The New World Order

This ambitious book attempts to deal with a variety of intriguing issues. As the title suggests, it is set during the English Civil War, but in Jeapes’s alternative history, Royalists and Parliamentarians are threatened with a third force, the invading Holekhor. These descendants of Neanderthals who left Earth for another world some millennia ago are readily able to colonise England, having the advantage both of vastly superior technology and of a connection with the magic of the land – a power which Cromwell perceives as witchcraft. The author therefore has scope for the investigation of issues such as the clash of imperialist and colonised cultures, conflicting technologies, religious fanaticism and divided loyalties. This last is particularly evident in the two protagonists, a Holekhor father and his half-English son. The father is leader of the Holekhor invasion force and both he and his son struggle to decide on which side their loyalties lie.

The book is at its best in the quick changes of action which surround the shifting political and personal alliances of the central characters, but the novel never settles into any focused or perceptive examination of the issues at stake. Straight science-fiction might have allowed a more detailed look at the military and personal dilemmas highlighted by the Holekhor invasion, while an historical novel would have provided ample opportunities to discuss religious fanaticism and conflict of loyalties.

The presentation of Cromwell, Charles II and other fascinating and complex historical characters rarely rises above caricature; the characterisation of Dhon Do and Daniel, the father and son protagonists, relies heavily on authorial assertion rather than convincingly realised psychology. Though the plot is fast-moving, it is also episodic, and the frequent shifts of perspective prevent satisfying narrative development. Too much time is devoted to explaining the background of the story rather than focusing on the action in hand. Jeapes obviously has enthusiasm for his several subjects and can write exciting action pieces, but this novel might have been better as two or three books rather than one.