I enjoyed this anthology, which has a great variety of stories inspired by H.G. Wells' classic "War of the Worlds" story, which was one of my first experiences with science fiction.

I have read several anthologies recently, but this wasn’t my favorite, though, it definitely wasn’t the worst. I decided to give this book a three-star rating, because of the way the book is written.

This is an nice collection of stories, some incorporating other era-related fictional characters, some standalone.

I didn’t enjoy all of the stories but that’s to be expected with different authors. All in all, a good addendum to the original book.

My thanks to Netgalley and Rebellion for the advance copy

2.5 stars

I wish I could say I enjoyed this book - especially with how excited I was to be approved for a copy on NetGalley. I'm still thankful to the publisher for sharing it with me, but reading the book was... a chore.

I loved War of the Worlds - and perhaps that was my mistake - I expected some of the same. But of course, such "spin-offs" can never be the same. It had none of the "horses, buggies and violent aliens" feel - it's more like it's all just regular steampunk. That, and I also tend to never enjoy short stories anyway. So I don't know what I was thinking.

The stories bored me, and I don't entirely know why. Some of them were good. But most of them were a chore to get through. A lot of them felt like something was missing, but of course not all.

And the thing I flat out HATED was how Tesla and Edison both were vilified in the last story. And Tesla was given an embarrassing "evil foreign guy" accent. Ugh. NO.

I thank the publisher for giving me a free copy of the ebook in exchange to my honest review. This has not affected my opinion.

Scarlet Traces: A War of the Worlds Anthology.



A collection of short stories based around War of the Worlds, by H G Wells, and Scarlet Traces an idea from I believe, Ian Eddington.


Based loosely, around war of the worlds. Each author provides their ideas around what they thought might have happened in the years following the failed alien invasion. Be that massive empire gains for the British, due to re-engineering alien weaponry. Fighting wars against the aliens on Mars and Venus. Having Holmes and Watson on the case. Or simply finding T S Elliot and Thomas Edison making cameo appearances. This book has it all.


Each story, at my reading speed took about half an hour. Not too short, to think about skipping. And, not too long, to loose interest.


If your a fan of Wells. This could provide some interest, as to how things could have developed. If your not give it a go. There maybe something there for you.


Rating: 3.8 / 5.0


Status: Completed.

A really good anthology set after the events in war of the worlds i recommend for any sci fi lover

As a long term fan of H G Wells classic, I had high hopes for this anthology and not a little anxiety – what if it wasn’t done right? I needn’t have worried; it was a first class collection of tales. As with all anthologies featuring many different authors, it was a mixture. I discovered new authors whose work I will definitely track down, enjoyed the work of old favourites and saw one or two stories I didn’t personally care for – which is just the way of things. However all the stories were professionally produced and showed understanding of the original source material, which was important to me. I also enjoyed the appearance of a few contemporary and well known figures both fictional and real who showed up. Such easter eggs always find a warm reception with me, nerd that I am. My favourites include Nathan Duck’s Voice for a Generation,Stephen Baxter’s The Massacre of Mankind (which I had read previously), The Menagerie by Emma Beeby and Spitting Blood by Mark Morris. Highly recommend the whole collection.

Scarlet Traces: A War of the Worlds Anthology is a new collection of short fiction based on The War of the Worlds . Edited by Ian Edginton, released 3rd Sept 2019 from Abaddon, it's 325 pages and available in hardcover and ebook formats.

I've been intrigued by The War of the Worlds for decades and have re-visited it regularly since that first reading when I was a youngster, so I was excited to see a collection of shorter fiction set in the timeline of H.G. Wells' classic. This collection, as far as I have been able to find out, is comprised of 12 previously unpublished shorter works, along with an introduction by the editor/curator. The authors are a mixed lot, some previously familiar to me and some were new (to me). One thing I love about anthologies is the potential to find new authors to follow. I tend to read anthologies like chocolate samplers; one story at a time, so this one has taken a while to read.

The stories are varied, there were (as always) some which didn't grab me personally, but all were well written and competently plotted. They were mostly in the 4 star range(ish) with a couple of really standout stories. The first story in the grouping was Going Up the Blue, by Stephen Baxter, a ripping yarn with a gut-punch payoff, and Voice for a Generation by (new, to me) Nathan Duck about the perennial chasm-balancing first generation immigrant kids face, torn between two worlds (in this case literally). These were both very solid stories and I will be keeping an additional eye out in future for these and several of the other authors in this collection.

It's unclear from the publishing info available online, but the eARC I received has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links and references. I hope the ebook release version does also. I've really become enamored of ebooks with interactive formats lately. Presumably that feature has carried through to the final release version.

This is a well curated solid collection of stories in the 3-5 star range. The two above-mentioned were both 5 stars for me.

Four stars on average. It's a diverting read.

*I received an ARC via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Thanks for the free book.*

If you like H.G. Wells' "War of the Worlds", you will like this compilation that is set after the Marsian invasion has taken place. You will meet Sherlock Holmes, T.S. Eliot, Tesla and many more well known personell from literature in addition to new inventions.

I did not enjoy all of the short stories in these compilations. Some were too short, some too long, and others just couldn't surprise me. Then again, the Marsian version of T.S. Eliot's "Wasteland" is superb and blew my mind. I also quite liked the Sherlock Holmes story.

4 Stars!

I like anthologies but I rarely enjoy more than half of the stories they contain. Scarlet Traces is no different - a great theme and concept but the execution vary from story to story. Worth trying anyway.

Even though I rarely re-read books, I decided to read War of the Worlds again before starting Scarlet Traces so that I could truly appreciate this collection of stories. Although I think anyone who is just familiar with the basic premise of War of the Worlds would still get a lot from this anthology.

The stories were quite interesting and varied, you could definitely tell there were different voices contributing to it. It's a fantastic concept- humans being what we are, there's no way we would just set up a war memorial in England and then just move on from the Martian invasion. Of course we would try to reverse engineer these incredible machines! The introduction to the stories pretty much stated the same thing and was a delight to read.

As with any collection, some stories were better than others. Personally I preferred the ones with more of a military theme, but most were fairly engaging. It was so delightful to have stories with familiar characters like TS Eliot and even Sherlock Holmes. At times I was a little lost with a couple of them, which unfortunately can happen with short stories because the author isn't given as much room to set the scene. Overall, though, this was an impressive collection and I really enjoyed it. Anyone who likes a bit of science fiction will get something out of reading this really creative "sequel."

Full review to come on my blog after publication!

SCARLET TRACES: A WAR OF THE WORLDS ANTHOLOGY

SCARLET TRACES: A WAR OF THE WORLDS ANTHOLOGY / EDITOR: IAN EDGINTON / PUBLISHER: REBCA / RELEASE DATE: SEPTEMBER 5TH

Ian Edginton began work on Scarlet Traces as a partially-animated web-serial for the website Cool Beans in 2002 but the collapse of the company saw it re-tooled into more of a traditional comic book story, which was published in the Judge Dredd Megazine. A sequel to War of the Worlds, Edginton and master artist D’Israeli imagined a Britain ten years after the failed Martian invasion, one in which the British have reverse-engineered alien technology to once again rule the waves.

The duo went on to work on an adaptation of the original H.G. Wells novel, seeding it with characters from their earlier work, and have completed a further three serials set in the same universe, with the latest – Home Front – serialised in 2000 AD earlier in 2019.

This latest venture into the world of Wells is a departure; not only is it delivered entirely in prose, but none of the stories are by Edginton or D’Israeli. Instead, Edginton has gathered some of British sci-fi’s heavyweights, along with pals from the comics world and some up and comers in the field of speculative fiction, and let them loose in his story-verse. The stories stretch from the earliest days of the Scarlet Traces timeline to its latter settings, during the great Venusian refugee crisis, and are set on Mars as well as on Earth, and even touch on the effects of Britain’s Martian-powered dominance on other nations.

The book sets out its stall early, with Stephen Baxter and Adam Roberts among the first contributors, but stays strong throughout with pieces by James Lovegrove, Doctor Who novelist Mark Morris, Black Library veteran Jonathan Green, as well as comics’ Emma Beeby, INJ Culbard, and Chris Roberson.

H.G. Wells’ world, and its expanded territory through Scarlet Traces, is a wonderful place to spend some time. With the comic book work produced by Edginton and D’Israeli understandably taking time to produce - the duo work on other stories, alongside their masterpiece - this collection of stories set in that world is a more than adequate stopgap. More than that, it fleshes out the work of Wells and his successors into a full-blooded brand that invites yet more investigation.

As a fan of The War of The Worlds, I was intrigued by the concept of this collection. The cover design grabbed my attention straight away as it’s beautiful. However, I was slightly disappointed in the contents as the number of stories I wasn’t keen on outweighed the ones I found enjoyable. The quality of the writing was strong but the characters and situations didn’t hold my attention.

The stories that caught my interest were The Martian Waste Land by Adam Roberts, Voice for a Generation by Nathan Duck and Wonderful Things by Jonathan Green. I loved the real-life figures that popped up as characters (TS Elliot, Howard Carter & Lord Carnarvon, Thomas Edison & Nikola Tesla) and the fictional ones like Sherlock Holmes to blend the historical with the fantastical throughout the treasury.

I appreciated the different approaches each writer took to the material and their originality, but overall I felt like I was missing something and I never fully connected to the characters in any given story. I had trouble getting into the plots and the general feel they were trying to convey. It’s been years since I read War of the Worlds, and I think I would have connected better with the material if I’d re-read it first.

Fantastic concept, fantastic collection! I really enjoyed this one, front to back. The concept was new to (wish I had thought of it, though). Sure, I've come across sequels to classic works before, and I don't just mean fan fiction. This isn't made-for-TV sequel material - this isn't just WAR OF THE WORLDS 2 as a rehash of the original. This is true what-if territory. What really would happen after WOTW ended? Well, people would start to investigate the dead Martians and the equipment they brought with them. These stories all start from there.

Some are good, some are great, a few fall flat but not too badly. A few pull in Sherlock Holmes or other classic characters (one offers a new twist on Jack the Ripper), and nearly all happen within the first 20 years after the original. There are some missed opportunities, too, like where are the foreign spies trying to get their hands on the Brits' Martian goods?

I would read a sequel to this, and I would read longer works in this vein. How about taking on TIME TIME MACHINE or DR. MOREAU next?

There are many good stories in this book and although I enjoyed reading them all I felt that they became mired in the past a bit too much, it would have been exciting to read a modern day tale as opposed to predominantly quite dated and seemingly old fashioned stories, still worth a read and the inventive adaptations of Martian technology are a joy to read about

Lots and lots of old timey British short stories. Excellent read for those who are into it. Not really my flavor but I did enjoy a few.

The War of the Worlds by HG Wells is a legendary story in the science fiction genre -- we know this much is true. Scarlet Traces collects stories inspired by this classic work. The entries run the gamet, and this was part of the intention behind the gathering of voices in the volume (as we are informed in the book's introduction).

Here we have body horror meets humor with ant-headed investigators, paired alongside poetic approaches and militaristic entries that echo some of Robert Heinlein's work, as well.

Well worth the price of admission and a pleasure to read.