Old Man's War
by John Scalzi
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Book Reviews of Old Man's War
Book Review: Strong Space Opera with Great Characterization
Summary: 4 Stars
I don't have much reading time these days, thanks to two careers and two young kids. The fact that I neglected the work side of things in order to finish this book in two days is a tribute to Scalzi's writing ability.
Old Man's War tells the story of John Perry, a 75-year-old man who enlists in the Colonial Defense Force (CDF). In Scalzi's universe, there's a lot of prime real estate out there for colonization. Unfortunately, there are a lot of alien races fighting to claim it. So the CDF recruits old, experienced men and women, providing them the physical enhancements they need in order to fight for humanity's future among the stars.
A number of folks point to Robert Heinlein as an influence on Old Man's War, and John Perry certainly feels like a Heinlein hero. Older and experienced, very down to earth (no pun intended), surprisingly competent, with little tolerance for stupidity. Perry is a good, likable man, one who still loves his dead wife, and who tries to do the right thing for himself and others.
While the book describes a number of battles, leading up to one climactic fight for a piece of alien technology, the fighting really isn't the core of the story. There's plenty of fun and flash and nifty SF to thrill the kid in me, but at its heart, Old Man's War is a character-driven story. It's about John Perry learning to adapt to his new life as a soldier, and eventually starting to think about life beyond his term in the CDF.
I have to admit, the book strained my suspension of disbelief at times. There are too many instances where John Perry is the best or the smartest or the luckiest soldier in the field. But even as I was muttering, "Yeah, right," under my breath, I kept reading, because the book is simply too much fun to put down.
I'm looking forward to reading the next book in the series, The Ghost Brigades.
Book Review: Old men don't fade away, they just become soldiers
Summary: 5 Stars
The "danger" of reading a new author is that if you like him or her, you'll want to read everything the author has written. For me, that is what happened with John Scalzi. After reading and enjoying The Android's Dream, I went back to get his earlier works. My next book by him was one of his earliest: Old Man's War, and it shows that The Android's Dream was no fluke.
The main character is John Perry, a 75-year-old widower a couple centuries in the future. Knowing his time is limited, he opts to join the military, particularly the Colonial Defense Forces, the army that not only protects all human colonies in the galaxy but also has a monopoly on space travel. Joining the CDF gives Perry a chance for a literally new life: he will be given a new body that is designed to fight.
Old Man's War is divided into three roughly equal parts. In the first part, John joins the CDF and makes some new friends as he's taken to CDF headquarters to officially join and get his new body. In the second part, he goes through basic training and fights his first battles, learning that the odds of surviving his stint are small; there are all sorts of nasty aliens out there, each with their own insidious killing methods. The final part has John learning of the mysterious Ghost Brigades and joining them in a dangerous expedition.
An obvious influence for this book is Robert Heinlein's Starship Troopers, but Scalzi's work is still its own distinct story. Scalzi has a light touch that provides some humor, but he never lets this lightness get out-of-hand; when things get bad, the comic element is pushed to the background. I'm not a huge military science fiction fan, but Scalzi may change my mind about that subgenre: this is an excellent book that shows why Scalzi is one of the great sci-fi writers of his generation.
Book Review: A Hugo worthy book if I ever read one
Summary: 5 Stars
Old Man's War is sci-fi as it's meant to be and Scalzi may be one of the best modern science fictions authors I've read. As the critic praise has commented already, this book reads like Heinlein come again.
John Scalzi's writing style hooked me immidiately. I began empathizing with his main character, John Perry, almost instantly. He writes John (from the first person) in a way that expresses his emotion as well as his sarcasm, making him a very entertaining character. By the time John enlists and joins up in the Colonial Defence Force, he meets other sarcastic characters like himself and the dialogue between them had be laughing out loud on numerous occasions.
In Scalzi's universe, no one can join the CDF until they are 75, as they want experienced and knowlegable human beings rather than young and immature ones. The book follows John and his band of self-designated "Old Farts" as they go to space for the first time, learn how they're going to be made young and battle-ready, head to combat training and then off to war with the numerous alien races who want to halt mankind's expansion into space. Every one of these aspects is very well written and very entertaining. The action scenes are fast-paced and intense and the scientific implications such as the Skip Drive are fascinating.
For me this book invoked nearly every emotion, from laughter to excitement to sadness. There may have been a couple of parts that I found a little hard to swallow (actually, the inch-tall alien race is the only one I can think of), but nothing worth dwelling over. If you liked Heinlien's Starship Troopers, you may like this even more. All respect to the classic sci-fi writer, but this book is more entertaining in almost every way. Read it and enjoy. I'm on to read Ghost Brigades.
Book Review: Excellent book, but I'm not a fan of Bruce Willis
Summary: 5 Stars
The book is excellent. It is extremely well written. John Scalzi is definitely a very talented writer. I gave it 5-stars so I definitely think it's a great story. I wll not go into the details of the book; that's already been done in other reviews.
But I will talk about a few things that I did not like about it:
1. Too much unnecessary sex. When the recruits get their new bodies, they go at it with reckless abandon all over the place. It's a rated R book. I don't like it; I'm a bit of a prude.
2. The main character, John Perry, remindes me of Bruce Willis from the "Diehard" movies. He is has a great since of humor, is is an outstanding soldier with no weaknesses on the battlefield. He is also the luckiest soldier in the universe. I mean extremely lucky. Everything he does is legendary and medal worthy. He is also the most well balanced soldier, mentally, socially, and emotionally, in the book. He is extremely sarcastic and humorous and even self deprecating. He does not know everything but his friends give him all the information that he needs. Imagine Bruce Willis in the Diehard series. Bruce is a regular NY cop who takes on international terrorists, says "Yippee-Kaya" all the time, and finds himself getting out of one tight spot after another through luck and un trained skills. Bruce's character is also the guy who is grounded and in love with his wife and family. And Bruce's sarcasm makes you laugh throughout the movie. That is John Perry throughout this book.
The thing is, I don't like superheroes very much, and I could only handle the first Diehard movie. After that, the act gets old and I refused to watch any other Diehard movies. The same for this character, John Perry. I could not read another book about this character.
Book Review: Great Comfort Reading
Summary: 4 Stars
It isn't going to change the world, or probably enlighten anyone, but this is a great piece of military sci-fi. This is a sort of modern Starship Troopers and the plot closely parallels it from enlistment, to boot camp, to a milk run on a low-tech planet, to humans getting hit, to the human offensive.
The first half of the book is like bottled lightning. Ideas come fast and furious and you can't stop reading. Scalzi's universe provokes the so rare sense of wonder in the reader as they experience the rejuvenation of the soldiers and the giddy joy of having incredibly gifted physical prowess tempered by the danger of a war in which most will die before their 10 year enlistment is up.
The second half slows and is weakened a bit in my opinion by a particularly maudlin plot involving the ghost brigades. The ghost brigades themselves are another wonderful idea the relationship plot detracted from the story for me. I found both the coincidence of the meeting and the follow up to be unlikely.
One plus is that the aliens are truly alien. So different that in some cases there can be no realistic understanding between the two races, though to be fair there are characters with dissenting opinions on whether the human race can negotiate with these other races which range from understandable and allied, to 100% alien and enemy to totally inscrutable with a motivation above and beyond conquest but interested in the spiritual growth of other races.
The climax speeds back up to the fast pace of the beginning and resolves the plot threads, mostly, in a more than satisfactory fashion. This is a really wonderful universe that has been created with room for many more stories. I will definitely be seeking out Scalzi's other titles.