It is May 1942. War is raging around the world. Major Heinrich Jager is fighting for the Third Reich on the Eastern Front. George Bagnall is a flight engineer for the RAF. Ludmila Gorbunova is a pilot, but for the Soviet Air Force. Moishe Russie is a Jew in the Warsaw Ghetto. Liu Han is a Chinese peasant woman. Jens Larssen is an American physicist on the Manhattan Project. Sam Yeager us a minor league outfielder and science fiction fan from Nebraska. Atvar is the fleetlord of the invading spaceships of the Race.
As is typical of Turtledove's alternate history novels, How Few Remain sports a large cast of historical characters. For his viewpoint characters, Turtledove makes use of Abe Lincoln, Sam Clemens, J.E.B. Stuart, Theodore Roosevelt, George A. Custer, Alfred von Schlieffen, Frederick Douglass and Stonewall Jackson. This broad cast of characters allows
Alternate-history maestro Turtledove's conclusion to his Worldwar and Colonization sagas, about how lizard-like aliens known as the Race invaded Earth during WWII and were fought to a stalemate by the major Allied and Axis combatants, lacks the vividly described battle scenes of its predecessors, but more than compensates by closely examining the Race's culture and society. While the Race have colonized much of Earth, they're amazed by the human ability to adapt to change.
Harry Turtledove begins The Great War: Breakthroughs as he has begun the previous two novels in the series, with George Enos living his life and demonstrating how the great events are effecting the everyman. Once past the reintroductions of his characters, Turtledove returns to the meat of the action, bringing characters from various storylines together, such as his team up of
Having explored the alternate history of World War II in the "Worldwar" series, Harry Turtledove now turns his attention to an alternate World War I in "The Great War" series, beginning with American Front. This series actually began in 1997 with the release of How Few Remain, Turtledove's branch point occurred when the Confederacy won their freedom from the United States.
