Ring of Fire III [Mass Market Paperback]

The quality of the set of short story collections in this series has varied from book to book. This book, in my opinion, sets the highest standard in quality, standard of writing and enjoyability of any of the collections set in the Ring of Fire universe. Mr. Flint has not only done an excellent job of editing but has provided one of the best ( and longest ) stories in the collection, "Four Days on the Danube". I also especially enjoyed "All God's Children in the Burning East" by Garrett W. Vance which is set in Indochina, Les Ailes du Papillion by Walter Hunt which is set in North America and "Salonica" set in the Ottoman empire by Kim McKay. Since the forward indicates that that these three areas will be playing a prominent role in future books, this is a good sign for the continued viability and reader interest in the whole series; both novels and collections.

Write on, Eric Flint! Write on!

Ring of Fire III (2011) is the third Alternate History anthology in the Assiti Shards series. It contains a novella, nineteen short stories, a map, and a preface by the editor.

The Preface by Eric Flint explains the contents of this anthology and mentions future works.

"Dye Another Day" by Mercedes Lackey tells of a scam pulled on Wallenstein by the uptimers.

"Birds of a Feather" by Charles S. Gannon concerns Irish mercenaries who are facing a change in warfare tactics.

"Falser Messiah" by Tim Roesch is about a young Jew who disagrees with the uptime reports of his role in history.

"Royal Dutch Airlines" by Gorg Huff & Paula Goodlett regards the change of TransEuropean Airlines into a royal enterprise.

"Milton's Choice" by Mark Huston addresses the arrest of John Milton for his writings in the original timeline.

"To End the Evening" by Brad Sinor relates the rescue of a kidnapped Irish Catholic by D'Artagnan and Aramis.

"Cap and Gown" by Jack Carroll discloses the contributions of a dying man to mathematical studies at Cambridge.

"A Relation of the Late Siege" by Panteleimon Roberts reveals tactics and weapons at the Ottoman siege of Iravan.

"Frying Pan" by Anette Pederson depicts the trials of a young Norwegian man in Rostock on the Baltic coast.

"All God's Children in the Burning East" by Garrett W. Vance covers the troubles of Japanese emigres in the Siamese kingdom of Ayutthaya and their move to the Khmer kingdom.

"Do It Once and Do It Again" by Terry Howard explains the development of an oil well in Wietze and the subsequent difficulties of a French agent.

"Les Ailes du Papillon" by Walter Hunt discusses the Butterfly Effect and its influence on the life of a French governor.

"And the Devil Will Drag You Under" by Walt Boyes depicts the downfall of a mercenary and the influence of uptime thinking on his life.

"Salonica" by Kim Mackey recounts the conversion of a Jewish employee of the Ottoman sultan.

"The Sound of Sweet Strings: A Serenade in One Movement" by David Carrico introduces the banjo to European audiences.

"Stone Harvest" by Karen Bergstrahl is about the redevelopment of archaeology in the new timeline.

"An Eye Opener" by Kerryn Offord & Linda Davidson shows the benefits of early detection and treatment of eye disorders.

"Make Mine Macrame" by Virginia DeMarce involves the USE in diplomacy and romance within Tyrol and Saxe-Weimar.

"Upward Mobility" by Charles S. Gannon puts a young "hidden" Jew in the middle of an aircraft development.

"Four Days on the Danube" by Eric Flint is the novella. It describes the Bavarian attack on Ingolstadt. The USE troops have to withdraw from the city and march toward Regensburg. They are pursued by an infantry regiment and a cavalry troop.

This volume contains new tales by eight authors -- besides the editor -- who have previously contributed to these works. Moreover, Virginia DeMarce has also coauthored three works with the editor as well as The Tangled Web. Both Mercedes Lackey and Walter Hunt are scheduled to co-author future works within the main series.

Highly recommended for Ring of Fire fans and for anyone else who enjoys tales of alternate history and cultural mixing. Read and enjoy!

-Arthur W. Jordin

The third RoF anthology was ok but because the universe of the series got too crowded with so many stories and side novels beyond the main storyline which is still excellent,I was left very meh overall by it; not even the usually dependable main author's (Eric Flint) novella contribution impressed me that much - the last 10 pages were very good but a lot of the rest was truly by the numbers prose I felt the author copy/pasted from other works and changed names and a little here and there. None of the rest of the stories stood out either though they were all readable.

The first anthologies had some great stuff that fit with the novels (Wallenstein, siege of Amsterdam etc) but could not be covered at length due to space consideration, here though...

As with the side novels I feel the saturation point has been reached and there simply are not enough interesting stories to tell anymore- or maybe not enough good authors beside Mr. Flint to tell them - since now almost all the angles of the mix between the 21 century Americans and the native 17th century people - tech, social, religion, arts, media, politics, etc - have been explored and what remains is an odd new world where the story crawls at the snails pace of the main plot that only Mr. Flint develops. It is telling that after 100's of stories including the Gazette and tons of novels we are still in 1636 essentially, so all is compressed in 5 years from the 1631 beginning of the original RoF event.

I am pretty sure this new world has tons of good stories and indeed it is fascinating to see what happens, but that is essentially the main storyline of Mr. Flint and as mentioned it is very slow going compared with the huge output of the rest of the writers.

Bring new mainline novels and stories out, cherry pick several side stories and forget about the rest and I think the series would be much stronger for it.

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