Blackout

Blackout by Connie Willis, 2010 is another intriguing time travel science fiction book.  The premise is that in 2060 historians ply their craft by time traveling back to earlier times to experience history first hand.  Talk about an awesome primary source – being allowed to observe past events in person!!  In Blackout we follow the adventures of several historians who travel back to World War II England.  One travels to a village manor in the country where evacuated children are sent to be safe from the Blitz – the bombing of London.  She is a servant who cares for the children, some of whom are a handful – street urchins ala Dickens.  Another travels to London to observe the Blitz firsthand and to experience life among those who sit out the night in shelters and the underground.  During the day she works as a shop girl in an upscale department store.  A third travels to a small coastal village south of Dover to cover the evacuation of British soldiers from Dunkirk.  Through a series of missteps he ends up traveling on a small, leaky boat across the English Channel on a rescue mission.  He returns safely, but slightly damaged.

In this book Willis gently reveals history from the ground up – history from the eyes of the common folk who lived it -- one of my favorite approaches.  All three of our historians assume roles of ordinary people caught up in the times they are studying.

The stories of these three historians converge as they find themselves trapped in the past with no apparent way home.  To discover the outcome we have to wait for Willis’s next book, All Clear, this October.  Based on Blackout it will be worth the wait…