Dale R. Cozort (1)

Romantic science fiction filled with mystery and traps; serious science fiction where the well-researched facts blend so seamlessly that you hardly notice you’ve been asked to believe them; complicated fiction with its premise so beautifully drawn you just have to read on; Dale Cozort’s Exchange has it all, smoothly written to offer a rich, complex read with great characters, involving mystery, and an endlessly fascinating strange new world. I couldn’t put it down. I couldn’t guess how it would end.

Exchange is the first in a series of novels, and it leaves plenty of questions to be resolved when the final page is turned. But it also resolves its own central story, making for a nicely complete and satisfying read. It’s a smooth, convincing story, beautifully told, and I can hardly wait to read more.

Disclosure: I’d read one tiny part of this online before and eagerly awaited the chance to read more.… (mais)

I am a SUCKER for alternate history stories. Dale Cozort has filled this genre need for me twice now, though it is not technically alt history. Both Cozort novels I have read deal solidly with people in our world stepping into a side dimension where tandem time is running like a river, but diverted by a single, but critical change in the historical record.

In "All Timelines lead to Rome", the empire never left the European continent. Expansionism was stopped dead in its tracks. The Americas were never 'discovered', plague never overtook the Western Hemisphere. It was a mass cascade effect of changes, pretty much removing all semblance of a world we would recognize.

In our world, we have found that the membrane between our timelines is malleable, with the right science, weaker spots can be temporarily opened allowing access to Timeline X. The difficulty here is that any involvement with timeline x could devastate it. An organization has been built to keep the purity of the timeline. Said org has found evidence of a huuuge breach in protocol, putting the entire timeline at risk.

Did I enjoy this book? Hell yeah I did. Would I read it twice? Unlikely. The reread value of this was low. The possibility of a sequel is also low, it was written in a way that I am unsure how it could expand. Too many loose ends conveniently tied up. I dunno.

There were a couple character elements that had me rolling my eyes, but over all they didn't diminish the novel, they simply didn't add to it.

Overall, a favorable and enjoyed read. Everything else is just me being nitpicky.


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Much as with the book itself, about three quarters of the publisher description is hand fed to you with answers contained within the first quarter of the book. It introduces one character, then references a second by name with no explanation.. It is overly fluffy and confusing by proxy. I think they dropped the ball on this and made the book less accessible, by being harder to get off the shelf. The cover is interesting and a good choice.

Here is my take-
ReBlurb--

"In an alternate earth timeline, Rome never spread it's wings. The Romans never great their empire outside of Europe, they just lollygag around home and portions of Europe. Horrific Euro plagues never spread.

Native North Americans are never impacted by the bevy of terrible problems that expansionism brought our world.and thrive with the paradigm provided. A single human cold from our world will destroy theirs.

So what could justify a corporation's decision to bypass timeline quarantines and blatantly pollute the time streams? What could be worth the potential of becoming the shepherd of xenocide in someone else's history?

Government experts Darla and Scott are going to find out, and it all starts with a dead woman's cellphone."


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Publisher's description:
"A dead woman's cell phone chip leads to a mystery spanning the U.S. rustbelt, a surviving Roman empire and a North America without Europeans.

A unique alternate history: Newly created portals lead to an alternate reality where prehumans survived on a Mediterranean island, enslaved by local farmers. Alternate history Rome rebuilt their culture around the slaves, preserving the empire but causing it to stagnate. As a result Europeans never discovered America and American Indians still control the alternate New World.

Intertwined mysteries: When Detective Darla Smith investigates a picture of an alternate reality Roman scroll concealed on a murder victim, she is dogged by her past and other mysteries. Why did alternate timeline Rome stop changing? How did Roman slave-raiders get to alternate reality North America? What does software giant Burgen Industries want in the alternate reality?

Powerful forces headed for a violent collision: A wealthy, idealistic business woman and her menacing security chief try to sidetrack the approaching investigation. An Indian town is attacked by raiders with modern guns. The trail leads Darla and Scott through cyberspace, decaying rustbelt towns and an Indian-controlled alternate North America toward a final confrontation."
… (mais)

When the police are called in to investigate the murder of a woman, the journey doesn't just take them across middle America but into an alternate earth. This secondary earth is a world where no industrial revolution has happened, and Romans still rule Europe. To get the menial tasks done, the Romans have enslaved a group of pixies, which are humanoid creatures bred specifically to please there master in whatever fashion is needed. No colonization has occurred and this means that Indigenous people still control all of the land in North America. This is a world out of time essentially. This is a world where none of the natural resources have been tapped and untold treasures are still to be discovered. Ancient artifacts are easily available for the taking.

Someone has been accessing the alternate earth and this means the possibility of them wiping out the Indigenous population with diseases that we have long ago built immunity to, or introducing advanced weaponry and starting the project of colonization again. It also puts our current earth at danger of small pox, should someone infected with the disease return. There is also the danger that interacting with the Romans or indigenous peoples will change their culture and path of development. Do we have the will to allow these people to develop naturally without our intervention?

I think this book walks the line between sci-fi and alternate history and manages to pull it off well. When it does move to the alternate world, Cozort adds little details like being able to drink directly from streams and a lack of things like satellites and motorized vehicles to provide convenience. This alternate world quickly becomes real to the reader and one can almost smell the pollution free air.

Though the title of the book is All Timelines Lead to Rome, the book is really all about the exploitation of North American Native people. I can see that Cozort took some time investigating the various tribes and how they lived, the problem is that the book read very much like a White saviour complex. Much of the motivations behind the characters was to save the Indigenous people from colonisation and of course exploitation. Scott, the professor, was highly aware of how the introduction of Europeans to North America not only brought diseases which the Indigenous had no immunity to but advanced weaponry. Obviously, what happened in our timeline was a genocide and it makes sense that the characters would want to avoid this, the problem is that those truly concerned where all White, making the book read like Rudyard Kipling's White Man's Burden. Jeni sought to give the Indigenous a chance by introducing them to advanced weapons in an effort to speed up their development because she believed that it was only a matter of time until our timeline began exploiting them. This approach of course does not factor in potential harm from disease. This entire book seemed to reify the ridiculous binary that Native tribes are backward and need saving. It makes absolutely no sense to me why Indigenous people from our timeline would not be concerned about their people on the other side. All we got were the opinions of White people on the issue.

The other characters of colour where equally trope laden. First we have Darla, the adopted rich girl gone bad. Though she has redeemed herself and become a cop, her past history of arson still haunts her in the form of a Vietnamese gang lord named Danny Minh. For some reason, Minh is obsessed with Darla and that is how he becomes involved in this case. His obsession makes absolutely no sense and we are given no real reason for his appearance in the book. It seems that his character's presence is only to provide another trope laden character of colour. Darla is smart and highly aware though much of her actions read like jealousy of the White female protagonist Jeni/Jolene.

Read More… (mais)

Thanks to Netgalley for sending me a copy!

A plus for a lot of people (however I can take it or leave it) is there is definitely a lot of excitement and action in this book. As a person who really enjoys character moved plots, it's a bit of a let down that there wasn't more character development, everyone is just a shell or a stereotype. Anthony, for example, plays a big role in this novel, but we're never shown anything but the stereotype of an abusive husband who's nothing but that. Does he care about his daughter? Is he doing it just piss Sharon off? It would have been interesting to delve into Anthony's motives more than "he did it just because he's a bad person!". They can be bad people, but they should have motivation for the things they do (even if its not a particularly good one) and more qualities besides being a bad person.

Sharon is okay. I like that she's not exactly helpless, yet she does come across a lot of situations needing of saving, a bit hard-headed. But she's definitely not a heroine I'd classify as "too-stupid-to-live" because I understand where she's coming from. The constant danger in which she puts herself is merely a consequence of the situation she's in (her daughter being kidnapped across a wild expanse of land occupied by religious nuts and convicts. Could get a bit dangerous even for the cautious).

Also I love Fred! I think that was a really neat addition to the story, and I wasn't expecting it even after she saved him from the river of debris. Really, it was cute! As for the animals, being a biology nut there was a few things that bothered me, like bats taking over for mice and other rodents in the Exchange, when bats are more closely related to humans, in fact, are the closest related to humans other than the primates. They aren't rodents. I find it unlikely they would just....take on rodent behavior. It seems unlikely.

But yes, I would go for the description that it's mostly a glorified romance (nothing wrong with that!) but it's definitely not what I expected. I was expecting something a little more hard scifi to go into my speculative fiction challenge, but this doesn't qualify. Oh well.

Overall it's a decent read, good way to pass the time, just don't be overly expecting of it. I thought it would have been more interesting had it ended the other way, as well.… (mais)