Thursday, 9 October 2025

Where The Time Patrol Series Was Going

Manse Everard is in every Time Patrol story and is usually the central character.

In "The Year of the Ransom," Everard and Wanda Tamberly meet.

In The Shield Of Time, Everard and Tamberly pursue separate careers in the Time Patrol and begin a relationship at the very end of the novel.

In "Death and the Knight," their relationship is still in place. 

That is it for Wanda Tamberly as written by Poul Anderson. 

There are two more things to be said. First, in "A Slip in Time" by SM Stirling, Everard and Tamberly have married but I still wonder what Anderson might have done with the characters if he had continued the series. Secondly, although "Star of the Sea" was written between The Shield... and "Death...," it is set before Everard meets Tamberly and in fact features his brief relationship with Janne Floris. The series became more and more involved and intricate. Anderson could have written more instalments set earlier and thus have delayed describing later developments with Everard and Tamberly.

We would have liked a much longer Time Patrol series.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Kaor, Paul!

And at least one Time Patrol story where Manse Everard is not seen at all or is even mentioned.

Ad astra! Sean