The Valley-Westside War
Encyclopedia
The Valley-Westside War is a 2008 young adult, alternate history novel by Harry Turtledove
. It is the latest in the Crosstime Traffic
series.
, 130 years after the war. The area of the city is controlled by two rival feudal states at war with one another: the Kingdom of Westside and the Kingdom of the Valley
. The Crosstime Traffic
team is dispatched to investigate the remains of the UCLA
library in an attempt to discover what happened to cause the initial nuclear war, but are caught up in the local war by citizens of both kingdoms who believe that they are trying to access the knowledge of the old people to create advanced weapons.
gave the novel a good review saying fans of dystopia
s would enjoy the story. SF Scope said the novel was "an interesting exploration of what a post-apocalyptic world might be" but found the characters, except for Liz and Dan, to be little more than ciphers. The Los Angeles Times
did not give a positive review describing the book as sloppy and saying it failed to live up to other dystopias based on alternate histories like The Man in the High Castle
, The Difference Engine
or The Plot Against America
.
Harry Turtledove
Harry Norman Turtledove is an American novelist, who has produced works in several genres including alternate history, historical fiction, fantasy and science fiction.- Life :...
. It is the latest in the Crosstime Traffic
Crosstime Traffic
Crosstime Traffic is a series of books by Harry Turtledove. The central premise of the stories is an Earth that has discovered access to alternate universes where history went differently. "Crosstime Traffic" is the name of the company with a global monopoly on the technology.-Background:The...
series.
Background
In The Valley-Westside War, a global nuclear war broke out in 1967, leading to the collapse of civilization. The book is set in what was once Los AngelesLos Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
, 130 years after the war. The area of the city is controlled by two rival feudal states at war with one another: the Kingdom of Westside and the Kingdom of the Valley
San Fernando Valley
The San Fernando Valley is an urbanized valley located in the Los Angeles metropolitan area of southern California, United States, defined by the dramatic mountains of the Transverse Ranges circling it...
. The Crosstime Traffic
Crosstime Traffic
Crosstime Traffic is a series of books by Harry Turtledove. The central premise of the stories is an Earth that has discovered access to alternate universes where history went differently. "Crosstime Traffic" is the name of the company with a global monopoly on the technology.-Background:The...
team is dispatched to investigate the remains of the UCLA
University of California, Los Angeles
The University of California, Los Angeles is a public research university located in the Westwood neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, USA. It was founded in 1919 as the "Southern Branch" of the University of California and is the second oldest of the ten campuses...
library in an attempt to discover what happened to cause the initial nuclear war, but are caught up in the local war by citizens of both kingdoms who believe that they are trying to access the knowledge of the old people to create advanced weapons.
Plot summary
The Mendoza family, funded by a Crosstime Traffic grant and disguised as traders, return to postwar Earth to learn who initiated the hostilities. Liz Mendoza frequently visits the UCLA library to analyze the period books and magazines, searching for insight and reasons for the conflict. It is on her regular trips to the library that she meets Dan, a Valley soldier whom she initially considers dull and dumb. Dan, however, is not as unschooled and ignorant as Liz thinks, and, although he is attracted to her, he has his misgivings about the Mendozas. His suspicions are confirmed, and he blows their cover and causes them to return to their own time alternate, but not before he asks why someone from a different time, who has the knowledge and expertise to help Earth recover from its postwar havoc, does nothing.Reception
The School Library JournalSchool Library Journal
The School Library Journal is a monthly magazine with articles and reviews for school librarians, media specialists, and public librarians who work with young people. Articles cover a wide variety of topics, with a focus on technology and multimedia. Reviews are included for preschool to 4th grade,...
gave the novel a good review saying fans of dystopia
Dystopia
A dystopia is the idea of a society in a repressive and controlled state, often under the guise of being utopian, as characterized in books like Brave New World and Nineteen Eighty-Four...
s would enjoy the story. SF Scope said the novel was "an interesting exploration of what a post-apocalyptic world might be" but found the characters, except for Liz and Dan, to be little more than ciphers. The Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
did not give a positive review describing the book as sloppy and saying it failed to live up to other dystopias based on alternate histories like The Man in the High Castle
The Man in the High Castle
The Man in the High Castle is a science fiction alternate history novel by American writer Philip K. Dick. It won a Hugo Award in 1963 and has since been translated into many languages....
, The Difference Engine
The Difference Engine
The Difference Engine is an alternate history novel by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling.It posits a Victorian Britain in which great technological and social change has occurred after entrepreneurial inventor Charles Babbage succeeded in his ambition to build a mechanical computer .The novel was...
or The Plot Against America
The Plot Against America
The Plot Against America is a novel by Philip Roth published in 2004. It is an alternate history in which Franklin Delano Roosevelt is defeated in the presidential election of 1940 by Charles Lindbergh.-Plot introduction:...
.
See also
- Ape and EssenceApe and EssenceApe and Essence is a novel by Aldous Huxley, published by Chatto & Windus in the UK and Harper & Brothers in the US. It is set in a dystopia, similar to that in Brave New World, Huxley's more famous work...
- A Canticle for LeibowitzA Canticle for LeibowitzA Canticle for Leibowitz is a post-apocalyptic science fiction novel by American writer Walter M. Miller, Jr., first published in 1960. Set in a Roman Catholic monastery in the desert of the southwestern United States after a devastating nuclear war, the story spans thousands of years as...
- LudLud (city)Lud is a fictional city in Stephen King's Dark Tower series and is briefly mentioned in Rose Madder. In The Dark Tower III: The Waste Lands, the book's protagonists, led by the gunslinger Roland, travel from Lud to an alternate reality version of Topeka, Kansas via a supersonic monorail called...