Settling Accounts Return Engagement: Book One of the Settling Accounts Trilogy

by Harry Turtledove

Book Overview

" Harry Turtledove] handles his huge cast with admirable skill. The insights into racial politics elevate this novel to a status above mere entertainment, although it provides that aplenty."--... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0345457234
• ISBN13: 9780345457233
• Release Date: August 2004
• Publisher: Del Rey Books
• Length: 623 Pages
• Weight: 1.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.5" x 6.6" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

Enjoy his series

long book but well worth the read. His series is getting deeper into the unfolding drama of the US vs. the CSA.

This is a great read !!!

It's about time Turtledove sent the Confederacy into the U.S.A. to exact some much needed retribution for the unlikely defeat they put on them in the Great War books that he wrote. Now lets see how far the Southerners will take their punnishment to the U.S.

Featherston's Vengeance

It's June 22, 1941 -- the day Jake Featherston had waited almost 25 years for. His hatred and loathing for the United States of America ran so strong, he didn't bother to issue a declaration of war, but instead let his bombers and artillery do the announcing for him. His armored forces and air force push north toward the Great Lakes as if they had the hosts of hell behind them, shooting or blowing up every U.S. soldier and barrel in their path. The Confederate States of America will put the Yankees in their place, so help them God -- or so Featherston declares. And even while General Patton leads the Confederates through Ohio, dark events occur in the swamps of the Deep South. For Jake Featherston is carrying out a different sort of revenge on a different foe -- an entire race of people. When a concentration camp commandant comes up with a radical idea, Featherston is obscenely delighted over this final solution to the Confederacy's problem with its black population... A great beginning to Turtledove's alternate Second World War tetralogy. The War begins on page one (well, the very last page of the preceding volume, to be precise) and gets worse and worse with each passing page. When chemical weapon attacks and mass murders are already happening in book one, who can guess what will be happening in the final book. And Turtledove brings it off convincingly in an American setting. The only problem I had was that the war seemed to slow down quite a bit during the middle third of the book -- between Al Smith's radio reply to Featherston's speech and MacArthur's Virginia offensive. But that was a minor annoyance, and not enough to greatly disturb my attitude toward this book. A definite set-up to a different World War II, for sure.

This isn't just a rehash of WW2

I write this partially in response to the people that have said that there is no way that the CSA could hope to beat the US and that their early victories are likely contrived. My response is that after looking at this I'm actually thinking that this might be closer to the Korean War, at least in the American Theater and, if not, then things are likely to be difficult. To anyone that wonders how the CSA could win/get so many victories it isn't just blitzkrieg tactics and artisit license, the following things are essential factors 1) The CSA has been gearing up for this for quite some time. Tractor factories have been prepping to mass produce barrels, Featherston has been constantly whipping the country up into a state of frenzy, and key people have been positioned. 2) The US is actually in pretty bad shape right now if you stop and think about it. The CSA has them cut up the middle, Canadians are likely revolting in pockets, Utah is a war zone (both of which split up the army) the US navy is tangled up with the Japanese, British, French, Confederate, and Mexican navies. They also weren't geared up in terms of production, there will be no great arsenal of democracy. The country needs more people at home to help keep in going, building buildings, war plant work, food production, etc. 3) This ties in with 2, Germany is getting knotted up in Europe, if they fall Britain and France can send more men and supplies to the CSA and can also focus fully on the US. Therefore the US likely needs to come up with some way of helping Germany, thus splitting forces further or getting overwhelmed later on. 4) The CSA has superior leadership, Featherston has the personal charisma and magnetism that makes him so powerful as a leader. With Patton commanding Barrel divisions, Potter running intelligence, Goldman making people say and think what the country wants them to... In the US we have Al Smith, not so good a speaker, the guy we need is secretary of war. McArther is probably going to cause more trouble than good for the country, not to mention that the nation is full of apathetics or people afraid of fighting. 5) The CSA is getting manpower to spare, the Empire of Mexico is sending in troops to act as support, also remember that Featherston planned this out in far advance, he made the country advance and mechanize not to modernize it as much as to make it possible to beat the tar out of the US. 6) CSA troop experience is probably higher. Most of the Great War veterans are in their cups by now, that is if they're still alive. Most US footsoldiers are raw recruits getting their baptisms of fire. The CSA troops on the other hand are a mix of people that fought in the Empire of Mexico as aids, put down the uprisings when they began sparking up again, it gave them practical combat experience, something that can be intensely valuable in a soldiers power. 7) CSA is better equipped, I'm sorry but in a war if you're using bolt action while the other guy is sprayi

The Confederacy Strikes Back

When I finished The Victorious Opposition, I couldn't wait for the next book in the series to come out. Unfortunately, like everyone else, I had to. For a whole year. Fortunately for me, Return Engagement was Mr. Turtledove at his finest and the book was certainly well worth the wait! As I worked my way through the 623 pages (thankfully, it was longer than The V.O.)I was drawn through a whole spectrum of emotions; I was shocked at the effectiveness of the CSA's blitz in Ohio, and the fact that they were able to so thoroughly whale the everloving snot out of the United States had me worried for a little bit about the outcome of this war. It was also disheartening to see Abner Dowling's first Command position go so horribly awry (the poor guy can't seem to catch a break!). Another of the things which I like about Mr. Turtledove's style of writing is his use of irony and understatement. Example: Strom Thurmond--"a young congressman named Storm or something like that was the first one up to address the [Freedom Party] meeting...He was very good on the Negro question, weaker elsewhere.(31)" Other reviewers have also referenced to the "Final Solution" line. As a young Black man in America, I was, of course, drawn to this fictional "Black Holocaust". It was interesting to see the USA's reaction, best typified in the scene where the Martin family is gathered around the radio while President Smith decries the Freedom Party's crimes against humanity. Chester Martin and his wife, Rita, both seem to shrug the news off with cold indifference, seemingly more concerned with helping their son with his arithmetic than the fact that thousands of blacks are being ruthlessly slaughtered. Of course, one can hardly hold them accountible; genocide in foreign nations often goes unnoticed--look at the real life instances of slaughter in Rawanda, or even the antipathy shown towards Jews by most Western Nations before the real Holocaust. The world it seems can be a fairly ugly place, and Mr. Turtledove paints his story bearing this fact in mind. Towards the end of the book, Scipio notices that the Terry has been cut off from the rest of Augusta by barbed wire. It would seem that the Terry has become the first American ghetto. Irony abounds. SPOILERS!!! Okay, I just need to get this off my chest: I am so glad that Mr. Turtledove killed Anne Colleton! Out of all the characters in the series save for MAYBE Jake Featherston (the dirty @$%#% & !) I think that that woman was the most unabashedly evil. I hated what she did to Scipio--the way she made him live his life in fear like that. Good riddance to bad rubbish! Further, was I the only one who though that Hip Rodriguez had died when he electrocuted himself? That was some creepy, Final Destination-type stuff there, man. END SPOILERS!!! If I were to have any problems they would be as follows: item: not enough young characters and or average footsoldiers (their stories were what made the Great War series so mem