LIBERATING ATLANTIS PDF, EPUB, EBOOK Harry Turtledove | 452 pages | 07 Dec 2010 | Penguin Putnam Inc | 9780451463203 | English | New York, United States Liberating Atlantis | Turtledove | Fandom Original Title. Other Editions 4. Friend Reviews. To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up. To ask other readers questions about Liberating Atlantis , please sign up. Lists with This Book. Community Reviews. Showing Average rating 3. Rating details. More filters. Sort order. Start your review of Liberating Atlantis Atlantis, 3. Dec 29, David R. One of Turtledove's silliest books. The series now at 3 has become a total mess. In this one, we are supposed to imagine that an ad hoc servile insurrection changes entire folkways after one battle. What is worse is the endless talking by uninteresting characters. I hope he end this series. Jun 07, Angus Whittaker rated it did not like it Shelves: read-in I only wish I could give this thing negative stars. It is bad - laughably bad. Or cry-ably bad. For starters, everyone in the novel is an idiot, and I mean that as sincerely as possible. The entire cast has about half a cup of intelligence between them, though Harry Turtledove seems to think they're all sharp as tacks. He repeatedly tells us how clever and wry his characters are, even as they spout their idiotic nonsense ineffectually masquerading as wit. Turtledove seems to have only enough ima I only wish I could give this thing negative stars. Turtledove seems to have only enough imagination for about five different types of scenes in the whole book. One of them, which he returns to over and over, is the "clever [not] characters plotting their ingenious [not] next move" scene. He makes full use of this particular scene, using it over and over throughout the book from the POV of both the idiotic slaves who are rebelling and the idiotic masters who are trying to put them back down. Here's the typical dialogue - it applies to each of these scenes equally, since in essence they're the same: Idiot One: Now we're in a tight spot. I wish we weren't, but we are. Idiot Two: We need to , that's what we need to do! One: Well, you won't here me say this often, but you're right. Two: Damned right I'm right! One: Only trouble is, that's easier to say than it is to do. Two: Oh. I hadn't thought of that. One: Only question is, how do we go about doing it? I kid you not, this is the average quality of the book. The rest of the dialogue follows the same pattern, no matter what the subject matter, speakers, or situation: a bunch of dipwads proudly displaying their stupidity in the mistaken belief that it is what's known as "wit. Besides the dialogue, which I have already ranted about enough, the plot is equally horrible. You'd think that a disciple of history such as Turtledove would know enough about the past to have some vague inkling of how an alternate one might play out - after all, his main writing genre is alternate history. But, although in other books he might display more prowess in this line, 'Liberating Atlantis' was not his finest hour as a historical theorist. The course history takes in the novel would only make sense if every single person in the world had the brains of a pygmy shrew. Of course, in this novel every single person DOES have the sense of a shrew, but this does not make the story any more believable. Here's the basic course the story takes: slaves rebel after years of mistreatment so far so good. The slave army grows larger as more slaves throw down their hoes and pick up rifles. Unfortunately, the government of Atlantis consists of two asswipes who never learned how to play nicely together. Say what you will about politicians, I find it hard to believe that a pair of clowns such as Stafford and Newton could ever be elected into an office higher than Assistant Regional Under Secretary's Helper. Anyway, the two consuls as they're known bicker and fight their way down into southern Atlantis, where the uprising is. They proceed to bicker and fight like two little girls for the next half of the book, while their general spouts words of European strategical "wisdom" he picked up on earlier campaigns. And, by the way, all of this is what Turtledove calls a "war. Anyway, I won't give away any more of the book than that, in case any of my readers are not fully persuaded by this scathing review and must pick up the book to see for themselves if it could possibly be as bad as I say. Suffice it to say that the ending is no better than the beginning, and the middle is worse than both. Jun 28, Marla rated it liked it. It was a good alternative history of the Civil War, the slaves forming an army instead of the North fighting the South, but there wasn't much that made it distinctively "Atlantian" besides the addition of a Radcliff. I wouldn't mind if he wrote more in this series, maybe have more interactions with "Terranova". But overall I liked the series and the idea behind it. Jan 10, redbees rated it did not like it Shelves: read-in Plodding, repetitive, points are sledgehammered home. Clumsy and trite. Nov 19, Clay Davis rated it really liked it. A good story about people fighting for their freedom. Jun 06, Ray rated it it was ok. Reading this book was like plowing a field with a teaspoon. Pretty much a tedious labor. Oct 17, Fred added it. Good alternate history. Jan 02, Aaron rated it it was amazing. In the third volume to this series, which is set in a world where everything west of the Mississippi River was separate from the American mainland. This separate continent has allowed history to form differently. In the first two books, Atlantis was settle by the English, French and Spanish before a Rebellion took place. Now, two generations after the previous volume, the USA that is the United States of Atlantis is heading into a major confrontation over the issue of slavery. The north made sl In the third volume to this series, which is set in a world where everything west of the Mississippi River was separate from the American mainland. The north made slavery illegal many years previous, but the south's plantation-based economy is dependent on the use of the slaves. Africans and natives taken from Terra Nova, the American mainland, are the two populations used as slaves. While debate is strong in the Atlantean Congress, things are really brought to the fore through a slave revolt. Frederick Radcliff, the illegitimate grandson of the hero of the Rebellion from the previous novel, is a house slave. He has recently gotten in trouble for tripping and spilling soup at his mistress' big party. As a result, he is being demoted to a field hand and will be given a number of lashes. His "wife," who really isn't his wife because Negroes can't marry, is joining him in his demotion. As he settles into life as a farm hand, he finds himself less and less able to handle the inequalities he faces just because of the color of his skin. While being scolded by the plantation overseer, Frederick loses his temper and kills him with a shovel. This starts a revolt that will spread across much of the South with Frederick as the leader of the newly "freed" slaves. While the story is primarily told from Frederick's perspectives, two other men come to the fore to add their view. In Atlantis, the executive branch takes on the form of a pair of Consuls with one representing the North and the other the South. They are in effect a shared prime ministerialship. Jeremiah Stafford of the South and Leland Newton of the North have been ordered south by the Congress to crush the spreading revolt before it tears Atlantis apart. The two greatly disagree in how to approach the revolt because of their personal views of slavery, but they are both surprised by the capabilities of the slave army under the command of Frederick Radcliff and his "copperskin" marshall, Lorenzo. The two find themselves questioning their low estimations of slave capabilities and white superiority as they are continuously pushed back by the slave army. This is even more surprising as they are joined by the head of the Atlantean army, Colonel Balthasar Sinapis of Greece. As usual, Turtledove has done a masterful job of creating a realistic tale. While this is likely meant to parallel the American Civil War, it contains its own twists and turns, which are largely due to the unique nature of Atlantis. Not only did they help colonize the continent, but they have played crucial roles in its history since the arrival of Europeans there. Even as Frederick is not part of an accepted branch of the family, he definitely lives up to his name with the events. One of the things I have always liked about Turtledove's books is that he masterfully creates realistic characters. The reader is presented the events of the alternate history through their eyes. Usually, this is done to offer very different perspectives, giving the reader a full gamut of the pros and cons of events and why people might do some terribly, horrible things.