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1632 series

Series overview

As stated in the first Grantville Gazette and on his site, Flint's novel 1632 was an experiment wherein he explores the effect of transporting a mass of people through time — in the case of this series, the small fictional town of Grantville, West Virginia from the United States in the year 2000 to central Germany in the year 1631.

1631-32 occurs in the midst of the Thirty Years' War (1618—1648). The plot situation allows pragmatic American union-oriented political thought to grind against the authoritarian religion-driven societies of an unconsolidated Germany barely out of the Middle Ages. Flint explores examples of suffering due to the petty politics of self-aggrandizement and self-interest on the one hand, and the irreconcilable differences of the schism in Christianity called the Protestant Reformation and the Counter-Reformation on the other. Despite the fact that the shift puts Grantville in May 1631 initially, because of the ongoing war and the primitive transportation networks of the day Grantville's arrival has something of a delayed impact, so the bulk of the book's action takes place in 1632, hence the name.

The series was initially continued with two collaborative works that were more or less written concurrently: 1633 (with best selling novelist David Weber) and an anthology called Ring of Fire (with other established science-fiction writers, including long "deep background" stories by both Weber and Flint).

Overall, the narratives are not oriented on one group of protagonists with a strong lead character, but instead is carried by an ensemble cast — though most books or short stories do have several strong characters who carry the action and plot forward. Flint had intended from the outset that the whole town would be the collective protagonist; a reflection of his philosophy that historic forces are not centered in the main on the actions of one or two key individuals, but on the many small independent actions of the many going about their daily lives and coping as best they can.

By late in 1632, the New United States-led coalition of the Confederated Principalities of Europe had become the arsenal and financier (through Jewish connections of real historical interest) for King Gustavus Adolphus. This leads the scheming Cardinal Richelieu, who'd been previously financing him to spite and weaken the Habsburgs, to turn on the Swedes. Various books from uptime Grantville, especially history books, had found avid readers amongst Europe's ruling elites, changing the plans and strategies of major players of the time.

Richelieu forms a four way alliance, the League of Ostend, to oppose the New United States, Gustavus' expeditionary army, and allied princes of the German states. After the first book, the series begins multiple plot lines or story threads reflecting this independence of action by a multitude of characters. The sequel 1633 spreads the Americans out geographically over Northern Europe. Next, the novel 1634: The Galileo Affair, and the first of the anthologies called the Grantville Gazettes introduced new strong characters. The former begins what is called the South European thread, and some of the stories in the latter and Ring of Fire began the Eastern European thread (Austria-Hungary northwards to Poland).

Co-author of 1633, New York Times best-selling author David Weber is contracted for no less than five books in the series in what is called the Central European or Main thread of the series, but there was a lengthy delay before the two busy authors could synchronize schedules to write that next mainline sequel together, 1634: The Baltic War, released in May 2007.

Without waiting for Weber, other sequels such as 1634: The Ram Rebellion, 1635: The Cannon Law, and the Grantville Gazettes continue in one thread or another with in-depth looks at societal ramifications from technology, religion, and social unrest as Europe deals with the outlandish ideas of Grantville's influential presence, to machinations of Europe's elites trying to maintain their hold on power, or leverage off of Grantville triggered events or knowledge for reasons of self-interest.

Collective collaborative effort

Fans are encouraged to contribute to the series though an online message board known as Baen's Bar. The entire Grantville Gazette and large portions of the Ring of Fire anthology, both of which are considered canonical, are paid, fan-written (albeit edited by Flint) works, and have directly contributed material to the main novels. The author also worked with other established authors to develop new stories and plot lines for further novels which are also published in the two Ring of Fire anthologies.

"Ring of Fire" has several levels of meaning: First it is the eponymous reference to what the town-folk themselves (and the few outside German witnesses) have come to call the observed phenomenon of their time-space juxtaposition. Secondly, it is a disparaging reference to the effects on the population of Germany at large, suffering under the war's environment outside American-controlled territory, used by Mike Stearns addressing a town meeting:

The beginning

1632 is the lead novel in the 1632 series. It is a science fiction (alternate history) novel originally released in November 2000, but atypically, continues to actually increase in quarterly sales, as are most of the sequels. Originally a single stand-alone story, the novel is now the first of an open-ended series with over twenty-six works of all kinds including e-published only works (e-books) of which twelve are standard trade printed books (Three [of eighteen of the bi-monthly Gazettes, and counting] are the printed canonical Grantville Gazettes (I, II, and III, the first of which is almost entirely longer fiction Flint couldn't put in the already lengthy Ring of Fire shared universe collection, the de facto first sequel antedating collaborative work on 1633, and of which two have been best sellers) published in print and an additional rapidly growing number related Grantville Gazettes e-books or e-zines (not in print).

In writing 1632, Flint's web forum "Shadow of Demons" at Baen's Bar was soon taken over by exploratory posts as captivated readers commented on the E-ARC released book, creating a ground swell of interest ("internet Buzz") in the months before its hardcover release. So strong was the response, especially after the release of the printed work, that a new sub-forum 1632 Tech Manual was created for discussions about it in early 2000, for the discussions had also spilled over into Weber's "Bu-ships" tech forum, and Weber joined the bandwagon by suggesting a sequel was in order. In the event, the two co-wrote 1633 and collaborated further on integrating the short fiction (much of it, unsolicited) into the de facto Ring of Fire sequel. It was followed by two other related forums: 1632 Slush and 1632 Comments within the next two years.
The Grantville Gazettes are a series of short stories in the collaborative fiction experiment, which started life as an online serialized magazine with an inconsistent and sporadic publication history. After the death of Jim Baen and with the publication of Grantville Gazette X by Baen Books, the last under contract with Baen, the Gazettes were again reconstituted as a subscription e-zine, now published regularly at six per year (bi-monthly) and paying above standard rates for submissions. They are a "boiler room" powering the collaborative synergy by the people involved with the 1632 Tech Manual and have developed into a repository for new ideas and themes in the series, although most explore the personal experiences of minor characters in the series or examine in depth some aspect (e.g. a multi-part serial explores and details Grantville's impact on public health in general, and the establishment of twin teaching hospitals as a joint project of the University of Jena and Grantville's new hospital, the Lahey Clinic.) In general, the anthologies in the series depict deep background canonical to future tales, but which are not in the main stream "action" of the novels focus. A group of stories have on several occasions produced a new plot thread.

Works in the series

In order of publication (includes e-book releases): 1632, 1633, Ring of Fire, The Grantville Gazette (I), 1634: The Galileo Affair, Grantville Gazette II, Grantville Gazette III, Grantville Gazette IV, Grantville Gazette V, Grantville Gazette VI, Grantville Gazette VII, 1634: The Ram Rebellion, 1635: Cannon Law, 1634: The Baltic War, 1634: The Bavarian Crisis, 1635: The Dreeson Incident
In order of print publication: 1632, 1633, Ring of Fire, The Grantville Gazette (I), 1634: The Galileo Affair, Grantville Gazette II.

1632 plot threads

1632 plot threads refers to the overall story arches or sequences within the 1632 series. Flint has opined he thinks in terms of plot threads in terms of major protagonists. But most web chatter devolves around geographical "spheres of influence", locations, or where protagonists have a general effect. As a series focused on displaying a believable neohistory given the series beginning—of being as realistic as possible given the initial series premises—the two approaches both fail equally in covering all the cases by any strict measure, because the character set who is starring in one thread will almost invariably appear in one or more other story lines as a personal departure point for that characters personal biographical history, or as a supporting role for events depicted in a book mainly covering events in another thread.

"Real history is messy," Flint has written in the foreword to Ring of Fire in explaining why he took the unusual step of opening a universe consisting of a single novel at the time into a shared universe. A champion of the common man, Flint disdains the "Strong Man theory of History", where big figures of heroic scope define events, but instead lays claim throughout the entirety of works in the series, that history is the small actions of common men acting in their own self-interest who in the aggregate determine historical forces and force events and responses from those in power, who might lay some claim to being a giant of history—the statesmen and power brokers who dot the I's and cross the T's and add occasional curlicues to the historic march of events—riding the torrent far more often than leading it in Churchillian or Rooseveltian fashion. That some persons of that mold have existed is not disputed, but that the narrative report that makes up historical reporting tends to overstate their impact and role, is Flints theme.

No matter what approach one takes to classifying a plot sequence in the series—be it geographical or character based—the key element of the series to comprehend is that the events depicted in its now voluminous works are not taking place in a vacuum, but in most cases are concurrent with developments in other parts of the European center.

Main/North-Central and Western European thread

The "Central European thread" or more correctly, the "Central and Southwest Central European thread", is the "main plot thread" of the series. It concerns events in the region from west to east of the Kingdom of England and Kingdom of Scotland, Northern France, the Spanish Netherlands, French Netherlands and the Dutch Republic, and the whole of western Germany eastwards to Brandenburg and the Electorate of Saxony, and southerly to the northern reaches of Bavaria. Bavaria proper, Switzerland, Austria, Bohemia and points easterly and north are properly geographically part of the Eastern European thread.

Novel: 1632 (February 2000)

Novel: 1633 (August 2002) with David Weber

Anthology: Ring of Fire (January 2004)

* includes the "The Wallenstein Gambit" with Mike Spehar which begins the Eastern Europe thread, "In the Navy" by David Weber and other stories antedating 1633 in the neohistory.

Novel: 1634: The Ram Rebellion (April 2006) with Virginia DeMarce, crafted as a collection of related 'key developmental events'. This is structured more as an anthology and includes substantial material from Paula Goodlett and other authors, but classed as a novel by the publishing trade since the stories all come together as having a related overall story arch (theme).

Novel: 1634: The Baltic War (May 2007) with David Weber, the direct main thread novel sequel to 1633.

Novel: 1634: The Bavarian Crisis (October 2007) with Virginia DeMarce

* Chronological sequel to 1632, but continues the Eastern European thread.

Anthology: Ring of Fire II (January 2008)

Novel: 1635 : The Dreeson Incident

South European thread

The "Southern European thread", or "Western South Europe and South Central European thread", or perhaps more appropriately, the "South-central and southwestern European thread" involves characters introduced in the short story "To Dye For" by Mercedes Lackey but the thread plot action proper continued in the second published novel sequel of the series, the best selling 1634: The Galileo Affair and its direct sequel, 1635: The Cannon Law, both co-written by Flint and Andrew Dennis. The main characters are in part, Lackey's The Stone Family, combined with Flint's Sharon Nichols and Larry Mazarre.

Novel: 1634: The Galileo Affair (April 2004) with Andrew Dennis.

Novel: 1635: The Cannon Law (September 2006) sequel to 1634: The Galileo Affair.

Eastern European thread

The Eastern European thread is taken to be east of the East Central European thread, the later of which may be understood as the base line through eastern parts of modern day Germany, Austria, western Hungary. The first fiction written within this thread was the novelette "The Wallenstein Gambit" and the prequel short stories leading up to it, all published in Ring of Fire but subsequent long fiction planned in the setting had to await authors scheduling issues, so the plot begun by Flint and finished in outline took a back seat to southern, western and central European events which both had ready collaborating authors and themes of their own to explore in the neohistory. In June 2006, Paula Goodlett and Gorg Huff wrote the "Butterflies in the Kremlin, Part 1: A Russian Noble", part of the serialized novel Butterflies in the Kremlin.

Novelette: "The Wallenstein Gambit", which continues from two plot-line suggested in "Here Comes Santa Claus" and "A Lineman for the Country" in the same anthology.

Serialized Novel: The Anaconda Project, published in the new format (own website re-organized) Grantville Gazettes in volumes 12 – 15 (2007 – January 2008), the solo-written book authored by Flint is available through webscriptions, and directly continues "The Wallenstein Gambit" and is the first long work in the thread and serves as a prequel to the 1635: Soldier of Bohemia.

Naval thread

David Weber and Eric Flint in 2002 (writing 1633 and Ring of Fire) originally contracted together and with Baen's Books to co-write the five "main series" books. When working on the long delayed 1634: The Baltic War novel and with the prolonged and ongoing demand for the series sequels, and considering the already experienced delays imposed by the difficulty of getting schedules between themselves synchronized (It took three planned "windows-of-opportunity" before one worked in The Baltic War) well enough for the two to have the three to six months or so needed to collaborate successfully, the two decided to alter their original planning and spin off a new thread—one based on the United States of Europe as a naval power.

The Americas thread

Stories in 1632 Slushpile regarding obtaining strategically important materials and some which have reached publication in regard to the Essen Steel Corporation and Essen Chemical are foreshadowing activities (mining Chromium for one) in North America, and others are pursuing latex Rubber in South America. In addition, the three books contracted between Flint and David Weber will in part involve expeditions sent by Gustavus and Mike Stearns to American shores.

Short fiction in the series

When the novel 1632 was written in 1999, it was conceived as an experiment in the literary genre alternate history by Flint, without intentions of writing any immediate sequel. He had in fact, several other years of writing projects planned, which subsequent developments were to delay as late as publication in 2006-2007. Flint—as a relatively new writer at the time, following the popular demand for a sequel elected to invite other established authors in the Baen's stable of writers to share the universe in order to rapidly develop its potential—in this he traded on his experience as an editor. This went on concurrently with a great deal of reader input in what became the 1632 Tech sub-forum on Baen's bar. In this initiative, he became the editor (He was already a Baen editor for the Baen Free Library) and together with fan input on Baen's Bar, and collaboration with established best-selling author David Weber on the first long sequel, 1633, concurrently put together the Ring of Fire anthology to inaugurate the short fiction in the series.

The novel and anthology shaped one another, all filtered through and also shaped by the discussions on Baen's website. This process continues to this day, primarily in the form of The Grantville Gazettes. Initially an experimental e-magazine of fan fiction, the first volume was successful enough to be released as a paperback. Subsequent Gazettes have also been released in print form.

Flint, as editor of all the short fiction, also maintains the series canon (co-ordinated by the Web site) and all copyrights to the alternate history universe per se, and with Flint as the controlling editor, the consequence is semi-pro or professional payment rates aside, Baen doesn't publish anything in the series which is not canonical.

In point of fact, the short fiction in the series frequently provides a more in-depth background and foreshadows larger events that are the meat of the long fiction in the series. The longer works are replete with mentions to events covered in the shorter works, and with characters and the history and events unfolded in such materials. Flint always publishes one of his own stories within the short fiction collections, or in the case of 1634: The Ram Rebellion, considerably more, as it introduces several important background factors that are central to further series developments as the altered history is to unfold to the reader.

The Grantville Gazettes

The Gazettes began as an experimental semi-professional online magazine featuring fan fiction and non-fiction edited by Flint and (eventually) a volunteer editorial board. At the time of Jim Baen's death in the summer of 2006 ten Grantville Gazettes were under contract and they had (with some fits and starts) settled into a new version roughly and irregularly three times a year. Baen's production staff was somewhat over worked by the deadline and the serialized magazine gave way to an E-book release from the sixth volume onward—though this was explained by Flint as primarily being due to Flint's other commitments, such as editing the new science fiction magazine Jim Baen's Universe. Earlier on, he'd explained the production delays in terms of overworked proof readers, executive editors, and so forth. Issues VI through X, after being released as E-books seem likely to not see print, where Jim Baen has been releasing (all but the first) issues some months later as hardcover books, the last he bought has yet to appear. Flint has explained that the market for anthologies is always very soft, no matter the genre, and it seems likely that any new print version from the Gazettes will be a "Best of The Grantville Gazettes".

In the meanwhile, Grantville Gazette X was jointly published as an e-book by Baen, but also as the first foray of "Eric Flint Enterprises" at which looks to be a joint venture of Baen Books and Flint where the new incarnation of the e-zine also pays SFWA rates and maintains a bi-monthly (six per year) publishing schedule. It is modeled very much on the same lines as Jim Baen's Universe, which is edited by Flint.

Beginning in early 2007, the Gazette's publishers added an online web-based edition published quarterly and moved the paper series to an annual "best of" volume. Additionally, the publishers moved to paying full professional rates instead of the semi-pro rates that had been paid. After one year, the Gazette expects to be an SFWA qualifying market.

1632-verse Glossary of Terminology

1632-verse/1632 universe— a way of referring to and clarify the distinction between entities or new time lines in science-fiction, its sub-genre alternate history, and discussions in science involving such esoteric physics as the Many world's hypothesis and Parallel universes in Quantum Mechanics.

Badenburg — A fictional walled town or small city located within five to six miles (10 km) of the locus of Grantville's new home. Citizens of the town were witnesses to the Ring of Fire, and have places in many of the short stories building the societal canvas of the works. For example, some of its people owned lands supplanted by the territory of Grantville within the Ring of Fire. A series of stories in Grantville Gazette III and 1634: The Ram Rebellion explores how the economic and personal effects of such circumstances were worked out and settled between the down-timer and up-timers. Second state in the New US (NUS).

CPoE or CPE, (October 1632—10 October 1633 NTL) — Confederated Principalities of Europe. Formed at the end of 1632 (novel) in the aftermath of the Battle of Grantville, with Gustavus II Adolphus as Captain General of the 'New United States', but not its monarch.

Down-timer* — Any native born in Early Modern Europe.

Emperor of the United States of Europe — see United States of Europe.

Gazettes / Grantville Gazettes—an experimental Online Magazine launched by Baen Books with (See: main article: The Grantville Gazettes)

Grantville — a West Virginia town containing a cast of about 3,500 of the 'collective protagonists exploring the 'what if' theme of what sort of changes might come about in the chaotic history of the Thirty Years' War and the resulting social and political development of Europe (and the world) if such a community of modern rural Americans landed in Europe one fine afternoon. The up-timer Americans possess advanced technology, are experienced at organizing and recruiting as well as walking around with a chip on their shoulders and are limited to the town's small stocks and industrial resource base but showed up with its libraries, industries, electricity, an educated motivated populace, 'can-do' attitudes, a smattering of modern combat knowledge and modern thought patterns in the heart of disorganized, unled, war-torn central Early Modern Europe.

OTL — Our Time Line, or the history of our world sans a Ring of Fire.

NTL — New Time Line, or the history of our world from May 1631 after the Ring of Fire. NTL and OTL are long standing abbreviations with wide acceptance amongst science fiction circles. New Time Line was coined to handle comparison of events in Parallel World discussions.

NUS or "New US", (by late Fall 1631—Fall 1632 NTL) — The New United States located in southern and western Thuringia — a loose collection of territories, towns and free cities lead by its first state, the up-timers (Americans) of Grantville, that Mike Stearns put together in the winter of 1631-32 to oppose the effects of "the wars" raging through Central Europe.

Ring of Fire — the label or name given to the three mile (5 km) in radius spherical space-time bubble caused by the Assiti shard that exchanged part of Thuringia with Grantville, West Virginia. While in the main faint and translucent, at ground level, the sphere appeared as an ephemeral (perhaps 15 seconds) wall of shimmering flames from the outside. Within, those near the edge also perceived something of the flames, but the effect was swamped and overwhelmed by the thunder-like sound blast that shook walls and rattled windows and fixtures like a mini-earthquake and the overwhelming blast of bright white light that was believed by many to be a huge display of sheet-lightning.

The Prince of all Germans, or The Prince of Germany, or just The Prince (perhaps most common) —a popular unofficial title bestowed gratefully and spontaneously by the populace at large in the areas of Germany which have benefited from the advent of the Mike Stearns influence under the NUS, CPoE, and USE governments. The title began to become widespread circa the end of the novel 1633 in the unrest that lead to the USE, is mentioned a few times in The Ram Rebellion and becomes very obvious in the early chapters of The Baltic War.

Up-timer — Any 20th century American from Grantville, WV.

The United States of Europe, (10 October 1633— present NTL); the successor to the Confederated Principalities of Europe, a Monarchial Constitutional Republic the United States of Europe formed at the end of the novel 1633 during a demonstrative outbreak of nationalism triggered by news of the Battle of Wismar circa 9 October and 10th during protracted radio negotiations between Mike Stearns, who was appointed its first Prime Minister, and Gustavus II Adolphus Vasa, who became the new Emperor of the United States of Europe in the agreement.

1632 Tech Manual, Slush and Slush Comments

1632 Tech Manual, 1632 Slush, and 1632 Slush Comments' are each specialized sub-forums of a specific sub-community of the general online community known as Baen's Bar which is a web site focused on the publishers works and forums to let fans interact with writers. The first sub-form, 1632 Tech Manual (from early 2000—generally known just as "1632 Tech") is dedicated to developing the background for collaborative fiction in the first Assiti Shards type fictional universe — 1632 universe or "1632-verse" — that began in the novel 1632 by Eric Flint, and the second two are spin-offs related to the fact that the series generated a lot of solicited fan-fiction, which has become a hallmark of the series, when such is accepted as canon. That process is ongoing at and in part explains the synergy of the series as literally hundreds of well educated people and experienced people have worked together to put together a logical and likely chain of events and societal impacts given the departure point postulated in the initial novel—a town of thirty-five hundred from a blue-collar rural community characteristic of the town where Eric Flint's mother called home.

The later two forums were eventually created and set aside as a submission venue and talk forum about such submitted work for the initial anthology Ring of Fire and the eventual series of serialized e-zines, The Grantville Gazettes all of which resulted from (originally) unsolicited manuscripts plus Flint's decision to make the milieu a Shared universe by inviting in other writers. About that time, Flint was contributing a short story and contracting for a novella to the Honorverse spin-off series "Crown of Slaves" and had become good friends with David Weber, who has opened that sub-series in similar fashion to other writers. Weber expressed an interest in writing within 1632-verse, and that discussion may have given Flint the idea of soliciting manuscripts from other writers on the huge infant canvas. It is certain, he had no plans for a sequel beyond the initial novel.

As the collaborative effort evolved, the Grantville Gazettes — along with 1632 Tech where technical aspects are hammered out and discussed to a surprising thoroughness — became a seed stock of new ideas and developments which give the rich verisimilitude to the background and plotting of the longer fiction in the series. Another distinction (sometimes very indistinct) is that stories in the Gazettes are normally told from the viewpoint of the common resident living through the international repercussions that the influence of Grantville's knowledge has caused on the larger stage. In seeming contradiction, about half the fiction in the Gazettes is merely emotive—amusing, tragic or dramatic, sometimes taking on many aspects of the popular soap opera—which is to say commercially successful and desirably entertaining to its subscribers. Even though those kinds of tales have little importance save as "color" or deep background, they serve to gradually illuminate the society coming into being and are valuable to the reader in illuminating the dissonances between our modern era and the emerging Europe of the fictional neohistory, as well as the practices and life of the Europe in our real history. Quite frequently a character developed in a minor soap opera-ish story will appear elsewhere in the series in a more important role, including as main protagonist anchoring a major work. (e.g. Nowell Murphy and others in about half the book 1634: The Ram Rebellion)

The 1632 Slushpile

"Slushpile" is publishing trade jargon referring to the pile(s) of unsolicited submissions to a periodical. In the "Continuing adventure" of the Grantville Gazettes According to Flint, the unsolicted stories began shaping the background thought in the series milieu, and the magazine "idea" was born whilst he tried to recoup some of the time costs involved in examining the fan-fiction. Also, he judged some of the tales to be professional quality, and indeed, incorporated many of them into about half of Ring of Fire. The flagship novel was written as a stand-alone literary work, an experiment with the new Assiti Shards story premise, and was but one of three such universes planned by Flint in 2000. However, the sensation and interest engendered by the 1632 novel's publication subsequently caused the other works to be delayed while the 1632 series was developed. The other books in the overall Assiti Shard series currently under contract are

Timespike, with Marilyn Kosmatka, published in May 2008."" at ericflint.net (accessed 26 October 2007). "May 2008 will see the publication of TIMESPIKE by Eric and Marilyn Kosmatka, a different branch of the "Assiti Shards" universe."

By Any Other Name, with Sarah Hoyt, first draft completed; Eric Flint scheduled his part of the writing for 2007-2008 in October website announcement.

1776, a solo novel, original name was 1781; production overdue and delayed.

1776 supposes George Washington and Frederick the Great are transposed to ancient Rome's Crisis of the Third Century; By Any Other Name, takes place in several different time frames including a transposition of the Assiti themselves into Elizabethan England; and Timespike involves transpositions of various populations into the unpopulated late Cretaceous era (145-65.5 million years ago).

The "1632 Tech Manual" forum has had a large role in developing the overall series as its discussions revolve around the course of likely events, reactions and developments as the fictional town of 3,000 souls transplanted into the middle of the religious based Thirty Years' War.