One of my all-time favourite writers is Russian-American Isaac Asimov, considered one of the best science-fiction writers along with Arthur C. Clarke and Robert A. Heinlein (the Three Great Men of Science-Fiction). I must have read the Trilogy of the Foundation (and its prequels and sequels) a lot of times, as well as a few short story books and other novels I also have here at home.
A very interesting thing about Asimov's writing is that, at least a few of them, have a certain uchronic component that attracts me a lot. This, combined with his genius for the science-fiction writing (and more, as he wrote more than 500 books and has one in every category of the Dewey Decimal System save for Philosophy, and even then he wrote an introduction to a philosophy book) make these stories very entertaining.
The first story I am going to talk about is a short story. In a certain Earth, people have managed to invent a device that is capable to communicate with other Earths (similar to what is used in Infinite Worlds, but more versatile and easier to use) and they use it to, basically, give each family their own Earth, an Earth fully devoid of human life, because there are so many parallel Earths in which either intelligent life never developed or there is not even a breathable atmosphere: the only thing that has to be done is to put an enormouse energy shield around the house, to keep the families protected and the air inside. One of these families complains about strange noises, and when an agent of Earth goes to investigate, he finds out that it is a group of men building large living blocks. After a conversation with them, in which he discovers that the other men come from an Earth where Hitler won World War Two, and who also travel between Earths to establish colonies, but at a larger scale, the Germans leave, accepting that the people from the "original" Earth were the first to be there. However, this is not the end, because they know that, at some point, they could find someone from another Earth that would not be as amiable. The last thing seen is an employee talking about another family seeing some strange red tentacles from their house's windows...
The second story is longer, a huge novel, actually: The End of Eternity. The main character is Andrew Harlan, a man belonging to a society called Eternity, which resides out of the normal space-time and can travel between the 25th and 70,000th centuries. Eternity's role is to maintain humanity's happiness and to reduce the damage it causes to itself by making Reality Changes, avoiding wars and technological advances that can negatively affect humanity (this is why I am including it, because they create alternative histories). Harlan is one of the best Technicians, the ones in charge of making Reality Changes a reality (sorry, sorry, it was a very bad pun) and his life changes when he meets Noys, a non-Eternal young woman who falls in love with him, and whom he smuggles into Eternity when he learns that the next Reality Change will erase her from existence. I will not tell you the full story, as I do not want to spoil the ending, but I can tell you that, at the end, a large Reality Change happens when a letter is written that leads to the first experiments with nuclear fission in the 30s, and, as a consequence, towards the atomic bomb and nuclear energy (in Harlan's "past", nuclear energy was invented at some point after the time travel method used by Eternity was invented), causing the End of Eternity, and, according to some fan theories, leading to the Robots' Trilogy and the Foundation Trilogy.
Finally, a third story in which alternative history is really, really well developed, and with the point of divergence placed very early in time: The Gods Themselves (from Friedrich Schiller's quote Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens, "Against stupidity, the gods themselves fight in vain"), a magnificent novel, very recommended to any fan of science-fiction. Asimov had the idea for this novel when other writer (Robert Silverberg) made up the isotope plutonium-186 in front of him, and when Asimov told Silverberg that, not only did that isotope not exist, but that it could not even happen due to the laws of physics, Silverberg replied "So what?". Asimov decided to find out the conditions under which such an isotope could actually exist, and, after concluding that the laws of physics would have to be very different in the hypothetical parallel universe in which plutonium-186 existed in, he started to work out how that parallel universe would work out, as well as write the novel (including scenes in answer to his editor's demand for aliens and sex: he put aliens, sex and alien sex in there).
The novel begins when a scientist called Frederick Hallam finds out that a tungsten-186 sample he had in a jar has been replaced with something else, and after a companion makes a sarcastic remark, Hallam eventually finds out that it is plutonium-186. After some work, Hallam suggests the change has taken place due to the influence of beings coming from a parallel universe, and he invents a device called "electron pump", that easily exchanges our universe's tungsten-186 with the other universe's plutonium-186, producing great quantities of cheap energy in both sides. A young researcher called Lamont discovers that the plutonium-186 introduced in our world is slowly bringing that universe's physical laws into our universe, creating a situation in which the Sun could turn supernova, but he is ignored due to the power Hallam has over the scientific community and the electron pump's cheap, clean energy.
The second part takes place from the point of view of three natives from the parallel universe, the "soft ones". In here, the strong nuclear force (the one that keeps protons and neutrons together in the nucleus) is stronger, and the differences coming from here and enormous: there are barely a few thousands of existing stars, all of which are consuming themselves rapidly, and in the equivalent to Earth lives a species formed by ethereal that "eat" solar energy, and which has three sexes, Emotional, Rational and Parental: these three sexes "mate" by "melting" and physically merging, with the Rational providing the equivalent to sperm, the Emotional providing the energy needed for reproduction and the Parental bearing and raising the offspring. These beings share a planet with others called "hard ones", who provide leadership for the soft ones, but no one between the soft ones knows where the hard ones come from. An Emotional called Dua discovers the electron pump plan, and also that the Earth's sun's transformation has been planned by the hard ones, as it is the only way the soft and hard ones will survive the approaching death of all stars (the only "food" they are getting in quantity is the energy provided by their end of the electron pump). Dua is opposed to that plan, and tries to communicate with Earth to make them stop the electron pump (messages that appear in the first part of the novel) and to convince others to stop their own side, putting her life in risk, but she is unsuccessful. In the end, Dua discovers that she has a lot more to do with the electron pump than what she thought, and also where the hard ones come from.
It is in the third (and final) part when the conclusion is reached: Denison, the scientist whose sarcastic comment sparked Hallam's discovery, travels to the Moon, where people are unsuccessfully trying to develop their own electron pump. Just like Lamont, Denison knows about the danger the exchange of isotopes between universes has for Earth, and he is trying to work out a way to avoid thee problems in such a way that it will not affect either Earth (who will suffer power problems if the pump is not used, and death if it continues to be used) nor the other universe (whose people will die if the pump is not used). He manages to do it successfully, connecting a second pump to another universe to balance the problems that would cause the supernova, but at the same time Denison must stop a conspiracy that pretends to use the new energy source to move the Moon away from Earth orbit.
If you have the time and find any of the above mentioned books (and, in fact, any of Asimov's books), I recommend you to read them, because they are very interesting (even if, by our own standards, some of their technology looks a bit antiquated) and entertaining.
I hope you have liked this post, and that you will enjoy the one I'm writing next Friday. Cheers!
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