This Christmas, my boyfriend got Amazon Prime (*not sponsored). We love to watch TV together, so Prime opened up a whole new world of shows. Our first pick has been Man in the High Castle.
It’s based on the Philip K. Dick novel by the same name, which features an alternate history of post-war America where we didn’t win World War II. The eastern part of the country is ruled by the Nazis, while the west side is ruled by the Japanese Empire. The story focuses on a woman who finds a tape showing V-Day in Times Square and a man who is transporting rebel cargo cross-country. There is intrigue and creepy period-details (like a Leave it to Beaver-style family breakfast…where the oldest son is a Nazi youth). It weaves the alternative history details into the story in a way that is deeply unsettling and compelling.
If you enjoyed watching Man in the High Castle, the obvious starting point is the book. I have to confess, I didn’t realize it was based on a book so I haven’t read it yet, but it is the source material for the show.
Next, I would read another alternative history, The Plot Against America. It follows a young Jewish boy in the US when FDR loses re-election the Charles Lindbergh, an anti-Semite and Nazi sympathizer. It has a similar sideways feeling, where there are familiar elements of mid-century America, but horrible differences.
If you’re done with alternative histories, how about an alternative storytelling? Maus is a graphic memoir by Art Spiegelman recounting his adult relationship with his father with flashbacks to his father’s time in Nazi Germany. The twist is that Art and his father are mice and the Nazi’s are cats. It’s an interesting spin on the sub-genre of Holocaust stories and with great art to boot.
Finally, for a nonfiction book. This one isn’t an alternative history or a retelling, but does depict a different past than the one we are often taught in US history. In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larsen tells the story of the US ambassador to Berlin and his family in the 1930s. While Americans are often depicted as almost unaware of the war until Pearl Harbor, these Americans are living in Berlin while Hitler begins his anti-Jewish policies. It shows an uglier side of Americans — one where we value nonconfrontation, disbelief, and appeasement over saving oppressed people. It has a similarly unsettling feeling to an alternative history and provides a counter to the conventional wisdom of American heroics.
ErinKwed 