Tag: TK Blackwood

Review: Alamo on the Rhine

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Alamo on the Rhine

For the first World War III review of the new year, I turn to T. K. Blackwood’s Alamo on the Rhine, a spinoff/side story of the Iron Crucible 1990s World War III. It’s about a daring strike on a vital air base at the start of the war. Told with the same effectiveness as the other entries, I greatly enjoyed it.

I couldn’t help but see the parallels to Market Garden, Kitona, and Hostomel and wonder what role those historical battles played in the crafting of this book, similar to how I wanted a “Soviet Gulf War” in All Union but not an exact one. It’s to Blackwood’s credit that the excellent story does not come across as a simple historical copy-paste.
This is a very fun book of the kind I haven’t read in a while. Nice job.

Review: Black Seas

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Black Seas

TK Blackwood’s 199X Fuldapocalypse (or should I say Yugoslavpocalypse) continues in Black Seas. Not surprisingly given the title, it centers around the biggest missile age naval battle ever. The centerpiece is an alternate history classic: The nuclear Ulyanovsk-class carrier (I’m still debating whether to have them be in All Union or not, btw…)

That alone makes it a guilty pleasure for me (I’m definitely including the slightly similar Kherson-class “Ivan Tarawa” large landing ships in that universe, btw…). It’s certainly able to juggle a ton of plot elements as well as any other successful technothriller. Plus it has an Iowa-Kirov showdown! (A sadly realistic Iowa-Kirov showdown, which is all I’ll say about it, but still)

So yeah, this is a worthy successor to the past entries in the series and a fun WW3 naval showdown in its own right. I highly recommend this.