Sorry, even though time travel is my favorite genre, I couldn't even get past the prologue. It's obvious that this is yet another vanity press book in dire need of an editor and proofreader. I've read (started) too many books like that lately to know how this one will end: with me throwing up my hands in frustration that I've wasted so much time trying to make sense of it. Better to quit while I'm ahead. ( )

VanWest The Past, by Kenneth Thomas, is a dystopian scifi novel. In 3000, the battle between the haves and have-nots on Earth has become a divide between genetically enhanced, long-lived Elites and working Citizens.

Our hero, Captain VanWest, is a competitor in the worldwide war games, something between our real Olympics and a dark Hunger Games. If VanWest can succeed here, he'll join the Elites. I enjoyed the references to Roman myth here, and this battle allows readers to see VanWest's character.

Although we quickly come to admire VanWest's strength and discipline, it takes a while to see much of his emotions and internal thoughts. VanWest's challenges take him into the past, where we see his strength and quick-thinking again and again, and he's finally challenged to take a stand between obedience and rebellion. Most importantly, by this point, I cared enough about VanWest to worry about him.

The worldbuilding highlights many familiar problems in our own world, and posits a dystopian outcome to these worries. All of today's worries about climate destruction and social inequality have intensified, creating a dark but believable future. Since the story takes place hundreds of years in the future (well... VanWest timetravels, but the story begins far in the future), spoken English has undergone some changes. The characters in VanWest have their own slang, which adds to the worldbuilding whenever they speak.

Without revealing too much about the ending, I'll just say that a sequel is clearly coming. ( )

Set in the year 3000, Earth has been environmentally devastated. The only habitable land is in Antarctica, which is under the total control of the Universal Council. Captain Vanwest is an Enforcer (sort of like the secret police). A group of anti-tech zealots, called Utopians, wants to get rid of the Council, and stop man's scientific progress, by time travel far into the past. Vanwest is given the task of stopping them.

Vanwest travels to Geneva 1951, to the international meeting which led to the formation of CERN, the European nuclear research agency. He is able to disrupt their plans. Returning to the year 3000, Vanwest falls for the daughter of the founder of the Utopians. The final confrontation happens at Cape Canaveral, Florida in 1998. The Space Shuttle "Endeavor" is about to launch, carrying an important part of what will become the International Space Station. Stopping the ISS from being built, by causing the shuttle to explode in flight, would throw a huge obstacle in the way of man's scientific progress. Is Vanwest successful in stopping the Utopians? Does he return to the year 3000?

This is a very good story that is worth reading. ( )