 | |
| Editor | Mike Resnick |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Genre | Alternate history,political fiction |
| Publisher | Tor Books |
Publication date | July 1, 1992 |
| Publication place | United States |
| Media type | Print (Paperback) |
| Pages | 398 |
Alternate Kennedys is analternate historyanthology edited byMike Resnick, published in the United States byTor Books. There are 26 stories in the anthology, including Resnick's own "Lady in Waiting". The remaining stories by various authors present scenarios where members of theKennedy family had lives that were different from real life.[1] The anthology was released on July 1, 1992.[2]
| Title | Author | Scenario |
|---|---|---|
| "A Fleeting Wisp of Glory" | Laura Resnick | TheCuban Missile Crisis blows up in 1962, leading toWorld War III and theapocalypse. Several centuries after apocalypse, legends of the twoCamelots become entwined. |
| "In the Stone House" | Barry N. Malzberg | Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. is not killed in action duringWorld War II and is later elected President of the United States in1952. His presidency collapses in 1955 after he firesSecretary of StateJoe McCarthy. |
| "The Kennedy Enterprise" | David Gerrold | In 1929,Joe Kennedy divorces his wifeRose and moves to Hollywood, where he remarries toGloria Swanson and his sons go into the movie business. Later on in his life, Joe's sonJack is a second-rate actor who has appeared in numerous films in the 1940s and the 1950s. However, his roles begin drying up by the time that he reaches his mid 40s. But in 1966, he is cast in what would become his best known role, namely CaptainJack Logan of theU.S.S.Enterprise (NCC-1701) inGene Roddenberry's hugely popularscience fiction television seriesStar Track. |
| "The Best and Brightest" | Kristine Kathryn Rusch | Robert F. Kennedy gets elected president in1964. Later on, ablack reporter faces a personal crisis when he is given evidence that Kennedy ordered anassassination attempt onMartin Luther King Jr. |
| "The 1960 Presidential Campaign, Considered as a World Wrestling Federation Steel Cage Match or Short Count in Chicago" | Jack C. Haldeman II | This story depicts the world affairs of 1960 and theUS presidential election seen through the metaphor ofprofessional wrestling. Referee Chicago Dick (Richard J. Daley) gives the long count to the Trickster (Richard Nixon) and the short count to the Hyannis Kid (John F. Kennedy). |
| "Siren Song" | Susan Schwartz | John F. Kennedy abandons love, peace, and bliss with amermaid to knowingly go back to a life he knows will end with hismurder inDallas. |
| "Them Old Hyannis Blues" | Judith Tarr | In a role reversal world,Elvis Presley is the US President while theKennedy brothers are famous rock singers. MeanwhileMick Jagger is an underground leader andJohn Lennon is theUnited States Secretary of State. Thefront cover of the anthology depicts a stack ofvinyl records with a record showing the Kennedy brothers on top, referencing the story. |
| "Rosemary: Scrambled Eggs on a Blue Plate" | Alan Rodgers andJames D. Macdonald | After she is lobotomized,Rosemary Kennedy has nightmares aboutaliens killing her brothers, replacing JFK with an alien double and lobotomizing her. |
| "The Missing 35th President" | Brian M. Thomsen | In atabloid-style story, future cloners/archaeologists can not findJohn F. Kennedy’s remains. The story also depicts Kennedy's alleged postNovember 22, 1963 activities, such as marryingMarilyn Monroe and becomingEarth’s ambassador to the Galactic Congress. |
| "Freedom" | Barbara Delaplace | WithJoseph P. Kennedy Sr. badgering his children to achieve his agenda,Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. decides death is his only escape from his father. |
| "A Massachusetts Yankee in King Arthur’s Court" | Harry Turtledove | John F. Kennedy is briefly transported back in time to ancientBritain, where he meetsKing Arthur ofCamelot. |
| "President-Elect" | Mark Aronson | Robert F. Kennedy survives hisassassination attempt bySirhan Sirhan. As a result, he adopts a hardanti-crime stance and becomes a member of theRepublican Party. He wins the Republican nomination and selects formerVice PresidentRichard Nixon as his running mate. Meanwhile, Robert's brotherTed wins theDemocratic nomination, resulting in the1968 election becoming a Kennedy vs Kennedy match-up. On election day, Robert defeats his brother. However, President-elect Robert dies in acar accident inChappaquiddick Island, resulting in Vice President-elect Nixon becoming the 37th president of the United States, instead. |
| "No Prisoners" | Pat Cadigan | Robert F. Kennedy decides to become a priest while his sisterEunice enters politics. Nearly three decades later in 1968, former Attorney General and now Senator Eunice Kennedy is faced with the final outcome of her brother'santiwar activism. |
| "Lady in Waiting" | Mike Resnick | Marilyn Monroe does not become an actress and remains under her original name Norma Jeane Mortenson. Years later at her waitress job inWashington, D.C., she gets picked up by President Kennedy for a one-night stand and futilely dreams of becoming theFirst Lady of the United States. |
| "The Inga-Binga Affair" | Michael P. Kube-McDowell | DuringWorld War II, it is revealed thatNavy officerJohn F. Kennedy was having an affair with a suspected femaleNazi spy. Alerted that theFBI is taping his trysts, JFK plots to get out from under hisfather's control. |
| "Bobbygate" | Rick Katze | John F. Kennedy is notassassinated in 1963 and runs for reelection thefollowing year. However, a reporter stumbles onto links between Kennedy's brotherRobert and a break-in at the Republican national headquarters (similar to the real lifeWatergate scandal), leading to Kennedy's fatherJoseph attempting tocover-up the scandal by whatever means necessary, including murder. |
| "Now And in the Hour of Death" | Debra Doyle andJames D. Macdonald | Kathleen Kennedy is not killed in a plane crash in 1948. |
| "Eoghan" | Nancy Kress | A fantasy version of the Kennedy clan. They are magically blessed while they do good. However,John F. Kennedy's refusal to withdraw from theVietnam War results in him gettingassassinated inDallas. |
| "’Til Death Do Us Part" | Charles von Rospach | One night in 1962,Marilyn Monroe is caught sneaking out of theWhite House. She later commits suicide and herghost haunts PresidentJohn F. Kennedy, urging him to find a way to be with her. |
| "Gloria Remembers" | Brian M. Thomsen | Joseph P. Kennedy Sr.signs a pact withSatan in order to have the Kennedy name glorified through his sons. He thinks it will be through their deeds. |
| "Told You So" | Esther M. Friesner | In a world were magic and mythical creatures exist,John F. Kennedy saves the life of aleprechaun and is given the power of making anything true merely by speaking it into reality. Kennedy begins to change the world for the better, but a misstatement inBerlin leads to disastrous effects. |
| "The End of the Summer by the Great Sea" | Ginjer Buchanan | Time travelingaliens do awful things to the Kennedy family. |
| "Prince Pat" | George Alec Effinger | Instead of dying two days after his birth in 1963,Patrick Bouvier Kennedy survives and goes into politics. He later runs for president in2000 as a Democrat with the aid of his numerous cousins, all intent on avoiding 1990s style marketing-politics. In the end, it pays off, and Kennedy defeats incumbent Republican president and formerSecretary of StateJames A. Baker. |
| "The Disorder and Early Sorrow of Edward Moore Kennedy, Homunculus" | Robert Sheckley | Ted Kennedy suffers a nasty fate. |
| "Rosemary’s Brain" | Martha Soukup | Rather than getting theprefrontallobotomy that permanently incapacitated and rendering her unable to speak intelligibly in 1941,Rosemary Kennedy instead receives an experimental operation that turns her into a genius. Afterwards, she discusses her plans for her future with her godfather. |
| "The Winterberry" | Nicholas A. DiChario | John F. Kennedy survivesLee Harvey Oswald’sassassination attempt, but suffers from severebrain-damage as a result and secretly cared for by his brotherTed and their motherRose with only them and doctors knowing about it. |
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