By David Mack

Tor Books, out now

1939 – the battle for dominion of the world has begun…

The mark of a good alternate history novel is that you find all the different twists and turns in it credible, and logical – insofar as human behaviour ever is. Churchill is killed in the Boer War, so he’s not there during the First World War or to take the reins in 1940 – you can work out how things could have played out, without being tied to specific historical dates. But when an author writes an alternate version of our own history – and along the way includes many historical events – they’ve set themselves a mammoth task, because not only do events need to play out in the familiar way, but they have to do so while being affected by other forces, whose agendas may well not coincide with those of the “real” participants. To those who are familiar with his writing in the Star Trek universe, it will come as little surprise that David Mack makes this sort of juggling act seem easy.

The Midnight Front is the first book in Mack’s new series which lifts the lid on the magickal undercurrents beneath the 20th Century. This one covers the period of the Second World War, with the Cold War and beyond to follow in the later volumes. Mack throws the reader and his central character, Cade, in at the deep end as war breaks out and the young American studying at Oxford finds his life turned upside down by magickal forces. He doesn’t have long to get up to speed, yoking demons and learning the tricks of the trade, before being sent into the heart of occupied Europe…

Mack doesn’t spare us the horrors of war. This isn’t a simple battle of Good Allies vs. Evil Axis, with a guy with a shield able to root out the bad guys (and before people complain, I love Captain America: The First Avenger!). This is an arena where the shades of grey have shades of grey, where the leaders have to make decisions that they know will lead to loss of life on a scale most of us need to find unimaginable to stay sane… and where those leaders will use anything that will give them the upper hand. Anything – on this Earth, and beyond (or below) it.

The fantastical elements are handled well, mostly in a matter of fact manner that emphasizes just how they are part and parcel of the lives of those involved with them. Yes, there are lots of demonic names (and a handy glossary) but whenever it seems as if you might need a reminder of who or what they are, there’s an appropriate nudge. This means the story can constantly maintain the necessary momentum, with sufficient time for us to get to know the characters (and feel the pain of their loss – no-one comes out of this unscathed).

Verdict: A terrific opening salvo in this rewriting of the 20th Century. 9/10

Paul Simpson