World War II. The great powers were at one another's throats. Armiesclashed across rolling countryside. Air forces sowed death from above.Then, in 1942, everything changed. A new front opened in World WarII—when an alien race attacked the Earth...

In his extraordinary alternate-history epic, Harry Turtledove createdthe acclaimed Worldwar saga. Now, in the Colonization series,what began as war has evolved into decades of epic struggles andrebellions erupting against the invaders known as the Race.

As the 1960s begins, one of the great powers explodes a nuclear strikeagainst the Race's colonization fleet. As she did a generation before,Germany goes to war over Poland, this time against the Race.Retaliation is swift and deadly, leaving much of the Third Reich in ruins. TheUnited States has used its fast-developing military technology to lockthe invaders into a standoff. And in China, the ragtag revolutionaryarmy of Mao Tse-tung—armed with Russian-supplied, German-madeweapons—may prove the Race's most intractable enemy of all.

On Earth, the alien invaders find themselves confronting a far morecomplex and difficult species than any they have encountered before.From the hatred between the Jews and the Deutsche to the irrepressibleinventiveness of human technology, the reptilian invaders realize theyhave met creatures that cannot be tamed. Ultimately, only superiorfirepower may keep Earth under the Empire's control-or may destroy theworld.

Despite its military superiority, the Race still fears itunderestimates its foes. While uprisings and aftershocks of war shake the planet,while the Race's troops are undermined by ginger addiction, one nation plotsa stunning counterattack.

With its sprawling cast of characters, startling plot twists, anduncanny sense of history, Colonization: Aftershocks is anothermarvelous achievement from Harry Turtledove—the author USA Todaycalls "the leading author of alternate history."

In the Worldwar tetralogy, set against the explosive backdrop of World War II, master of alternate history Harry Turtledove wove a saga of world powers locked in conflict against a deadly enemy from the stars.

Now, with Colonization: Second Contact, Turtledove expands his magnificent epic into the volatile 1960s -- when humanity must face its greatest challenge: alien colonization of planet Earth. During the Worldwar, Washington, D.C., Tokyo, and dozens of other cities perished in the radioactive holocaust of nuclear battle. Twenty years later, a fitful peace reigned over the continents. Though Himmler controlled Germany and France, Molotov ruled Russia, and President Earl Warren tenuously governed the United States, the invaders lorded over most of the world -- coexisting in an uneasy balance with humans. As both the alien and human races experience the rampant social turmoil of the sixties, they are fatefully influenced by the tremendous upheavals -- and by each other.

Then amidst this strife comes a new phase of the alien invasion... the arrival of the colonization fleet -- an enemy that seeks to sweep humankind aside on a global scale. The fleet's terrible goal is to colonize and seize control of every man, woman, and child on Earth. Yet as governments feverishly develop weaponry, a terrible truth emerges: This war will be fought not only on the ground but in the vacuum of space.

The United States must summon all its technological genius -- or face destruction.

In 1942 Hitler led the world's most savage military machine. Stalinruled Russia while America was just beginning to show its strength inWorld War II. Then, in Harry Turtledove's brilliantly imagined Worldwarsaga, an alien assault changed everything. Nuclear destruction engulfedmajor cities, and the invaders claimed half the planet before an uneasypeace could be achieved.

A spectacular tale of tyranny and freedom, destruction and hope,Colonization takes us into the tumultuous 1960s, as the reptilian Raceponders its uneasy future. But now a new, even deadlier war threatens.Though the clamoring tribes of Earth play dangerous games of diplomacy,the ultimate power broker will be the Race itself.

The colonists have one option no human can ignore. With a vast, ancient empire already in place, the Race has the power to annihilate every living being on planet Earth.