escape the law enforcement net closing around her?

To readers, authors and publishers...

Is your story going to be published in time for the next New Releases? Contact us at ahwupdate at gmail dot com.  We are looking for works of alternate history, counterfactual history, steampunk, historical fantasy, time travel or anything that warps history beyond our understanding.

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Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update, a blogger on Amazing Stories and a Sidewise Awards for Alternate History judge. When not writing he works as an attorney, enjoys life with his beautiful wife Alana and prepares for the day when travel between parallel universes becomes a reality. You can follow him on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Learn how you can support his alternate history projects on Patreon.

Amazon Orders Full Season of The Man in the High Castle

If you don't follow us on Facebook or Twitter (shame on you) you would have missed the announcement that Amazon has ordered a full season of The Man in the High Castle. This does not come as a complete surprise to me, as the show was the most watched show on Amazon's pilot season and has been called "as compulsively watchable as conspiracy-minded The Americans with the supernatural trappings of Lost." Alternate historians rejoice!

According to Deadline, the full season will premier later this year in the US, UK and Germany and play into 2016. Check out my review of the pilot and this pivotal scene from the pilot below:

Good job, Amazon. You did the right thing. Just don't screw it up!

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Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update and a blogger on Amazing Stories. Check out his short fiction. When not writing he works as an attorney, enjoys life with his beautiful wife Alana and prepares for the inevitable zombie apocalypse. You can follow him on Facebook or Twitter.

Map Monday: The Former United States in The Man in the High Castle

With Amazon's The Man in the High Castle still getting a ton of press coverage and discussion, I thought the time was right to dedicate a Map Monday to compare how the former United States was divvied up between Germany and Japan in the book and show. The partitioning of America between the Axis powers is one of the most prominent features of the story and probably why Amazon led with it in the intro:

In that shot you see most of the continental United States being controlled by the Germans, with a slice of the West Coast occupied by the Japanese and and even smaller slice down the Rockies being the neutral territory between the two powers. This is a remarked difference from what has usually been associated with the book on places like Wikipedia:

In the above world map you can see the neutral zone is much larger and covers territory associated more with the Great Plains than the Rocky Mountains. Although it has been a while since I read the book, I don't remember if Dick was clear of where the borders of the neutral zone were located. In fact, I am not even sure if a Nazi client state in the southeast existed either:

Both world maps share similar characteristics, so perhaps Dick did mention something about the southern states forming some fascist Neo-Confederacy. Bruce Munro seemed to think so when he created his map set after the events of the novel:

Perhaps the only thing these four maps indicate is that there is a lot of wiggle room in the original source material for drafting maps of The Man in the High Castle world and I look forward to seeing them all.

If you want more cartographic wonders, check out these maps of steampunk conventions, the world if scaled by population and the countries most likely to survive climate change. If you want to submit a map for the next Map Monday, email me at ahwupdate at gmail dot com with your map attached and a brief description in the body of the email.

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Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update and a blogger on Amazing Stories. Check out his short fiction. When not writing he works as an attorney, enjoys life with his beautiful wife Alana and prepares for the inevitable zombie apocalypse. You can follow him on Facebook or Twitter.

You Can Now Watch The Man in the High Castle Pilot For Free

Well today is the day. You can now watch the pilot for Amazon TV's adaptation of Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle for free. I believe the way Amazon's pilot season works is that the more positive reviews and ratings a show gets, the better chance it has to be picked up for a full season. Of course, I am not suggesting you rate this product well just for the sake of getting an alternate history show on the air. We don't need another Spike's Alternate History. If you do watch it, however, please take the time to give it a fair review.

There really is not much to say after that. I only request people please keep spoilers to themselves for at least a week so everyone has a chance to watch the first episode. I really hope it is good, especially with some calling it the next House of Cards and the effort the producers are going through to at least match the time period.

I plan to watch it as soon as I get home tonight so expect a review from me in the very near future.

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Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update and a blogger on Amazing Stories. Check out his short fiction. When not writing he works as an attorney, enjoys life with his beautiful wife Alana and prepares for the inevitable zombie apocalypse. You can follow him on Facebook or Twitter.

Why I Am Optimistic about Amazon Studio's The Man in the High Castle

Those who regularly follow The Update probably know I have been less than thrilled by the announcement of Amazon TV's adaptation of Dick's The Man in the High Castle. I make no apologies about my concern. Some hold The Man in the High Castle as the book that kickstarted the modern alternate history genre, taking it out of its pulpy sci-fi status and maturing it into its own sub-genre more akin to historical fiction. Nevertheless, aesthetic choices and divergences from the book's plot made me anxious that the producers of the show were taking the story in the wrong direction. Now, however, I feel a little better.

The first assurance came from this article in The Columbian. In this article a Jay Greene discusses the staggering amounts of money Amazon is spending on original and controversial content. I found the quote Roy Price, the vice president who runs Amazon Studios, to be particularly enlightening: "We're not trying to be meek. We're trying to be interesting." Good, glad to hear that Roy. With all sincerity, I want producers to take chances on risky ventures. Sure you can make money by playing it safe, but taking risks is where the real wealth is to be found, both for the producers and the fans.

The second assurance came from another article, this time from an editorial in Northwest Asian Weekly. It was written by Johnny Pak, an actor who worked as an extra on the pilot. Pak's closing statement summed exactly what he felt about his small role in The Man in the High Castle: "This was one of the most interesting experiences I've ever had. It’s not often that there’s a demand for Asian actors in Seattle for a production of this scale. To feel like being a part of history and meeting new friends, it made for a very special day."

Is Amazon making history? Perhaps it is too soon to tell. That being said, I feel optimistic about their chances. By next year we should find out whether or not Amazon created a adaptation worthy of this classic of alternate history literature.

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Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update and a blogger on Amazing Stories. Check out his short fiction. When not writing he works as an attorney, enjoys life with his beautiful wife Alana and prepares for the inevitable zombie apocalypse. You can follow him on Facebook or Twitter.

Rupert Evans Cast as Frank Frink in Amazon TV's The Man in the High Castle

Hot off the announcement about the casting of Alexa Davalos, Deadline is reporting that Rupert Evans (Hellboy) has been cast as Frank Frink in Amazon TV's adaptation of Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle. The press release describes the character as a "an artist and an intellectual with a secret", which is probably the fact that he is Jewish and trying to hide from the Nazis if they follow the novel. The character is one of the point of view characters and probably should have been the male lead, but apparently someone else got that role.

What do you think of the casting news so far? Let us know in the comments.

Amazon Studios to Produce Pilot of Philip K Dick's The Man In The High Castle

The big news from last week (since I don't have the time to write up a complete Weekly Update) was that Amazon Studios was creating a pilot for a series based on Philip K. Dick's Hugo Award-winning novel The Man in the High Castle.

For those who don't know, The Man in the High Castle is set in a 1962 where the Axis Powers were victorious in World War II. The United States is occupied between a Nazi East Coast, a Japanese West Coast (known as the Pacific States of America) and a neutral "Rocky Mountain States" lumped in a middle as a buffer between the two power blocs.

The novel is considered by some to be the precursor to the modern alternate history genre as it brought the what if game out of the pulpy tales of time travel, magic and parallel universes and allowed for a serious tale of alternate history without any ASBs (although the genre certainly has plenty of that still).

According to Deadline, The Man In the High Castle is a joint project of Frank Spotnitz (The X-Files) and Ridley Scott's (who also adapted Dick's Blade Runner) Scott Free Productions. The pilot will be written by Spotnitz and be directed by David Semel (Legends). The project originally was set up as a four-hour miniseries Syfy last year, but it looks like the cable channel passed.

While I am sort of happy Syfy won't get the chance to ruin one of the classic works of alternate history, I am still worried about how long this project is taking to get made. The longer a project languishes in development, the worse it is likely to be. That being said, getting rid of cable like I did a couple of months ago is looking like an even better idea.

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Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update and a blogger on Amazing Stories. Check out his short fiction. When not writing he works as an attorney, enjoys life with his beautiful wife Alana and prepares for the inevitable zombie apocalypse. You can follow him on Facebook or Twitter.

Videos for Alternate Historians

Got a few videos I think fans of alternate history will enjoy. First up, the book trailer for friend of The Update Alison Morton's new book Perfiditas (sequel to Inceptio):

The launch party for the book is happening November 6 and you can find out more information on her site. Next up, fans of steampunk and video games might enjoy learning some trivia about Bioshock Infinite from the guys over at Achievement Hunter:

Finally, Jonathan Lethem and Kim Stanley Robinson discuss the influence of Philip K. Dick, whose novel The Man in the High Castle is important to our favorite genre as well:

Enjoy!

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Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update and a blogger on Amazing Stories. His new short story "Road Trip" can be found in Forbidden Future: A Time Travel Anthology. When not writing he works as an attorney, enjoys life with his beautiful wife Alana and prepares for the inevitable zombie apocalypse. You can follow him on Facebook or Twitter.

The Man in the High Castle will be Adapted for Cable TV

Unless you have been trapped on an alternate timeline, you probably heard last week about Syfy (pronounced "siffy") finalizing a deal to adapt Philip K. Dick’s Hugo Award-winning novel The Man In The High Castle into a 4-hour miniseries event with Frank Spotnitz (The X-Files, Hunted) attached to write and serve as Executive Producer. Ridley Scott’s Scott Free Productions will produce the project with Headline Pictures, Electric Shepherd Productions and FremantleMedia International (which will distribute the series globally). Spotnitz will write the first two hours and supervise the writing of the second two hours The second writer, air date and casting are TBA.

For those who don't know, Dick's The Man in The High Castle is set in an alternate 1960s in which Nazi Germany and Japan were victorious in World War II. The year is 1962 and the Axis Powers have split the United States between themselves. Now Germany and Japan are locked in a Cold War and the former United States could be the spark to set the world ablaze. All of this is background to our cast of characters who live their different, yet connected, lives.

“Ridley Scott is one of my all-time favorite filmmakers and this is one of my all-time favorite books,” said Spotnitz, “so I am incredibly honored and thrilled to have this opportunity.”

“The Man in The High Castle is one of Dick’s most imaginative and captivating works and certainly one of my favorites. I am pleased to team up with the singular Frank Spotnitz and Syfy, Headline Pictures, Electric Shepherd and FremantleMedia International to bring this epic to audiences who will find this story as intriguing and riveting as we do.” said Ridley Scott. This is not Scott's first foray into Dick's fiction. He directed Blade Runner (1982) a remake (sigh) of which is in the works.

The idea of turning The Man in the High Castle into a film or television series is nothing new. Electric Shepherd announced last November they were working on a television version of the classic story. Now that SyFy has picked it up, however, should alternate historians be worried about what they are going to do with this classic (some might say the original) work of alternate history? Remember SyFy are the guys who gave us Mansquito and Sharktopus. Of course, Spotnitz and Scott have a lot of cred in the geek community, but Prometheus (despite its critical and financial success) has left a lot of fandom grumbling.

And let's face it, alternate historians have been burned before by cable.

Nevertheless I am going to play the cautious optimist for this one. I am not going to rant and rave, I want to see this series get made. It don't even need an exact retelling just as long as still presents the fundamentals that made the story great. If Scott and company don't manage to screw it up, we might even see a longer series which further explores Dick's Axis victory dystopia. Who knows? Maybe they will even Fringe-ify it by exploring (spoiler alert) the bizarre (from his perspective at least) alternate Earth Nobusuke Tagomi visited for a short time.

I guess I will need to consult the I Ching on this one.

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Matt Mitrovich is the founder and editor of Alternate History Weekly Update, a blogger on Amazing Stories and a volunteer editor for Alt Hist magazine. His fiction can be found at Echelon Press, Jake's Monthly and The Were-Traveler. When not writing he works as an attorney, enjoys life with his beautiful wife Alana and prepares for the inevitable zombie apocalypse. You can follow him on Facebook or Twitter.