Time Spike (The Ring of Fire) Mass Market Paperback – December 29, 2009

I struggled with what to rate this, but I settled for a three because the good parts of the book were enjoyable enough that I don't regret reading it. The world building is typically fairly good, and the historical tibits with the Cherokee and Union soldiers were interesting and fairly well researched. The writing is solid, and the actions scenes are exciting.That said, this is is easily the worst of the 'Ring of Fire' books. Eric Flint tends to build excellent worlds, and write cliched characters. Unfortunately, the situation in this case is more character based and it really detracts from the enjoyment. In a scenario that should have led to difficult moral dilemmas and some hard choices, things just keep conveniently lining up to remove the problems and keep the hero's hands clean.The conquistadors are fairly one-sided badguy, and that's reasonably accurate to history. However, the corrupt prison guard who could have could have given voice to the darker side of pragmatism comes off as as realistic as a Captain Planet Villain.Also, there are just a few too many insta-romances.The biggest downside however is the section in the modern age with the Grantville mystery research team. It's basically an unrelated, and poorly written, short story covering up a minor glitch in the prologue of 1632. I'll sum it up and you can just skip those chapters:Blah blah blah technobabble blah blah blah conspiracy theory blah blah blah politics blah blah blah. Oh, and one more insta-romance to top it off.And yes, according to the prologue of 1632, it is aliens doing this; but the train of logic which leads these scientists to conclude it's aliens behind the time spike... well, I think I just heard a creationist rolling their eyes.

Title: Time SpikeAuthor: Eric Flint and Marilyn KosmatkaPublishers: Baen Books; 1 edition (May 1, 2008)Format Read: KindleA change of shift is in process at Illinois' maximum-security prison when the world seemed to stumble. Was it an earthquake? They thought so until the sun came up in the wrong direction, and found that the Mississippi River was gone. Then the dinosaur wandered by and used the prison walls for a back scratcher.The prison and its inhabitants had been thrown back in time millions of years. They found others from different periods of time as well: Cherokee Indians and their Army guards from the Trail of Tears; Spanish conquistadores; Mound people. But the main problem for Captain Andy Blacklock was that the prison inmates outnumbered his guards almost ten to one.How will they survive against prehistoric predatory dinosaurs when they had human predators as well?This is part of the series of novels from the Assiti Shards works by Eric Flint, et al., in which parts of modern day America are ripped out and placed back in time. Most of these novels deal with Grantville, WV when it was sent back to the seventeenth century, and how modern politics, art, and music (at the least of the influences) could change Europe. I started reading these first.Then I found Time Spike. The prisoners, guards, and nurses of an Illinois maximum security prison are sent back to the Cretaceous period, or so the resident dinosaur buff thinks. Then the search parties discover people from other periods of time: nineteenth century, sixteenth century, twelfth century, and prehistoric. And they need to try to live together because of the giant predators.In addition, unlike the Grantville novels, Mr. Flint and Ms. Kosmatka alternate the story between the past and the present. In the present day, there is a group of scientists who don't agree with the reason given by the US government as to what happened at Grantville. Some of these scientists had recorded strange readings. So when they registered the same type of readings in Illinois, they gather there to try to discover what is happening.At first, I didn't like this alternating of story lines. But I grew to appreciate it. And I can see this becoming a series as well, but perhaps not as prolific as the Grantville group - after all Grantville landed in seventeenth century Europe, which can lead to a cast of millions in at least thirty countries or territories.My Score: I am giving this a rating of 4 out of 5 stars only because I have become so involved with Grantville. If I had read this first, I could see myself giving it 5 out of 5.Time Spike was reviewed by Janet L Reeling

I like the idea behind this book more than the execution of the book. I still found it to be a good book, but it has the same alternate/parallel history book cliches as most other novels of the genre. There is always a noble leader, survivalist character with necessary skills so the group won't die off, smart guy who has all the information/knowledge needed to make "informed guesses" about the situation, and tough, highly skilled female character who isn't afraid to speak her mind. I think this novel could have been broken into two novels rather than be squeezed into one. Not really a climax to the story, as a main antagonist died before meeting any of the main characters and the other main antagonist went paranoid crazy and had eliminated what would have made him a challenge for the main protagonist. He also died off screen. There also wasn't a lot of focus on the dinosaurs. They really did not effect the story at all. Still the story was alright, but really is a closed loop story. It is related to the 1632 series as the Nantucket series is related to the Emberverse series.

"Time Spike" by Eric Flint and Marilyn Kosmatka is an SF novel about a maximum-security prison which gets shifted in time. It begins in the Universe left behind by Grantville in Eric Flint's "Ring of Fire" or "Assisti Shards" series of books which begins with " 1632 (Assiti Shards) ."In a sense you could argue that this book bears the same relationship to the "Ring of Fire" series that S.M. Stirling's " Dies the Fire: A Novel of the Change by Stirling, S. M. published by Roc (2005) " series does to his "Nantucket" trilogy which begins with " Island in the Sea of Time ."The similarity is that both Flint and Stirling wrotes stories in which a community from the late 20th century or turn of the millennium was thrown back centuries or millennia in time and had to adapt to and create a new reality: "Dies the Fire" and this book respectively tell you what happens to the world left behind.However, while the same event which in Stirling's Universe threw Nantucket back three millennia also had catastrophic results for the world left behind, in this series the world left behind by Grantville merely grieved for a town they assumed had been destroyed and started to study what might have caused it.There the similarities end. Stirling wrote just three books about Nantucket and has so far published eleven novels in the "Emberverse" series about the world left behind. Flint and his co-authors have so far published well over a dozen "Ring of Fire" novels about the world Grantville creates in the 17th century but just this one about the world left behind. And most of this one is about a second, similar event, in which a prison gets thrown over a hundred million years back in time to the era of the dinosaurs, along with people, flora and fauna from the nineteenth, sixteenth, and seventh centuries and every other time between now and the late Jurassic.The dinosaurs with which the inhabitants of the prison find they are sharing their new environment are scary enough, but they are not nearly as dangerous as some of the people...OK, this was never going to trouble the Hugo or Nebula award judges, but it is a well-written and entertaining story and an amusing way to spend an hour or two if you like this kind of story and can suspend disbelief 1632 (Assiti Shards)Dies the Fire: A Novel of the Change by Stirling, S. M. published by Roc (2005)Island in the Sea of Time

Its OK. Some nice ideas, but I found I just couldn't connect with the characters. Unless you really, really liked the other books in the series, then I cant really recommend it.

I have had many books from this publisher and never had a problem but this book has been falling apart as I have tried to read it with pages just falling out in clumps, very poor quality production.

Good read, just a few of the obvious choices missed, why did the guards not use their vehicles to explore? Enjoyed the plot. Looking forward to book two.

I am a bit of an Eric Flint fan these days. I've read all the 1632 & on wards Ring of Fire books & enjoyed them. Tried the Time Spike sample & thought, 'yes I want to know what happens' & I'm glad I did, a good read:)