Third in Turtledove's alternate world/fantasy series (Darkness Descending, 2000, etc.) recasting WWII as a magical battle between Algarve, the lebensraum-seeking equivalent of Nazi Germany, and its numerous smaller opponents who desperately seek shaky alliances in the hope of stemming the tide. The consensus on Turtledove seems to be that either you love him or you leave him alone. Certainly his fans absorb alternate Civil Wars, WWIs and WWIIs of every imaginable variation, and keep coming back for more. Here as elsewhere, though, Turtledove doesn't even pretend to write a satisfying ending: prolific he is, and he just keeps churning ’em out.
