No Period

by Harry Turtledove

A man sets out to tell a story of his ex, which in turns becomes a story of the world. If only he could change that story—find the moment where it all began and alter the past. But what if he can't find the beginning—or even the end?

Edited by Patrick Nielsen Hayden

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Alternate History, Science Fiction, Ebooks

15 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 30, 2020

About the author

Dr Harry Norman Turtledove is an American novelist, who has produced a sizeable number of works in several genres including alternate history, historical fiction, fantasy and science fiction.

Harry Turtledove attended UCLA, where he received a Ph.D. in Byzantine history in 1977.

Turtledove has been dubbed "The Master of Alternate History". Within this genre he is known both for creating original scenarios: such as survival of the Byzantine Empire; an alien invasion in the middle of the World War II; and for giving a fresh and original treatment to themes previously dealt with by other authors, such as the victory of the South in the American Civil War; and of Nazi Germany in the Second World War.

His novels have been credited with bringing alternate history into the mainstream. His style of alternate history has a strong military theme.

Reviews

[karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

WELCOME TO DECEMBER PROJECT!!

this explanation/intro will be posted before each day’s short story. scroll down to get to the story-review.

this is the FIFTH year of me doing a short story advent calendar as my december project. for those of you new to me or this endeavor, here’s the skinny: every day in december, i will be reading a short story that is 1) available free somewhere on internet, and 2) listed on goodreads as its own discrete entity. there will be links provided for those of you who like to read (or listen to) short stories for free, and also for those of you who have wildly overestimated how many books you can read in a year and are freaking out about not meeting your 2020 reading-challenge goals. i have been gathering links all year when tasty little tales have popped into my feed, but i will also accept additional suggestions, as long as they meet my aforementioned 1), 2) standards, because i have not compiled as many as usual this year.

IN ADDITION, this may be the last year i do this project since GR has already deleted the pages for several of the stories i've read in previous years without warning, leaving me with a bunch of missing reviews and broken links, which makes me feel shitty. because i don't have a lot of time to waste, i'm not going to bother writing much in the way of reviews for these, in case gr decides to scrap 'em again. 2020 has left me utterly wrung out and i apologize for what's left of me. i am doing my best.

DECEMBER 19: NO PERIOD - HARRY TURTLEDOVE

...make him think i've forgotten that supervolcano trilogy—i have not—but this proustian paragraph of a story—this joycean rivverrun ouroboros—is a successful writing exercise; telling a story 'membering things past—lost love, regret, &yadda—rippling the, "what if we'd done this?/what if we'd done that?" conceit beyond the actions of two mortal lovers, spinning it wider and wider to encompass history's game changers, nature's full stops—with ample dadjoke wordplay on the word 'period' in a story containing none—though it loses cool points, from me, for canceling out the success of pulling off the challenge by gauchely going one step too far with the LOOK AT ME SUCCESSFULLY PULLING OFF THE CHALLENGE of it (meanwhile, the back of my mind chuckles and mutters, "pulling off"); which going one, two steps too far (particularly in the 'humorous' elements), was one of the big dealbreakers for me in t-dove's writing—the cringey corny neverending (riverrun) of ostensible humor; something i haven't encountered in any of the short fiction of his i've dared to read, but was supersaturating those unforgivable, unforgettable supervolcano books, so even though it's not the case here, you can kind of feel his impulse on standby, testing the air with its l'il feelers—and it's relevant, here, to mention—just as it's relevant to wearily acknowledge the inevitable urge reviewers will feel to mirror, in their reviews, the style, the cleverness, the challenge t-dove himself takes on, but i'm here to tell you—i don't want to...

read it for free here

DECEMBER 1: PG - COURTNEY SUMMERS
DECEMBER 2: THE JUMPING MONKEY HILL - CHIMAMANDA NGOZI ADICHIE
DECEMBER 3: ORIGIN STORY - T. KINGFISHER
DECEMBER 4: THE GREAT SILENCE - TED CHIANG
DECEMBER 5: A CLEAN SWEEP WITH ALL THE TRIMMINGS
DECEMBER 6: BORED WORLD - ANDY WEIR
DECEMBER 7: VAMPIRE - ROBERT COOVER
DECEMBER 8: A STATEMENT IN THE CASE - THEODORA GOSS
DECEMBER 9: STET - SARAH GAILEY
DECEMBER 10: MARGOT'S ROOM: EMILY CARROLL
DECEMBER 11: HORROR STORY - CARMEN MARIA MACHADO
DECEMBER 12: TERRAIN - GENEVIEVE VALENTINE
DECEMBER 13: IF AT FIRST YOU DON'T SUCCEED, TRY, TRY AGAIN - ZEN CHO
DECEMBER 14: GHOUL - GEORGE SAUNDERS
DECEMBER 15: DURING THE DANCE - MARK LAWRENCE
DECEMBER 16: CLEARING THE BONES - CELESTE NG
DECEMBER 17: THE WAITER'S WIFE - ZADIE SMITH
DECEMBER 18: DEMOLITION - FIONA MCFARLANE
DECEMBER 20: DON'T LEAVE ME ALONE - GG
DECEMBER 21: RUB-A-DUB-DUB - TONY MILLIONAIRE
DECEMBER 22: HANSA AND GRETYL AND PIECE OF SHIT - REBECCA CURTIS
DECEMBER 23: BRIDESICLE - WILL MCINTOSH
DECEMBER 24: I, CTHULHU, OR, WHAT'S A TENTACLE-FACED THING LIKE ME DOING IN A SUNKEN CITY LIKE THIS (LATITUDE 47° 9' S, LONGITUDE 126° 43' W)? - NEIL GAIMAN
DECEMBER 25: CHRISTMAS TALE - MARK LAWRENCE
DECEMBER 26: THE MONSTERS OF HEAVEN - NATHAN BALLINGRUD
DECEMBER 27: TWO DREAMS ON TRAINS - ELIZABETH BEAR
DECEMBER 28: THE MARTIANS CLAIM CANADA - MARGARET ATWOOD
DECEMBER 29: UNDER THE WAVE - LAUREN GROFF
DECEMBER 30: MR. SALARY - SALLY ROONEY
DECEMBER 31: A/S/L - EMMA CLINE

come to my blog!

[Prabhjot Kaur · Rating 3 out of 5]

so you wonder if the two of you could have been happy when you followed Zeus while she worshiped Wotan, but, of course, religion hadn’t been the problem between the two of you

A man is telling a story about his ex and then he wonders and wanders into the land of what if this happened, what if that didn't happen, what if and what not.

imagine what the world could have been like if some band of early Homo sapiens wandering up out of Africa through the Middle East hadn’t turned left at Anatolia, gone into Europe, and wiped out the Neanderthals they didn’t interbreed with

We have all been there contemplating what if this didn't happen in the history, would I still be here or what of things took a different turn, would that mean different turns for my life too? It was a unique experiment which was impressive and not impressive at the same time. The writer staying true to the title of the story never uses a period in the story.

and you come to the mournful and melancholy conclusion that, regardless of what you do to the world and its past, there is no period, no period at all

3 stars

[chvang · Rating 1 out of 5]

No Period? No s#%t. Harry Turtledove doesn't use a single period. It's all one long rambling run-on stream of consciousness.

No period, but also no plot, no point, and no prraise. Just, no.

[Rebecca Crunden]

and you come to the mournful and melancholy conclusion that, regardless of what you do to the world and its past, there is no period, no period at all, you can change that gives you any real chances of making a go of it with your ex, and that makes yet another Gedankenexperiment, this one dealing with altering the Cambrian Explosion, pretty pointless when you get right down to it,

A stream of consciousness story where a man imagines various different scenarios of how his relationships and life - and the direction of history and wars and evolution - could have gone. No full stops used! I definitely felt a little dizzy by the end, but thought it was a cool way to write a story.

[Badseedgirl · Rating 3 out of 5]

The title says it all about this little stream of consciousness ditty. It can be found at tor.com here.

[Minnie · Rating 5 out of 5]

4,5*

A man sets out to tell a story of his ex, which in turns becomes a story of the world. If only he could change that story—find the moment where it all began and alter the past. But what if he can’t find the beginning—or even the end?

The blurb describes this weird, period-less short story (aka one long sentence) better than anything I could come up with (which is a rare opinion for me to have of blurbs; I never think they to their books justice). In any case, this story is just what it says - our narrator goes on a Proustian dream journey, triggered by a conversation with his daughter, that takes him through the entire history of life on Earth, both human and pre-human, desperately trying to find a scenario in some alternate universe where he and his daughter's mother might have worked out their differences and stayed together.

I haven't read much Proust - who heavily inspired this piece -, but I've seen enough about the madeleine scene to know that it's a pretty good imitation in its own right. Not only do we jump right into the middle of the action, we jump right into the middle of a sentence!

isn’t the way I meant to tell this story (and, as a matter of fact, I don’t think this is exactly the story I intended to tell), but there you are -

And so on and so on. By the way, in case you're wondering, yes, there is indeed not a single period in the whole text - it's all just one long monologue (though not, strictly grammaticaly speaking, one sentence). It made it both challenging and interesting as well as difficult and annoying to read, and it's where the half-star detraction comes from, but since it's deliberate and pretty well-executed I have to stress that the fault lies mostly in my laziness.

The strongest trait was the cynical, educated humour of the narrator; he makes allusions to, and fun of, many different historical periods and political parties, sometimes putting them in a mix that makes us a bit uneasy. It's good-hearted cynicism, though, and it made for a wholesome ending, which is always a good thing in my book.

I highly recommend this, if only to kill the time in a waiting room!

[Rachel · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked the thought experiment and the stream of consciousness with no actual sentence ends (no periods). What I couldn't get over was that the guy was kind of longing for his ex, whom he was married to fairly briefly and didn't get along with, when he was 40 years into a good marriage with kids (even though he acknowledges that near the end, which, there really isn't an end, but). I say that as someone who doesn't long for my ex, and who would hate if my current partner was longing for his ex.

[Jales · Rating 4 out of 5]

Eu amo fluxo de consciência, e mostrada como foi aqui, simplesmente ótimo trabalho. Referências e ligações com relacionamentos. Muito bom mesmo!

[Logann · Rating 5 out of 5]

that was utterly spectacular

[Sam · Rating 4 out of 5]

if you're in a period processing a break up, you need to pick this up, whether you got the short or long end of it and it's a stream-of-consciousness execution

[JasonA · Rating 1 out of 5]

The book is called No Period, so of course, the author writes it with no period. Not a one. The whole thing is just one rambling, stream of conscious paragraph. I normally like Harry Turtledove, but this one just wasn't for me. It feels more like a writing exercise or something written on a bet.

[Anita · Rating 4 out of 5]

A stream-of-consciousness meandering prose—I would almost say prose poem—that gets some points for going on a limb and being a bit daring in format, but it’s a bit too depressing or somewhat sardonic or bitter in tone for my tastes. However, I do think it’s an interesting read for encapsulating a brief love/life history spanning generations in a nutshell, while speculating on a lot of cosmological forgone what-if’s both forwards and backwards in time.

This line is somewhat poignant—“because when you don’t say anything she blames you for refusing to communicate with her, not understanding how there can never be any real communication across generations since you’ve been to a lot of places she’s still on the way to, places you would spare her from if you could but you know you can’t because the only way not to go to those places of sorrow and sickness and tiredness and wearing down and graying and wrinkling and sleeping badly for too many good reasons is to die before you get to them”

One of the parts that’s a bit expansive in terms of breadth:
“so you decide to go deep, to throw a no-shit Hail Mary (not the right choice of words under the circumstances, but whatthehey, whatthehey) far into the past and imagine what the world could have been like if some band of early Homo sapiens wandering up out of Africa through the Middle East hadn’t turned left at Anatolia, gone into Europe, and wiped out the Neanderthals they didn’t interbreed with, instead leaving the continent to their beetling-browed close cousins to use and abuse as they pleased”

[Peter Bradley · Rating 4 out of 5]

No Period by Harry Turtledove.

Please give my Amazon review a helpful vote - https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-re...

Every great writer needs to indulge in a little experimentation.

Or a little prank.

Since this is Harry Turtledove this short story involves alternate history, precisely a meditation on the "what-ifs?" that might have enabled the poor shlub narrator to have had a successful marriage rather than a failure.

The prank is that the story is told as a six-page run-on, stream of consciousness, single sentence.

As a reader, you should be onto the joke in the first page, but there is a nice twist at the end and the narrative is pretty amusing.

This is a party trick, not really a story, but it's not a bad party trick.

It's also about a five-minute read.

[Netanella · Rating 3 out of 5]

Harry Turtledove's is one of the most prominent names in alternate history, especially those 'what if' scenarios that pivot around a turning point in history. What if the Confederacy won the American Civil War? What if the Axis powers won during the Second World War? What if the Huns never went back east. Here, in "No Period," a middle aged man ponders that 'what if' scenarios that could potentially reverse the circumstances of the break up with this ex. It's a fun mental experiment that's pretty thrilling to read, especially for those trained in history.

I am quite pleased to learn in Turtledove's bio that he holds a PhD in Byzantine history!

[Colleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This, for me, was an amusing little story.....all in stream-of-consciousness writing....with, of course, no periods....but I'll use extras (ellipses, commas, etc.) to make up for those he was missing. I could really relate to his inner dialogue about relationships gone wrong and the epic influence that ripples throughout all humankind from the drama of those relationships...You know, the ones that we all have. Just a lovely little diversion and the over-analysis in which my mind has indulged...on, oh, so many occasions.

[Michael · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a strange story. The title made sense fairly quickly once you realised that the story was a single sentence I.e. no full stops as we English say or no periods as the Americans say. 10/10 for originality but, alas, the story did nothing for me. Certainly, not one of Harry Turtledove’s best.

[Cliff Dalton · Rating 5 out of 5]

No Period, Period

a strange story; what is stranger is I was able to follow the whole story and when I began I thought the damn thing wasn't formatted correctly but it was just right for

[Barry · Rating 2 out of 5]

An interesting exercise in creativity, something Harry Turtledove hardly lacks but beyond the cleverness, I didn't find it particularly compelling. Could be a commentary on me rather than the work of course.

[Rob Roy · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you could go back and change history to make a change you want in your life, could you? This is the premise of this short story. What period of history do you make your change in. I will leave the answer to those who read it.

[Serg Koren · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting experiment in form. A bit disorienting to start and get into, but once you figure it out, just go for the ride. Too many “and”s for me. ;)

[Matthew · Rating 4 out of 5]

mostly relatable

[emily · Rating 1 out of 5]

oof, that was not for me. i understand the conceit, but the story wasn't enough to keep me reading through it.

[Mark Moxley-Knapp · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun, unusual read. Sort of free-association thoughts about relationships and history. Hey, it's a short story, give it a shot.

[Nathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a pretty strange one. It was more of a person's reflection on their life rather than a story.

[Anne (w/ an E) · Rating 2 out of 5]

One long run-on sentence without a period, therefore no breaks between thoughts. This made it difficult for me to absorb very much from this 'story'.

[Alison · Rating 2 out of 5]

Gimmick

[Alysa H. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kind of brilliant, but difficult to read unless you really love that stream-of-consciousness style!

[Gladimore · Rating 3 out of 5]

Now I am out of breath. It's like Ulysses all over again, but shorter, so much shorter.

[Marsha Valance · Rating 3 out of 5]

Turtledove offers a writing experiment. NO PERIOD lacks any periods. It is a stream-of-conscious run-on incomplete sentence centered on whether the narrator could preserve his marriage in an alternate dimension. Not a top choice for his readers.

[Katherine · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was pretty good. Felt like a self reflective piece for Turtledove, a guy who has spent his career doing "what if" with history.