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1634: The Ram Rebellion (Assiti Shards)
by Eric Flint
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Baen (2006-04-25)
ISBN: 1416520600
EAN: 9781416520603
Dewey Decimal #: 813.54
Binding/Media: Hardcover - 512 pages
Edition: 1St Edition
SKU: S366-1087
Condition: Like New
Comments: UNREAD but may have a crease or mark or minor imperfections. In stock - Sent fast from British booksellers.
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Editorial Reviews
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Product Description
The Thirty Years War continues to ravage 17th century Europe, but a new force is gathering power and influence: the Confederated Principalities of Europe, an alliance between Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden, and the West Virginians from the 20th century led by Mike Stearns who were hurled centuries into the past by a mysterious cosmic accident. Inspired by the example of American freedom and justice, a movement in Franconia among the peasants, who have revolted several times even before the arrival from the future of the town of Grantville, an independent revolutionary movement has arisen, flying the banner of the head of a ram. The West Virginians fully approve of liberating the peasants from the nobility, but they are also aware of how revolutionary movements can lead to bloodbaths. And avoiding that deadly possibility will require all of their future knowledge and all their plain old American horse-trading diplomacy. . . .
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Customer Reviews
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1634: The Ram Rebellion
Rating  (3)
Date: 2010-06-20
A good sidebar to the "1632" series of books. Not as exciting, nor engrossing, but fleshes out new characters in the continuing story of those Americans who were caught within The Ring of Fire. Look forward to new releases in this series. I've read four so far.
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Not bad but still far from good
Rating (3)
Date: 2010-05-23
The hard part about writing a review for this book is that it is an anthology followed by the (main) novella. The intention is noble (read the introduction by Eric Flint for details) - to collect the short fan fiction originally destined for the Gazettes into a coherent whole to tell the story from the "common man's" POV.
Interestingly, the anthology authors are quite entertaining (for the most part), especially the Brillo stories =]. Then the novella begins and I had a really really hard time getting through the rest. One problem is an overabundance of characters with detailed histories, neither of which are too relevant to the plot. It's the first book I've ever read where I had to continually keep skipping to the character list at the start of the book (part of the problem was that so many of the characters were thoroughly interchangeable in terms of personality and "voice", despite the detailed histories - as if the author had forgotten to use different templates for different characters). In some parts, it reads like an old ladies' gossip club (with weirdly detailed family histories that I actually started skipping through after the Nth time I encountered one). After reading MANY books by Eric Flint, I feel reasonably confident that it didn't feel like he had written much of the novella part *shrug*.
If you split the anthology and the novella, I would give the anthology 4 stars and the novella 2 stars (figured on an average of 3 =P). I know the Baltic war will be good (Flint and Weber - how could it not?) but I'm apprehensive about the rest of the series - DeMarce features on too many of the later books.
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Far and away the most boring book in the series
Rating  (1)
Date: 2009-12-31
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
I have every single Ring Of Fire book, and in general, the series is among my favorite sci-fi works. Except for this one. This book is not only almost unrelated to the rest of the series internally, it consists of a series of incredibly inane anecdotes about raising sheep and rabbits. Certainly the dullest sci-fi book I own. The ONLY reason to read this one is because it's referenced from later works, in particular 1635 - The Dreeson Incident. You'd think that a character in a sci-fi novel should have a story at least as interesting as a normal person in real life - and this book sure misses that goal. Unless you're really, really keen on reading short children's stories about anthropomorphic rams (the sheep kind), this book is sure to disappoint.
Skip this one - you'll thank me later.
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Stagnent!
Rating  (2)
Date: 2009-11-06
0 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
I love the RoF series. I love the politics, intrigue, planing, and military actions. But this book is borderline horrible! The Ram Rebellion was fun for the first 20 to 30 pages, but then it just got old. Simply felt like bad filler in a worse dinner. How many pages about a dance instructor trying to figure out how to get a dance company up and running? It became a Seinfeld show. A book about 'nothing'. I have read maybe 1000 sci-fi/fantasy books. I can count on one hand how many I have just given up on or skipped through. This is one of them. This is the equivalent of a modern day reality show about little to nothing. Some may like that, some may love that. Good for you. I feel ripped off in time and money.
I wont buy any more written by VD.
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Anthology With a Thread
Rating (3)
Date: 2009-04-05
The Ram Rebellion details the exploits of the citizens of Grantville as they attempt to bring democracy to war-ravaged 17th century Germany. This installment in the Ring of Fire series is told in a series of short stories (written by many authors) from many points of view. In fact, there are too many points of view to make this tale anything beyond lackluster. There are too many "main" characters to focus on and we only really get to know a meager handful of them in any depth. (Despite this, some of the characters are quite interesting). This story would have been much better served had the multitude of authors focused on three or four characters instead of twenty or thirty.
This tale succeeded, however, in one significant way. The primary author, Flint, makes it a point to mention in the preface that history is never made entirely by the "hero", but is lifted up and molded by the ordinary people swirling around the hero. The Ram Rebellion succeeds in highlighting this fact. Yes, there were too many characters to focus on. But those characters are creating history...and we get to read all about it.
Despite this installment of the Ring of Fire's mediocrity, I am looking forward to reading more about the citizenry of Grantville as they struggle to make a new life for themselves in old Germany. I believe it is a story worth continuing.
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