Alternate History

[MysteryMike]

Title explains it. This thread is for discussing any form of fiction that involves alternate history whether past or present.

Here's one I really like and currently reading. Always loved the idea of European colonists interacting with Ice Age megafauna not to mention a bonus of living alongside another hominid species.

The premise is pretty much in an alternate history where the ancestors of Native Americans never crossed the land bridge to the New World. Instead it was the more primitive Homo erectus (Called Sims by the Europeans) who continued to exist to this day. When Europeans arrived instead of Native Americans and their cultures. They found a land inhabited by the Sims and other Ice Age megafauna such as mammoths (Hairy elephant) and saber-toothed cats (Spearfang cat). The book pretty much tells a series of short stories that ranges throughout the 300 year history ranging from 1610 to 1988 of how colonization of the New World goes down in this alternate history and how our view towards Sims changes overtime from simple-minded creatures to eventually intelligent beings with some rights.

All in all. It's an interesting premise. It does ignore some butterfly effects such as why the Norse, Polynesians or Inuits (Which I can forgive since this was written back in 1988 and back then it was thought humans getting to the New World through the land bridge was the only way) never settled but still a fun concept none the less.