Designated Targets: A Novel of the Axis of Time

Overview

It's World War II and the A-bomb is here to stay.The only question: Who's going to drop it first The Battle of Midway takes on a whole new dimension with the sudden appearance of a U.S.-led naval task force from the twenty-first century, the result of a botched military experiment. State-of-the-art warships are scattered across the Pacific, armed to the teeth with the latest instruments of mass destruction.Nuclear warheads, rocket-propelled grenades, AK-47s, computer-guided missiles-all bets are off as the major powers of 1942 scramble to be the first to wield the weapons of tomorrow against their enemies. The whole world now knows of the Allied victory in 1945, and the collapse of communism decades later. But that was the first time around.

Editorial Reviews

In Birmingham's worthy sequel to Weapons of Choice (2004), the world of the 1940s continues to struggle with the ramifications of the Transition: the intrusion into the middle of WWII by a 21st-century naval task force fighting the global war on terror. While the lion's share of the technological windfall falls into the laps of the U.S. and Great Britain, the Axis acquires enough to increase its deadliness exponentially. Furthermore, Hitler and Stalin make an uneasy peace as they unite to prevent both of their respective systems from being consigned to the ash heap of history, freeing German forces for a renewed invasion of England. The time-displaced warriors from 2021 find that their most implacable foe is not Nazi commando Otto Skorzeny but J. Edgar Hoover, furious at being "outed." The author doesn't make the mistake of pitting his protagonists against morons, and he rightly shows how improvements in command and control trump bigger and better guns. Entertaining cameos by Elvis, Marilyn Monroe and John F. Kennedy will delight the geek in all of us. Agent, Russell Galen. (Oct.) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information. -- PUBLISHERS WEEKLY.

Author Information

Bio of John Birmingham

John was born in Ipswich, Queensland, in 1964. In 1994 he published his first book, He Died with a Felafel in his Hand, which became a cult youth book and eventually a bestseller. For his second book, the pulp fiction The Search for Savage Henry, he used the pseudonym Harrison Biscuit. (Out of print, but available from the shop on this website.) This was followed by another shared housing comedy bestseller, and sequel to He Died with a Felafel in his Hand, The Tasmanian Babes Fiasco. John's fourth book, How To Be A Man, written with Dirk Flinthart, appeared in 1998. He Died with a Felafel in his Hand has been turned into a successful play, and is was filmed by Richard Lowenstein (director of Dogs in Space). Felafel was published in Italy in early 1997 and in Britain by HarperCollins in October 1997. It was the Guardian's book of the week and was described by Loaded as "one of the funniest books ever". Leviathan, a history of Sydney, and was published by Random House in October 1999. In November 2002 Duffy and Snellgrove published two pocket-sized guides by John, The Felafel Guide to Sex and The Felafel Guide to Getting Wasted. In September 2004, to coincide with the 10th anniversary of the publication of He Died with a Felafel in His Hand, we will be publishing a comic edition of the book, illustrated by Ryan Vella.

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Additional Info

Imprint

Ballantine Books

Filesize

1.86 MB

Number of Pages

384

eBook ISBN

9780345486066