S. M. Stirling has been writing alternate history for a long time now, and he handles the genre with ease and panache. This book is no exception; he’s created a perfectly believable world in which Theodore Roosevelt regains the presidency and is in office on the brink of World War I. Roosevelt’s enthusiasms have already shaped much of American culture and institutions, including a flowering of invention and his top-secret spy-and-assassin agency, the Black Chamber. Posing as an agent of the Partido Nacional Revolucionario (the resistance movement bent on freeing Mexico from American domination) Agent Luz O'Malley Aróstegui goes undercover in Europe to infiltrate the mobilizing German forces. The contrafactual history and subsequent changes are perhaps the most interesting aspects of the story, yet all this is but a background for what is essentially a spy thriller featuring a female James Bond. There’s sex (without romance), tension, and page upon page upon page of exciting action.

This raises my central concern about The Black Chamber. Is it a story set in an alternate Europe, as Germany is gearing up for war with chemical weapons? Does it focus on the unfolding differences that arose from Theodore Roosevelt’s re-election? Or is it essentially a spy thriller – and one in which a woman perpetuates the roles of male spy characters in literature – that could just as easily have taken place in the real world?

The writing is strong and the action scenes and step-by-step, tension-laden revelations are skillfully handled. My reservations are two-fold, as above. I had difficulty with those aspects of Luz that mirrored the most offensively sexist characteristics in male-dominated spy thrillers. Her internal monologs felt immature and insecure as well as insensitive. She didn’t seem to have any genuine relationships until Irish revolutionary Ciara Whelan came onstage.

Secondly, I found the long, detailed descriptions of action (such as page after page, step-by-agonizing-step portrayal of Luz climbing a wall) went from interesting to tedious. But the biggest problem was that I didn’t find the story hefty enough for its length. It felt to me like a novella stretched out to a fairly long novel. This is obviously a personal taste issue, and fans of Stirling (of which there are many!) will likely see this as a strength and The Black Chamber as a worthy addition to his bibliography.

The usual disclaimer: I received a review copy of this book, but no one bribed me to say anything about it. Although chocolates might be nice.

S. M. Stirling tosses the reader into an Alternate America where Teddy Roosevelt became President in 1912 and swept the Progressive Republican Party into office. Four years later, Luz O'Malley Arostegui, an undercover operative of the Secret Service's notorious Black Chamber boarded an airship to infiltrate a German plot against America. Luz and an Irish-American lass she picks up along the way manage to uncover the details of the plot, survive a U-Boat voyage and sabotage the plotters get-away in Boston. The reader gets plenty of action, skullduggery, period details and a look at an almost America. The cameo appearances of Hoover, Patton, and Wood just added to the fun of this alternative history tale. And thankfully, the next volume is coming out next year, so read this now and Theater of Spies next year!

"Black Chamber" eBook was published in 2018 and was written by S. M. Stirling (https://smstirling.com). Mr. Stirling has published more than 50 novels. 

I categorize this novel as ‘R’ because it contains scenes of Violence and some Mature Situations. The story is set during the World War I years, though in an alternate timeline. In this world, President Taft dies in office and Teddy Roosevelt becomes president again instead of Wilson. The result is a much more conservative US. A US that is primed to enter World War I against Germany. 

The primary character of the story is Luz O'Malley Aróstegui, a young woman who is a spy for the Black Chamber, an American intelligence organization. She is sent on a secret mission to Europe posing as a Mexican revolutionary who is seeking Germany's assistance. She discovers that the Germans plan a secret attack against American cities to delay them from entering the war. 

Aróstegui must use both her feminine wiles as well as her considerable skill to fool the Germans, obtain the information she has been sent for, and report her findings.  

I thoroughly enjoyed the 13.5 hours I spent reading this 400 page alternate history thriller. The altered timeline is interesting and gives a foundation for some creative stories. I have read many of Mr. Stirling's novels and have found them all very entertaining. The chosen cover art is OK. I give this novel a 4.5 (rounded up to a 5) out of 5.

Further book reviews I have written can be accessed at https://johnpurvis.wordpress.com/blog/.

My book reviews are also published on Goodreads (https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/31181778-john-purvis).

My affection for the alternate history subgenre of speculative fiction is no secret. I’ve always been enamored of the answers to “what if?” questions that these sorts of stories can provide. The idea that one small difference can cause ripples that lead to larger and larger divergences – it makes for fascinating fiction.

S.M. Stirling is one of the foremost practitioners of alternate history; his latest is “Black Chamber,” the first in a series about a World War I that was significantly different than our own, from the enemies being fought and the institutions doing the fighting. It’s a strong introduction, one that hints at the many differences – large and small – between that history and this one.

The year is 1916. Teddy Roosevelt is the President of the United States, having made his way back to the White House after years away. His latest foray into the Oval Office has resulted in some bigger, bolder initiatives – both domestic and international – that are leading toward an America that is much more progressive in some respects, yet considerably more conservative in others.

In this world, rather than wait until WWII for a covert agency (i.e. the OSS/CIA) to spring up, Roosevelt created the Black Chamber, a secret organization devoted to espionage and other unsavory work that the powers that be would prefer to see confined to the shadows.

Luz is an agent of the Black Chamber, highly educated and highly skilled; she’s one of the best they’ve got. Her assignment is to infiltrate the upper echelon of the German effort to wage war on Europe and beyond. Posing as a Mexican revolutionary with an anti-American bent, Luz uses all of her skills to with the confidence of a German agent code-named Imperial Sword; said agent has been in America for reasons that Luz’s superiors would very much like to know.

But when Luz succeeds in gaining the necessary trust and proximity, the plot that is ultimately revealed to her far outstrips anything she could have anticipated. For in the remote mountains of Saxony, a plan is being set in motion to ensure that the United States will be unable to enter the looming conflict – a plan that has potentially horrifying consequences for not just Luz and her contemporaries, but possibly the entire nation. And she has to trust someone … but who?

“Black Chamber” has a lot going for it. There’s a richness of detail with regards to the world building that is quite nice; when it comes to this sort of thing, I tend to lean more toward the “less is more” attitude. That is, I’m not someone who needs exposition dumps – a handful of organically provided moments of specificity beats the hell out of text blocks of authorial hand-holding. Stirling trusts the story and trusts the reader, allowing for a feeling of discovery.

Granted, it only works because of a solid sense of characterization. Luz makes for a fine heroine – smart and capable while also flawed. She serves the foundation of the narrative without ever feeling like she’s invulnerable; despite her status as the main character, she never feels 100 percent safe. That balance is VERY hard to pull off.

And of course, when you’ve got someone who knows how to put together a spy story doing the telling, it’s tough not to be sucked in. It’s tense and propulsive for the most part; there are a couple of stretches where the action lags just a bit, but the narrative rarely loses much steam. You’ve got the requisite sharp turns and surprising developments – it’s just a good espionage yarn.

Granted, there are a few things I would have wanted from “Black Chamber.” I’d have liked a bit more Teddy Roosevelt – the flashes we get certainly whet the appetite. And it gets a little crowded and abrupt in the third act. But those are relatively minor criticisms – it’s definitely a page-turner.

If “Black Chamber” is any indication, we can expect this newest series from S.M. Stirling to offer the same level of historical veracity and adventuresome storytelling that we’ve come to expect. It’s a strong start – one whose continuation I anxiously await.

While I was happy to read an alternative history thriller as a change of pace, reading BLACK CHAMBER felt like a chore to work through with it's extensive detail about almost everything which slowed the plot way down or just confused me at times. I love a good world building effort and this book excels at that but getting into the minutia of every little detail became over whelming at points and parts that I wanted more explanation on were skimmed over leaving me guess as to why characters where doing things and what was going on generally.

Confusion and exhaustion aside, the alternative history aspect of the plot was fun to read. I enjoyed seeing what changes to history were made and the book had an exciting steampunk James Bond feel but with a female as the titular suave spy. I liked Luz though at times she does come off as too perfect, she's a wonderfully vibrant and tough lead character. The other characters were fun too and I enjoyed learning about the various alliances and more about the Black Chamber spy group.

BLACK CHAMBER is a well researched and thought out alternate history thriller set during WWI but I felt like I needed to know a lot more about the real WWI to understand everything that was happening in this alternate history. I enjoyed the thriller part and Luz fighting the bad guys on an airship was awesome. Since this is the first book, there is a lot of set up required so I'm hoping the next book in this series focuses more on the espionage and less on the details of this world and every characters' backgrounds.

Black Chamber by S.M. Stirling
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This started with a bang as Teddy Roosevelt became president a second time as WWI started but then bogged down as the story progressed. The Black Chamber is the spy agency and the main character is Luz O'Malley Aróstegui. She is ruthless and on a mission to discover what the German's have developed in secret. The secret is indeed deadly but in setting the scene and telling the back story the tension left the story in the middle but returned in the end. It will be interesting to see where Stirling will go with this series. This history is set up with the US in grave trouble and the German's close to winning. That makes the Black Chamber more important than ever.

I received a free copy of the book in return for an honest review.

When this book came across my desk for review—I was stoked. I don’t read a ton of alternative history, but this one sounded so so so good that I was eager to read it without question.

I sounded like alternative history mixed with some espionage and sci-fi so how could I pass? I couldn’t!

In 1912, just months before the election, President Taft dies suddenly, and Teddy Roosevelt wastes no time in grabbing power as he wins another term as president. By force of will, he ushers the United States into a new, progressive era with the help of the Black Chamber the mysterious spy organization, watching his back.

Luz O’Malley–a brilliant, deadly, and young Cuban Irish American agent of the Black Chamber–heads to Germany. She’s on a luxury airship swarming with agents of every power on earth, as well as conspirators from the Mexican Revolutionary Party and the sinister underground of the reborn Ku Klux Klan, yet none know her true identity.

Her anonymity will be essential as she strives to gain the secrets of Project Loki, an alarming German plan that Roosevelt fears will drag the U.S. into a world war. To gather this intelligence, Luz will have to deceive the handsome yet ruthless Baron Horst von Duckler. She, along with naive Irish-American Ciara Whelan, has to get this vital information back to the U.S.–or thousands of lives might be lost (summary from Goodreads).

OK so now I remember why I don’t read alternative history. Having a masters in history makes alternative history hard. Like really hard to read. I kept getting confused—-why was this happening? No that’s not what happened, I would scream in my head! I literally kept reminding myself that this was a fictionalized account of history—-essentially it was #fakehistory

Admittedly, it took me a long long long time to read this book mostly because I struggled with my own inner voice telling me that this wasn’t how things happened. I couldn’t just let my mind go and let the story happen.

How much of my own personal bias and struggles got factored into this review? Quite a bit if I am being honest. If I take out my own personal struggles with the historical piece, then I would say that this book was rather unique. I thought that Stirling did a great job writing a creative and memorable story for his readers. The premise of the story itself was really detailed and well thought out. Luz was my favorite character. She wasn’t your typical heroine and I really respected Stirling for creating this different and vibrant character.

This book is described by some readers as a James Bond-ish style novel and I would agree that this book had a lot of similarities with the infamous spy. Sophisticated, action packed and primarily driven by main characters rather than supporting characters. And I would completely agree with this! Stirling puts his energy into the main characters and I loved that.

So where does that leave me? If I was going on my own personal struggles I would say 2 stars but if I am looking at it from an objective perspective—I liked the writing and thought the story was full of creativity and strong characters so I would say based on writing—a 4 star rating. But I had to average them out and settled on 3 stars for this one.

This book is truly aimed at fans of alternative history, if you like that sort of thing then you will probably love this book. If you are me and like history to be more or less the same, then you might want to pass on this one. Though if you don’t have a huge understanding of WWI then you might not even care about alternative history!

Challenge/Book Summary:

Book: Black Chamber (Tales from the Black Chamber #1) by S.M. Stirling

Kindle Edition, 400 pages
Expected publication: July 3rd 2018 by Ace
ASIN B076GP8XJX
Review copy provided by: Publisher/author in exchange for an honest review

This book counts toward: NA

Hosted by: NA
Books for Challenge Completed: NA
Recommendation: 3 out of 5

Genre: Alternative history, WWI, spy novel

Memorable lines/quotes:

A thrilling story that flips history on its head. Stirling has a way of painting a beautiful world. Right up there with some of my favorite world builders like Robert Jordan and Sarah J. Maas. The world is so wonderful that it flows us through the story like a boat on a river. Had a great time reading this book.

Received an advance reader copy in exchange for a fair review.