Having reread Island in the Sea of Time and the 1632 series, an idea occurred to me:
How about one of these "Alien Space Bat" plots with the transported folks from the past coming to the present?
Happily bubbling away in the back of my mind, I picked an event with a controllable number of folks of diverse backgrounds... kind of.
Premise: Alien Space Bats cause a "ring of fire" that transports the RMS Titanic from the night of April 14, 1912, (in its own universe) to the night of April 14, 200x (in a universe where the Titanic sank).
Now, before I can get to the wonderful drama of these early 20th century class-stratified folks adjusting to the "chaotic" modern age, I need to figure out the consequences of the arrival. I'd need to figure out how long the old ship can cruise around without realizing anything's wrong except a "damned strange weather phenomenon last night, wot?" And just what modern ship will encounter Titanic first.
I'd like it to be the Queen Mary 2 on its own transatlantic crossing, but I'd also need to realize how long it would be before the Titanic was picked up on radar, etc, getting the various Coast Guards riled up when it only has a Morse spark-gap "wireless" system or semaphore for communication...
And exactly how the US Coast Guard WOULD react...
If you folks still have the link to that author's resource blog for me to ask such questions, that would be swell.
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''
-- James Nicoll
How about one of these "Alien Space Bat" plots with the transported folks from the past coming to the present?
Happily bubbling away in the back of my mind, I picked an event with a controllable number of folks of diverse backgrounds... kind of.
Premise: Alien Space Bats cause a "ring of fire" that transports the RMS Titanic from the night of April 14, 1912, (in its own universe) to the night of April 14, 200x (in a universe where the Titanic sank).
Now, before I can get to the wonderful drama of these early 20th century class-stratified folks adjusting to the "chaotic" modern age, I need to figure out the consequences of the arrival. I'd need to figure out how long the old ship can cruise around without realizing anything's wrong except a "damned strange weather phenomenon last night, wot?" And just what modern ship will encounter Titanic first.
I'd like it to be the Queen Mary 2 on its own transatlantic crossing, but I'd also need to realize how long it would be before the Titanic was picked up on radar, etc, getting the various Coast Guards riled up when it only has a Morse spark-gap "wireless" system or semaphore for communication...
And exactly how the US Coast Guard WOULD react...
If you folks still have the link to that author's resource blog for me to ask such questions, that would be swell.
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''
-- James Nicoll