Editor's Winter Reading Suggestions - 1st one:Family Trade

The Harford County Public Library Winter Reading Program will be starting in January (check with your local branch for their kick-off celebration date). I thought for the next two and a half weeks I would post here reviews of all sorts of different books I have recently finished to give you some ideas outside of the usual bestsellers for your own winter reading.

I am going away to Wales to visit my Mum and Dad for the Holidays and will not be back until the New Year. To cover my absence, I have scheduled a lot of reviews, one to be published automatically every three days or so. They will be a mixed bag of genres. Most will have been published two or three years ago. Perhaps these reviews might stimulate you to try something different from your usual fare?

This is the first book:

The Family Trade by Charles Stross, 2004 (Find this book in our catalog)

This is book one of The Merchant Princes series by Stross and probably should be read first in the series. It definitely should not be read by anyone who expects a neatly sewn-up and satisfying ending; it will, however, appeal to all readers who like their intellect challenged and their preconceived notions turned upside down. In this fast-paced story filled with constant danger, action, and shifting realities, Miriam Beckstein is given a locket and is transported by it to a parallel world, where knights on horseback chase their prey with automatic weapons. This world diverged from our own world in the Dark Ages, when, after a catastrophic war, the Vikings left Europe and colonized the whole of North America. Fans of alternate history will be interested to see how this world developed on an alternate path from ours and is still feudal, with colonies on each coast and a wasteland in between in control of antagonistic Native American tribes. Miriam discovers she is a lost countess in this world, a powerful heiress in the kingdom of Gruinmarkt, whose balance she has upset by her reappearance. This upset places Miriam in acute danger as she travels back and forth between the kingdom and our well-known Boston and New York. Science fiction fans will enjoy the exploration of the concept of parallel worlds, the detail with which the kingdom of Gruinmarkt is described and the technology of “world walking.”