| have always been trends in popular fiction and | | | | genres. Lovers of time travel fiction can now |
| literature. Trench coated private eyes were all the | | | | choose between traditional 'stuck in the past' |
| rage back in the 1930s and 1940s, and | | | | novels such as Doomsday Book by Connie Willis, |
| confessional pseudo biographies (often fictional), | | | | alternate universe time travel stories written by |
| detailing harrowing childhoods topped the best | | | | S.M. Stirling or John Birmingham, or romance |
| seller lists of the past few years. | | | | novels set between past and present such as the |
| Such trends are just as common in genre fiction | | | | Outlander series by the ever popular Diana |
| as they are in popular fiction. In recent years, the | | | | Gabaldon. |
| most popular fantasy novels are not Tolkien like | | | | These writers now regularly top the best seller |
| tales of knights and their elfish companions, but | | | | lists and line up for science fiction awards, and |
| urban fantasy novels featuring werewolves, | | | | their fans build communities online, in many cases |
| vampires, modern cities, and strong Buffy like | | | | writing new stories set in the same universe. An |
| lead characters. | | | | example of this is Eric Flint's Grantville series, |
| Science Fiction does not escape the popular trend. | | | | where fans are actively encouraged to write new |
| I've always been a fan of time travel stories in | | | | stories about the twentieth century American |
| fiction, but until recent years there was very little | | | | town transported to seventeenth century |
| of it around. Golden Age writers such as Isaac | | | | Germany, with the best stories being published in |
| Asimov and Robert Heinlein ventured into the sub | | | | the Grantville Gazette. |
| genre in their heyday, as did a small number of | | | | Recent examples of the genre include the Island |
| literary authors such as Kurt Vonnegut and | | | | in the Sea of Time trilogy by S.M. Stirling, in which |
| Daphne du Maurier. But it has only been in the | | | | the island of Nantucket is mysteriously |
| past 15 years that time travel fiction has come | | | | transported back in time by three and a half |
| into its own. | | | | thousand years, The Plot to Save Socrates, by |
| H.G.Wells published The Time Machine in 1895, and | | | | Paul Levinson, where two time travelers attempt |
| for the next one hundred years there were | | | | to prevent the death of Socrates, The Anubis |
| fewer than fifty novels published where time | | | | Gates, by Tim Powers, in which a twentieth |
| travel was central to the story. But since 1995, | | | | century academic travels back to nineteenth |
| fifty six new time travel novels have been | | | | century London to do battle with ancient Egyptian |
| written, turning what was once seen as a quirky | | | | sorcerers, and the ever popular and award |
| plot device into an entire sub genre of science | | | | winning The Time Traveler's Wife, by Audrey |
| fiction. | | | | Niffenegger, demonstrating that time travel in |
| Modern writers such as Connie Willis and Eric Flint | | | | fiction is now very much mainstream. |
| have lifted the time travel story to a whole new | | | | There has never been a better time for fans of |
| level, introducing their own sub genres within sub | | | | time travel novels. |