Alternate Universes are popular concepts in science fiction.
Generally they are used to create settings in which some pivotal historical
event turned out differently, such as the US not entering WWII and Hitler winning,
or Europe intervening in the Civil War so that it’s still going on in a more
modern world.
I was thinking of an alternate world in which fictional
novels were never invented. The population would be generally literate but the
material available for reading would be nonfiction primarily, with some
mythological material. There’d be no tradition of printed fiction. And science
would be just starting to get underway.
Say I got transported to that world. I started thinking
about what I’d do if I wanted to establish a tradition of fiction writing in
this universe. Most of what I have
written is clearly later in our Earth’s tradition. But there are many great
earlier stories in our own tradition that I’ve often wondered how I might
rewrite them if I’d come up with those ideas first. In this alternate universe
none of those ideas would be done, so I’d have my chance. Here’s what I was
imagining last night that I’d write in this alternate world. What do you think?
Which books would you write?
1. War of the Worlds
2. Dracula
3. Frankenstein
4. Wolfman
5. The Invisible Man
6. Journey to the
Center of the Earth
7. Lord of the Flies
8. The Mummy Returns
9. The Living Dead
10. From Earth to the Moon
----
----
