Operation Chaos

Operation Chaos by Poul Anderson, 1971/1999, Orb
Here's another book that I never would have read if I didn't find it for cheap at the St. Louis Book Fair. I don't particularly dislike the writings of Poul Anderson, but I don't particularly like them, either. I have read some of his short stories in the various anthologies that I own, and nothing really struck me as being all that great. Still, the basic premise of a witch married to a werewolf fighting against "The Adversary" (read: Satan) sounded promising, so I figured I'd try it.

Overall, the story was quite entertaining. The setting is an alternate current age where magic re-entered the world around 1900. The story starts with our heroes being involved in a war against some Arab army that has invaded the United States, and goes from there. The author does a great job of actually making the setting totally believable. At first it seemed ridiculous that Chevrolet and Ford would make brooms (like, flying brooms that witches use), but after a while you get used to the concept. I still had a hard time visualizing it all, but it didn't get in the way of the story. The pacing is pretty good, but you can tell that the different parts of the book were written at different times as different shorter stories, as there are significant breaks in time that jar you a little bit out of your suspension of disbelief. You get used to a current situation, and the next thing you know it is 5 years in the future. Never my favorite way of handling