British writers seem to have a thing about time travel. Perhaps it all started with H.G. Wells, or maybe we can blame Doctor Who in all his varied incarnations. Or perhaps it’s because the British have quite a lot of history and it’s all around them. Is it surprising if they think it would be simply smashing to toddle back into the past for a quick peek? And, having exhausted the vanilla versions of time travel quite early on, authors from my native land have thought up quite a few ingenious variants. Herewith, I regale you with five frightfully peculiar time travel tales penned by Brits…
Alan Smale
Five Books that Twist History Until it Begs for Mercy
Starships are so last century. Hey, I’m the first to admit that they look neat on the big screen, but in written fiction spaceships stopped doing it for me a while ago. Same with dystopian futures and post-apocalyptic nightmares. Why read about dystopias when I can just drive into town?
But, oh, the broad, glorious, panoramic sweep of history—that’s where it’s at! History is the big playground. In bitter reality most of history was brutal and unpleasant, inexplicable and capricious, but reimagined by a good writer it can be fascinating. For me, history is always new.