Prior to picking it up, based on my friend's somewhat reserved recommendation, I had doubts what I was getting into with If the Allies Had Fallen: Sixty Alternate Scenarios of World War II. Provided you find yourself in a similar situation this collection of scenarios will quickly break down your delusions of being along those more familiar alternative history fiction lines.

What we have instead is strictly on "what if?" basis backed by some dry analysis and powered by collected expertise of over dozen authors tackling individual scenarios. And their respective sub-scenarios because most get broken down for clarity and precision. Even keeping in mind they summarize for you the gist of things prior to their deviation points it helps immensely if you know your WW2 history or have some familiarity with chronologic order of things. They don't joke around when they start talking about where specific Japanese ships were on relevant days or how changing years when it comes to rocket technology could've affected the outcome of the war, for example. While there are rare few scenarios where authors take broad strokes, such as the very last one - what if Hitler won the war on all fronts and what that could've taken - most scenarios go into minutiae, putting the spotlight on the fact they were written by historians, professors and military men.

Which is really my main problem I can't criticize properly - it's dense as all hell with details and hypotheticals. I found myself easily lost following fictional territory maps tracking army movements. Somewhat less so by dates, but if you lack basic knowledge of the timetables I'd suggest looking things up as you read. Something else I noticed is for all the attention to fine print almost all of the authors were unwilling to actually speculate to any great depth. You get a meticulous 30-page essay ending on what is essentially "nothing of any significance would have changed".

Maybe it's just a fiction fan clamoring for more.