What Ifs? of American History: Eminent Historians Imagine What Might Have Been (What If Essays) Paperback – 7 September 2004

Unlike many alternate history publications, this book series contains essays written by trained historians creating fascinating narratives based on logic and facts. Every book in the series has been a great read. The experience was made even better by a seller who delivered the book promptly and at a good price.

... because contrafactual history involves not just one's intellect but one's fantasy as well. Actually it's not Cowley who does all that but altogether 17 historians he persuaded to write the various chapters of his book. Which deal with questions like "Which circumstances might have impeded the main contribution the Mayflower made to the formation of (later) American society; the Maylflower compact"? To "What were some of Nixon's positive plans for American society, which the Watergate cover-up and its outcome managed to foil and condemn to the "maybe" literature.What I like about this particular book is (a) that it covers very interesting moments in American history and examines some intriguing "What If" speculations about them. And (b) that Crowley's approach to the task keeps the overall text full of suspense and maintains the reader's attention this way. By assigning only one such event to each author, and giving him limited space to detail his speculations.Not every author does an equally good job, IMHO, hence only four stars rather than the five many chapters by themselves would have earned.

If I had a pic to add, it would be my nose in this book!! I absolutely love the What-If series, because it puts a spin on history that we NEVER get in school, which stirs the imagination encouraging more exploring of more history.

I have to learn to pay a bit more attention to the alternative history books I get--but sometimes mistakes work out okay.I'm a big fan of the alternative history and have picked up a lot of books over the years. When I spotted this one on Amazon, I liked the specific focus on American history. It's very clear from any study of American history that there were a LOT of times when things could have ended up radically differently with just a small change in outcome.This book is NOT a series of stories based on a particular premise of "if this than that"....this book is a series of essays by historians that examine various possible outcomes of different historical crises points. Each is around 8 - 10 pages in length and while quality of necessity varies due to the wide number of authors for the most part they're quite well written. The essays tend to walk through time beginning with the early settling of North America ("What if the Mayflower Had Never Sailed?" through to relatively recent history ("What if Watergate Were Still just an Upscale Address?).The overall tone is a serious discussion of how things might have been, together at times with the necessary footnote documentation to back up a particular claim. Most of the decision points are familiar to the alternate history crowd (there are the requisite South Wins and No Kennedy Assassination essays) of course, but other focus on some lesser known possibilities (such as Eisenhower going on to Berlin in WW2).I enjoyed this book quite a bit. It wasn't what I thought I was going to get when I ordered it, but I'm glad I did. Recommended for any historian or alternative history buff.

This is an interesting book and a good companion to the other What IF? booksI would have given it another star if not for editing and factual (non-counterfactual) errors:McCullough writes "ships-of-the-time" instead of "ships-of-the-line"and puts Cornwallis' surrender in 1783Fleming's "Northwest Conspiracy" is a little long, and at one point promotes Carringtonfrom Colonel to General, then back to Colonel againWinik puts Richmond's fall on April 13th, not the 3rd.Eisenhower's heart attack was in September 1955, not 1956 (Morgan)Khrushchev banged his shoe on the desk at the UN, not ParisHe also could not have sent condolences to Powers' family afterthe latter died in 1977 because he himself died in 1971.The whole idea that US-Soviet relations would have taken a turnfor the better seems far-fetched with the Eisenhower Adminstrationhaving only 8 months left in office, especially as the author takes painsto stress some personal connection between Eisenhow and Khrushchev (Feifer).A Soviet sub is counterfactually sunk "south of Cuba" in the text,but south of the Bahamian island of Andros on the accompanying mapAnd how can a sub be "55 miles WEST of Virginia Beach"? Or even northwest(up the James River?) (O'Connell)After listing the Watergate burglars as McCord, Liddy, and Hunt, Malkinsays that, other than McCord, "all the other burglars were anti-Castro exiles"Anti-Castro, yes, but not even Hispanic.And, on the subject of Nixon's career without a Watergate scandal (andnone of his other crimes like the Ellsberg break-in coming to light duringhis time in office), what about the effect of Agnew's disgrace and resignation? (Malkin, Stacks)That should have been addressed, in my opinion.