The Last Republic

The alternate history of the beginnings of a war between a US and an independent, Iran-allied Utah/Deseret, The Last Republic is one of those books that is only distinguishable by its premise. It would be a medium-grade techno-thriller if it involved real places. Granted, given the comparative scarcity of technothrillers today, that would be praiseworthy (mildly), but it doesn’t, of course.

The bizarre alternate history, which is very much a soft AH (Iraq with a surviving Saddam is similar to real life Saudi Arabia in terms of relationship with the US, both sides use historical F-16s, etc…), is what makes this stand out. Still, I just don’t think the author took advantage of it as much as he could. Could that have made it worse? Quite possibly. But would it have made the book much more interesting? Quite possibly as well. As it stands, it’s a 51% book with weird sauce.