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They say, write what you know. Harry Turtledove wrote about a graduate student at UCLA born approximately 1948 to a Jewish-American family, who in his spare time, writes science fiction. Okay.
"Arrival" is a movie about a linguist who gets volunteered for a first-contact mission by the US army. "Project Hail Mary" is a movie about a xenobiologist who gets volunteered for a space travel mission by a quasi-dictatorial power that steps up to deal with a global crisis. "Stranger Things" is a TV show about nerds in the 80s who quote pop culture and make allusions and have political campaign signs in their yards to tell you It's The Eighties, Everyone, Have We Mentioned We Love Star Wars.
All of these fictional works are interesting because, in the first two cases, you can clearly see how Louise and Ryland's professional study make them especially qualified to handle extraordinary events, and in the latter, the kids have surreal, out-of-this-world adventures that don't hinge on what decade it's in. (Admittedly, some of the older characters' sideplots get dragged down by less fantastical and less engaging Cold War shenanigans. Hold that thought.) "Three Miles Down" wants to be in that category, but it's not.
This is an alternate history based on a stranger-than-fiction story; the CIA really did attempt to secretly raise a sunken Soviet submarine from the bottom of the ocean, in disguise as a mining ship sponsored by eccentric zillionaire Howard Hughes (to be fair, eccentric zillionaire provides a cover story for military-industrial complex is a very plausible story in any decade). In the fictionalized version, there's a cover story inside a cover story. The submarine was actually taken out by a derelict alien spacecraft, and young Harry--sorry, Jerry--is the weird hippie on a ship full of conservative CIA goons who might be able to use his SF knowledge to puzzle things out.
There are some good parts. The designated hitter was still new-ish in 1974, and I'm a sucker for a good baseball allusion (as you know). The day-to-day minutiae of grad school life rings true:
Jerry is studying whalesongs, which you might think would come in useful in a first contact story, but nope--it's just his writing skills. He gets a personal rejection letter from Ben Bova of Analog and calls him back to schmooze and get advice:
Still good advice! But it just feels like a self-insert wish-fulfillment character who brainstorms strategies based on "what would Gandalf do" and that's enough to impress everybody.
There isn't a whole lot of diversity on the project--okay, fine, it's 1974. (The Russian spy ships are mixed-sex, though!) But the one prominent female character is Jerry's fiance-turned-wife, Anna, and...it's not clear that they really like each other? He keeps seeing her in terms of "tests" he has to pass, like, "do I have to read her mind and figure out that she doesn't want sex tonight? Will that earn me points? Oh no, women are so strange."
It's billed as a first-contact book but, spoilers, there isn't...really...any first contact? The plot stakes at the end turn into "will the US and the Soviet Union start World War III over who gets to play with the spaceship," and this is resolved, in the sense that they don't start World War III, but the end is somewhat open in terms of "will we communicate with the aliens." Some of the Goodreads reviewers suggest that this may be sequel bait/Turtledove likes to work in trilogies, which would explain why some plot threads kind of fizzle out. And it's possible the whalesong stuff might matter then. But as it is, I found the book on its own to outstay its welcome. Quoting SF writers good, Nixon and company bad. We get it.
Bingo: probably using it for "published in 2022," could also count for "No Ifs Ands or Buts," standalone (although see above). Would 1974 qualify for "historical" SFF? :S
"Arrival" is a movie about a linguist who gets volunteered for a first-contact mission by the US army. "Project Hail Mary" is a movie about a xenobiologist who gets volunteered for a space travel mission by a quasi-dictatorial power that steps up to deal with a global crisis. "Stranger Things" is a TV show about nerds in the 80s who quote pop culture and make allusions and have political campaign signs in their yards to tell you It's The Eighties, Everyone, Have We Mentioned We Love Star Wars.
All of these fictional works are interesting because, in the first two cases, you can clearly see how Louise and Ryland's professional study make them especially qualified to handle extraordinary events, and in the latter, the kids have surreal, out-of-this-world adventures that don't hinge on what decade it's in. (Admittedly, some of the older characters' sideplots get dragged down by less fantastical and less engaging Cold War shenanigans. Hold that thought.) "Three Miles Down" wants to be in that category, but it's not.
This is an alternate history based on a stranger-than-fiction story; the CIA really did attempt to secretly raise a sunken Soviet submarine from the bottom of the ocean, in disguise as a mining ship sponsored by eccentric zillionaire Howard Hughes (to be fair, eccentric zillionaire provides a cover story for military-industrial complex is a very plausible story in any decade). In the fictionalized version, there's a cover story inside a cover story. The submarine was actually taken out by a derelict alien spacecraft, and young Harry--sorry, Jerry--is the weird hippie on a ship full of conservative CIA goons who might be able to use his SF knowledge to puzzle things out.
There are some good parts. The designated hitter was still new-ish in 1974, and I'm a sucker for a good baseball allusion (as you know). The day-to-day minutiae of grad school life rings true:
Interlibrary loans all went through the Research Library at the north end of campus. It would have been nice if he could have done this through the Biomedical Library in his preferred part of the sprawling university, but no such luck.
At UCLA, science, engineering, and mathematical types mostly hung out in the southern part of the campus. The north was for English majors, would-be historians, students of foreign languages, and others even less likely than marine biologists to land jobs after graduating. There were more girls up there, but that was only of theoretical interest to him these days.
And some of the Nixon jokes are funny/poignant:At UCLA, science, engineering, and mathematical types mostly hung out in the southern part of the campus. The north was for English majors, would-be historians, students of foreign languages, and others even less likely than marine biologists to land jobs after graduating. There were more girls up there, but that was only of theoretical interest to him these days.
"This project has approval up to the very highest level. You can be sure of that," Steve said.
"You mean the President?"
"The very highest level," the man from RAND repeated.
Considering what Jerry thought of Richard Nixon, that didn't seem recommendation enough.
Unfortunately, the running joke about "what if the aliens say 'take me to your leader' and the leader is Nixon, I can't believe people are still stupid enough to support such an incompetent crook, I sure hope nobody this terrible ever holds office again" wears thin quickly. Likewise "haha isn't this weird, it's like we're in a science fiction story:""You mean the President?"
"The very highest level," the man from RAND repeated.
Considering what Jerry thought of Richard Nixon, that didn't seem recommendation enough.
...a character in a well-written story wouldn't try to do something so important while being so ignorant. Then he remembered Frodo in The Lord of the Rings. So much for that! In The Lord of the Rings, though, at least people on Frodo's side hadn't lied to him about what was going on.
Ad nauseum. We get it.Jerry is studying whalesongs, which you might think would come in useful in a first contact story, but nope--it's just his writing skills. He gets a personal rejection letter from Ben Bova of Analog and calls him back to schmooze and get advice:
You started with the top markets, sure. But if you didn't sell there, you sent your brainchildren to magazines with less prestige and less money. Getting paid at all beat getting zilch for what you did.
Still good advice! But it just feels like a self-insert wish-fulfillment character who brainstorms strategies based on "what would Gandalf do" and that's enough to impress everybody.
There isn't a whole lot of diversity on the project--okay, fine, it's 1974. (The Russian spy ships are mixed-sex, though!) But the one prominent female character is Jerry's fiance-turned-wife, Anna, and...it's not clear that they really like each other? He keeps seeing her in terms of "tests" he has to pass, like, "do I have to read her mind and figure out that she doesn't want sex tonight? Will that earn me points? Oh no, women are so strange."
It's billed as a first-contact book but, spoilers, there isn't...really...any first contact? The plot stakes at the end turn into "will the US and the Soviet Union start World War III over who gets to play with the spaceship," and this is resolved, in the sense that they don't start World War III, but the end is somewhat open in terms of "will we communicate with the aliens." Some of the Goodreads reviewers suggest that this may be sequel bait/Turtledove likes to work in trilogies, which would explain why some plot threads kind of fizzle out. And it's possible the whalesong stuff might matter then. But as it is, I found the book on its own to outstay its welcome. Quoting SF writers good, Nixon and company bad. We get it.
Bingo: probably using it for "published in 2022," could also count for "No Ifs Ands or Buts," standalone (although see above). Would 1974 qualify for "historical" SFF? :S
