1636: The Ottoman Onslaught (21) (Ring of Fire) Hardcover – January 3, 2017

I was extremely happy with this entry in the 1632/Ring of Fire series. It picks up where the Dresden crisis left off, and adds Tom and Rita Simpson back into the main story line again.My only criticisms are that it's a bit predictable at times, and that the build-up lasts significantly longer than the action. This has been a problem in the last few novels (most notably The Cardinal Virtues, set in France), but, here, the characters are by now well-drawn, and it's enjoyable seeing Mike Sterns, Rebecca Abranel, Gretchen Richter and her husband Jeff, Tom & Rita Simpson, Thorsten Engler, and all the rest--just go through their daily lives.More specifically, I should also mention that, like most Ring of Fire books, the book isn't so much a tightly-plotted story as a detailed account of what happened to various characters throughout the year. Personally, I don't mind this, though, since the characters are fun and interesting. The dramatis personae is getting extremely long, though, so a lot of characters are getting left out of the main plot thread or having their roles significantly curtailed: Prince Ulrik, Princess Kristina, Caroline (Thorsten's betrothed), Admiral Simpson & his wife, USEAF head Jesse Woods, secret agent Harry Lefferts, the Roths, the Stones, everyone in Amsterdam and England and Grantville--the list goes on. Hopefully future entries in the series will tell us more about what happened to them.I should also mention that there is currently a significant formatting error in the Kindle edition, which is quite distracting. About half-way through the book, all of the text changes to italics, and stays that way for the remainder of the story. It happens when Tom Simpson is thinking about the sign on a cathedral door, which is block-quoted. This is the main reason my review is 4 stars, in addition to my more spoiler-y criticism below.Minor Spoilers Ahead:My favorite part is when Gretchen Richter invades and captures a portion Poland with the assistance of two Polish spies, who originally had no intention of helping her.My least favorite part concerned Ottoman's the capture of Vienna, which was handled in a very abrupt manner, with surprisingly little reaction from the other characters. I did like the depiction of the POV of the sultan's soldiers, but it often felt like the Ottomans were intentionally depicted more as an alien threat than as fellow down-time human beings--making the Ottoman scenes occasionally take on racist or Islamophobic overtones. Was Sultan Murad really more of an inhuman monster than Tilly, Wallenstein, the Cardinal, etc.? I have no idea, but this depiction just felt a bit off to me. This is the other reason why I couldn't give 5 stars.

I am a huge fan of the Ring of Fire series and have eagerly awaited the arrival of The Ottoman Onslaught. In short, I am well pleased with this volume in what I believe to be the greatest and certainly the most copious body of literature of our new century. Eric Flint has created a literary universe with great detail and more importantly with a very large cast of characters, all of whom are fully realized people and people with whom we want to share our time. In this volume we travel between three frontier areas of the seemingly endless expansion of the United States of Europe. In each area we encounter a clutch of our familiar characters. While the Ottoman Onslaught, the invasion of Austria by Murad IV, provides the main focus of the events in the story we also have the situation in Bavaria to resolve. In a third direction we have another story way out in Silesia dealing with the complex political and military activities there. On the Austrian front Murad shows an unexpected talent for using new technology in unexpected ways in his attempt at completing the long held Ottoman dream of attacking Vienna. Flint introduces us to some new characters, expands some previously introduced characters and lets us into the lives of old friends once again. Not only do we sit in the council rooms of the high and mighty but we also hang out with the likes of beautiful young financier Judy Wendell and teen age spy Minnie Hugelmair, two of my favorite characters. Minnie's gal pal and fellow teen spy Denise Beasley, another strong character, has been assigned to help out in Silesia. We have a whole herd of people active on that front from Polish soldiers to revolutionaries to a raving army of mercenaries. We could separate the parts dealing with Silesia and put them in an entirely different book if we (or if Flint) wanted to. There certainly is enough story there for a stand alone book. At the end of one of the other books Michael Stearns, commander of the Third Division of the USE army, takes an order from Gustav II to hurry on down to Bavaria and overthrow the Duke there. This makes for a third story, also well developed and filled with its own cast of characters, many of whom are old friends. I and the many other fans read these books because of the well rounded and interesting characters. Flint gives them interesting and important things to do, which is a bonus for us. Flint sets up his culmination very well. We have three tales to bring to a conclusion. It is this conclusion that prevents the award of all five possible stars in the Amazon rating. Even with 579 pages to work with the ending of two of the tales seem forced and flat. The main thrust, the struggle with the Ottoman's, is quite properly left hanging at the edge of a cliff. I have not problem with that either as a technique to continue interest in the series or as an end to this particular segment of the grand story. But both the Bavarian story and the Silesian story finish up with an unsatisfying abruptness. I will re-read The Ottoman Onslaught next week to see what I might have missed or skipped over too quickly. I like these stories so much that I customarily read each one several times. The ROF tales are outstanding. Flint is a grand writer and has managed to bring in many other writers to help him expand his vision. Bravo.

First, I liked this entry in the series just as much as all the others that Mr. Flint has written.Before you write the review, you are asked to pick one of a series of canned answers to some questions. The first question was about the plot. The three responses were, Predictable, Some twists and Full of surprises. I chose answer number one because this book was predictably well written. The plot was predictably exciting and through the story we learned more about the characters as they continue to develop, which is also predictable. There were also some twists which I have also come to expect and were, therefore, predictable. Also, while I wouldn't go so far as to say that the plot was Full of surprises, there were some surprises in it, which is predictable for a book written by Mr. Flint.As you can probably surmise, I'm something less than 100% happy with the choices offered in response to that first question. For me though, the thing that qualifies this as a really good book is this. I was sorry when I reached the end. OK, and one other thing. I can't wait for the next one.

This is the 21st book, and one of the better ones, in a series in which a small American town is sent back from around the turn of the millennium to Germany in the middle of the 30 years war. The books in this series are identified with titles which are, or begin with, the 17th century year in which the main action of each book takes place (e.g. 1632, 1633, etc) and it is sometimes known as the "Ring of Fire" or "Assiti Shards" series.The "Ring of Fire" is how the inhabitants of Grantville described the event which brought their town back 370 years in time and a few thousand miles in space. The Assiti were the race whose thoughtless actions, described in the first book as akin to "criminal negligence," caused that event, though we are told in the first novel in the series that no human will ever learn this.Some of the books in this series were just written by Eric Flint but most have one or more co-authors such as David Weber. They differ very greatly in their style and focus, and I gather I am not the only reader who enjoyed some of them very much more than others. There is a group of five novels which I did enjoy and can recommend to others, and from which this story follows on, which can be read in sequence and give you a reasonable overview of the history of the very different seventeenth century which Grantville's arrival in Germany in 1631 creates in the stories.Eric Flint himselves describes these same five books as the "Main line" or spinal cord of the series to date in the afterword to this volume. They are: 1632 (Ring of Fire) 1633 1634: The Baltic War 1635: The Eastern Front (Ring of Fire) 1636: The Saxon Uprising (Ring of Fire Series Book 12) If you read those five in sequence this book, "1636: The Ottoman Onslaught" follows on quite well from "The Saxon Uprising."At the start of this book, although there are two significant wars going on, the "United States of Europe" which was founded by the refugees from tur-of-the-millennium America in alliance with Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden, appears to have successfully surmounted the initial challenges to its existence as a fledgling democracy, internal and external.One area from which, at this time in history, no threat was expected was the Ottoman Empire. In the history we know, the Ottomans had attacked the Austrian Empire in the previous century, and been defeated, and would attack again later in the same century and be defeated again. But the Caliphate has a new, young and dynamic sultan who has read the history books from that other future, and has been motivated to try to change that future. So he assembles a new and very different army from the ones which had attacked Vienna in our history, determined to get a different result. Once again the United States of Europe faces an existential threat - and this time, so does Western civilisation.That threat is not resolved in this book, hence my "cliffhanger ending alert" warning in the title of this review. The first half of this book deals with the "mopping up" from the challenges described in the previous novels, including the final stages of the two medium-sized wars mentioned above. The second half of this book describes the first few major battles of what looks likely to be a much larger war.A fuller list of novels and short story collections in the series, in approximately the reading order suggested by the author, is as follows:1632Ring of Fire16331634: The Baltic War"The Grantville Gazette" story collections1634: The Ram Rebellion1634: The Galileo Affair1634: The Bavarian Crisis1635: A Parcel of RoguesRing of Fire II1635: The Cannon Law1635: The Dreeson Incident1635: The Tangled Web (by Virginia DeMarce)1635: The Papal Stakes1635: The Eastern Front1636: The Saxon UprisingRing of Fire III1636: The Kremlin Games1636: Commander Cantrell in the West Indies1636: The Cardinal Virtues1635: Music and Murder (by David Carrico—this is an e-book edition only)1636: The Devil’s Opera1636: Seas of Fortune (by Iver Cooper)1636: The Barbie Consortium (by Gorg Huff and Paula Goodlett—this is an e-book edition only)1636: The Viennese WaltzRing of Fire IV1636: The Chronicles of Dr. GribbleflotzThis book, "1636: The Ottoman Onslaught"Flint has also written a book called  Time Spike , in which a second time dislocation event hits the 21st century world which Grantville has left behind a few years later. At the time of writing this review the book "The Alexander Inheritance" is shortly due to be published (in July 2017). and in that novel a third "Ring of Fire" type event hits the timeline from which Grantville and the main characters of "Time Spike" had previously disappeared.I did enjoy this book, which has some good humour and some clever ideas. The quality of the historical research and imagination in this series is extremely patchy, excellent in places and rather poor in others. This appears to be one of the better books in that respectFor example, earlier books in the series made out Charles I of England, who admittedly wasn't the most brilliant man who ever lived, out to be a far bigger idiot than he ever was in life, while presenting a view of Oliver Cromwell which depicted him as seen through the most flattering of rose-tinted spectacles.I'm not an expert on dirigible airships or on the history of the Ottoman empire but to the best of my knowledge the research which has gone into constructing "The Ottoman Onslaught" appears to be pretty good, on those subjects and others. There are also a few very sharp political and historical insights in this book. One particular speech about the nature of politics which appears in the early part of this novel (explaining why "There will always be a Conservative faction" in politics which will always be powerful and often dominant) would benefit many students of real-world politics and not a few practitioners.Eric Flint does, however. have a weakness for making those 17th century historical characters who he approves of amazingly successful in adapting to ideas from hundreds of years later, and to make them implausibly prone to behave in accordance with the standards which 21st century readers will approve of.Nevertheless a "fun read" and one which I enjoyed.If you enjoy this story of a modern community sent back many years in time, you might also enjoy S.M. Stirling's Nantucket trilogy in which that island is sent much further back by a similar event. The Nantucket trilogy consists of: Island in the Sea of Time Against the Tide of Years (Nantucket) On the Oceans of Eternity (Nantucket) . 1632 (Ring of Fire)16331634: The Baltic War1635: The Eastern Front (Ring of Fire)1636: The Saxon Uprising (Ring of Fire Series Book 12)Time SpikeIsland in the Sea of TimeAgainst the Tide of Years (Nantucket)On the Oceans of Eternity (Nantucket)

It is good to see at least one of the themes of the 1630 universe working itself out. If you have not followed the series closely some of the in jokes (about characters and their love interest) can be a little wearing. Still the airships are well thought out and amazingly the Turkish terms and names are spot on.So recommended if you are already familiar with this universe but not if this is your first exposure to the 1630's time shifted world created by Eric Flint. Much better than 'the wars on the rhine' which was the last one I read.

Yet another great book in the series, using different authors but same cast of characters. Please keep them coming and we will keep reading them.

Probably the most entertaining series of books in the last decade. I have read over 20 of the novels / short story collections / spin off's and I am eagerly awaiting the next installments.

I got it to read, of course! What else can one use a Kindle file for - I can't even lend it to anyone.I doubt whether anyone who hadn't already worked through most of the preceding volumes would appreciate it much - but I have.