New Deal Coalition Retained: A Sixth Party System Wikibox Timeline

Sulemain

Sulemain

Banned
And it speaks to a wider problem with this TL, particularly with regard to events outside the United States: the whole "Queen Nixon" thing, the events in Northern Ireland and South Africa, they just seem to be the arbitrary whims of the writer, rather then coming from the logic of the world itself. Things happening by author fiat is not good Alternate History.
 
shiftygiant

shiftygiant

Gone Fishin'
Bulldoggus said:
Guys, this is like the third update in a month where y'all have fucking swarmed @The Congressman. Piss off. We're all just trying to enjoy a good story here. Remember, Drew turned Rumsfeld into an insane dictator. Kovalenko turned Efram Zimbalist into an insane dictator. People turn people into people they weren't on this site. Come on.
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Drew turned Rummy into a dictator. Kovalenko turned Zumbalist into a dictator. Those made sense in their contexts (and even then there was a severe structural issues with Rummy), but here... no, I'm sorry but if this is a Turtledove nominated timeline, then it's going to be treated like every other timeline on this site that's been nominated. This means that it's going to have an influx of readers, this means that these new readers aren't going to put up with stuff like Solzhenistyn or some of the other borderline incoherence in this TL, this means that it's actually going to be held to some kind of standard. If you seriously don't want people discussing this TL as alternate history, then it should be in the Writers Forum. And even then, there is a hell of a lot I could say about the quality of writing.

The bottom line is that if this is nominated for a prestigious award, you don't get to tell people to 'piss off' the moment they start looking at the foundations and find it's rickety. You can't have your cake and eat it, you can't have this TL be held up as the best post-1900 has to offer and then turn around and slap people in the face for daring to question it.
 

Gordian

Sort of came across this now, but Patrick McGoohan is a weird choice to play James Bond, considering that when he was offered the role OTL he rejected in personal grounds (his devout Catholic faith) that wouldn't have changed ITTL.
 
Comisario

Comisario

Pericles said:
I don't think any of you noticed but the Turtledove polls have closed.
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What does that change? A healthy amount of constructive criticism after TL updates, regardless of when the updates are posted or even if the TL was previously a Turtledove contender, is a positive thing and we shouldn't shy away from it.

I hope you understand that our concerns over quality are just that - concerns over quality.
 

Napoleon IV

To have it even be remotely possible that Solzhenitsyn becomes a Soviet official requires a POD well before 1957. At the very least you need to avoid having him go to the Gulag (which completely ruined his faith in the Soviet system, and turned him into a devout Christian). I also suspect that even a non-jailed Solzhenitsyn would be disillusioned by the revelation of Stalin's crimes in 1956 (he was just that sort of person).
 

Bookmark1995

Banned
Yes I agree.

If you want to write something, you have to expect to people to challenge you on it. That's one of the reasons we are allowed to comment on a thread.

Solzhenitsyn wasn't just a man sent to the GULAG. He had a mentality which would have made it impossible for him to work for a communist state he considered decadent and corrupt.

Yeah, I consider it too much of a stretch. But it is your story, you can do what you will. But expect us to speak up if we find something to be implausible.
 

Napoleon IV

Comisario said:
Very true. Being inquisitive when it comes to timelines is just what every writer - I should hope - wants.
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The fortress mentality that a portion of this TL's readers have is disturbing, to say the least. Criticism comes part and parcel with making any sort of creative work, and as long as the criticism is constructive and civil there's no reason to treat it like an attack. This is a writing piece, not a battlefield.
 

Trixtor

I personally like historical accuracy, but I prefer a good story more than that. They often intermesh, but one isn't a condition of the other. There's validity to the idea of hewing to historical truth bar a nail and seeing what comes from it, and there's also validity to continually changing small things for the sake of a good plot, interesting characters, and a fun setting.

This stuff is true for all fanfiction, and in the end, that's what alternate history is. That's not a devaluation, either, but it means that, like with any work of fiction, there are multiple ways to judge a work beyond historical plausibility. Internal consistency is far more important, really.
 
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