review of
Harry Harrison's A Transatlantic Tunnel, Hurrah!
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE
- November 12, 2021
- read for the 2nd time under a new title & finished on September 28, 2021

This is the 4th Harrison bk I've read & reviewed. The Technicolor Time Machine: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3289373454 ; Tunnel Through The Deeps: Tunnel Through The Deeps ; Planet of No Return: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3367739965 . The 1st & last of those 3 were reviewed in 2020. Tunnel Through The Deeps was reviewed in February, 2014, almost 8 yrs ago. Now, you might notice that that particular bk has a title similar to the one about to be reviewed. As it turns out, despite the different titles, it's the same fucking bk. I didn't remember reading it before. AHA! But there is a difference: the version I just read is 254pp, the version I read almost 8 yrs ago is 174pp. 80pp more in the edition I just read. The font size is smaller in Tunnel Through The Deeps, maybe that's the only difference. The 1st & last paragraphs appear to be the same. SO, it's really the 1st Harrison bk I read, I just reread it. I feel cheated. What the hell, I'll rereview it, maybe that'll produce some interesting comparison material. Wdn't it be 'funny' if my new review were word-for-word identical to the old one? I almost wish that wd happen - but if it did I think I'd get scared. Maybe what I'll do is write a very brief review in wch I don't bother to quote any of the bk. The review will be so brief that it won't really tell the reader much of anything.

This is an alternate history novel in wch the US never came into being b/c Britain won the War of Independence.

It has a character named "Fighting Jack".

It also has time

& a vote

& a flying ship

& a steam car

& 15 hrs

& an Iriquois bar.

There's an ongoing controversy.

Instead of a Cuckoo Clock there's a Jackdaw Clock.

Not to mention a helithopter.

& let's not forget Jules Verne's Around the World in 180 Days.

But what were you saying about an artificial island?

Is presenting a question a technique?

I've always found wire recorders interesting even tho they were technically terrible.

Almost as terrible as ending w/ the Pinkertons. ( )

This would have to be one of the earliest post-Vernes post-Wells steampunk books - basically written before the term was even coined. But it's definitely steampunk, positing an alternate history where the Victorian steam age never ended. Some great 'boy's own' adventure writing here, featuring manly men and derring do. Hurrah, I say! ( )

A Transatlantic Tunnel, Hurrah
Author: Harry Harrison
Publisher: Tor
Published In: New York City, NY
Date: 1972
Pgs: 237

REVIEW MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS

Summary:
The 1970s on a Earth quite different than ours. Here science and engineering is on the verge of a tunnel crossing the Atlantic connecting Britain to the colonial America. This will be the crowning engineering feat of the twentieth century. The most brilliant engineer of the Empire, Augustine Washington, is working on it. His success would go a long way toward erasing the stain brought on the family name two centuries past when one of his family stood against the crown and was hanged as a traitor. The traitor’s name was George.

Genre:
Adventure
Alternate History
Fiction
Multiverse
Science fiction

Why this book:
Harry Harrison caught my eye...then, alternate history reeled me in.

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Favorite Character:
Gus Washington is a good character. Noble. A bit stiff.

Least Favorite Character:
Sir Isambard being a repetitive jackass because his ideas are being superseded.

Favorite Scene:
Fighting Jack getting sucked out through a pressure blowout.

The Nautilus event.

Pacing:
The pace is alright.
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Last Page Sound:
Well...

Author Assessment:
The repetitive piece concerning Sir Isambard is damaging to my enjoyment of this story. I would still read anything with Harry Harrison’s name on it, but this sticking point keeps coming back to me.

Editorial Assessment:
Seems that the editor should have tried to talk Harrison out of the Isambard repetition. I know I’m harping on it.

Knee Jerk Reaction:
instant classic, real classic, real genre classic, really good book, glad I read it, it’s alright, meh!, why did I read this, not as good as I was lead to believe

Disposition of Book:
Westbank Community Library
Austin, TX

Would recommend to:
genre fans ( )

My reactions to reading this novel in 1996. Spoilers follow.

I decided to read this book to see how it influenced Richard Dreyfuss’ and Harry Turtledove’s The Two Georges since Harry Harrison is specifically mentioned in the acknowledgements of the latter novel. This novel is better than that one, and there are enough similarities between Harrison’s alternate universe and that of The Two Georges to show Turtledove’s and Dreyfuss’ debt is great.

Both feature worlds dominated by French and English Empires and lacking united Germanies though Harrison’s novel mentions Russia very little. Both novels feature relatively genial worlds spared our two World Wars; indeed, one of the final scenes in Harrison’s novel is a psychic viewing our world and horrified by what she sees. Both have North Americas with prominent Indian and Irish populations. While both novels feature Iroquois Indians, Harrison’s novel mentions several other Indian tribes in North and South America who seem to have maintained sovereignty or, at least, respect and power. Still, as befitting the pseudo-Victorian tone of this novel, the Irish and Indians are mainly there to be colorful, humorous characters. The Two Georges really only mentions the Iroquois and the Irish but treats their situation (possible cultural death in the Iroquois case and discrimination and appalling labor conditions for the Irish) in a much more realistic manner. Both novels postulate worlds more technologically backwards than ours though Harrison (as befitting the author who put steam powered robots in one of his Stainless Steel Rat novels) creates some delightful variations on current technology – typically large, unique, and underemployed. His hero, Augustine Washington, travels by huge “helithopter”. Large, mechanical computers and their new electronic counterparts are rare and unaccountably referred to as “Brabbage” engines not Babbage engines. Transoceanic flight exists but in large, very ornately decorated airplanes owned by the Cunard line which views them as they once did ocean liners. They prefer to go for quality of passenger and not quantity. Both novels also feature the American Revolution as never (at least successfully) occurring. In Harrison’s novel, unlike The Two Georges, Washington is a reviled traitor.

However, this novel features another turning point. In the year 1212, Crusaders in Spain do not defeat the Moslems at Navas de Tolosa, and the nations of Spain and Portugal never come into being. England discovers the New World and seems to have settled North America much more slowly. Indeed, Washington works on the transcontinental railway when a young engineer though the novel takes place in approximately 1973. Both novel feature a typical humorous aside of alternate history novels – characters alluding to or reading alternate histories describing our world. Thomas Bushell in The Two Georges dismisses an alternate history describing WWII as absurd. Here Harrison alludes to his friend and literary colleague Brian Aldiss. Here he is the Reverend Aldiss who writes “popular scientific romances”. While I normally don’t like fannish allusions to other sf authors, the joke and idea is much more palatable in alternate histories since part of their charm is seeing literary and historical characters in a new light. As befitting Harrison, this novel features many humorous scenes using this element. Another Harrison friend, colleague, and author is mentioned – Kingsley Amis, here Lord Amis, “foreign minister”. The engineer who enthusiastically talks Washington into being the first human to cross the Atlantic via rocket bears the name Clarke, a suspiciously close resemblance to Arthur C. Clarke. Dick Tracy even shows up and economist Keynes is mentioned.

This book is a quick, concise, charming read. Harrison proves he can do the hard science when describing strange Victorian vehicles (I liked the carriages hooked up to electric cars controlled by horse reins.) and, of course, the charming and plausible seeming centerpiece of the novel: the transatlantic tunnel (Though Harrison does a mighty bit of hand waving when explaining how his bridge across the mid-Atlantic fault zone will accommodate mid-ocean spreading). Critic J. J. Pierce called this sort of story (he was talking about another novel featuring a transatlantic tunnel), “industrial science fiction”. That’s a good description though there’s action and a bit of intrigue here too. ( )

Harrison's novel is considered one of the founding works of the steampunk genre. It features all of the expected litererary tropes including an alternate history, overly mechanized technology, and a strangely backward looking and forward leaning world civilization.

The hero of this work is Augustus Washington, an engineer and descendant of the disgraced General George Washington who was hung as a traitor during the early failed attempt at American Independance. His skills put him in charge of the effort to build a monumental undersea railway tunnel from England to the American colonies.

Combining elements such as the Pinkerton Detective Agency, the Brunel family of English engineers, cloak and dagger derring do, and Washington's desire to establish America as it's own country, Harrison writes a tightly plotted thriller.

The copy of the book I obtained was from 1972. The one recurring downside to reading this book was the poor editing used in it's preperation. Normally I'm not one to get stuck on spelling mistakes and the like, but in this copy it was a recurring incident. A shame because it distracted from a very good story. ( )