Marvano

Okay, K asked me to elaborate on why I hate this book, so. Here we go.

There was apparently a point in the distant, fortunately-gone past where all you needed to write science fiction was a good idea. Not a plot. Not characters. Not writing that was remotely competent or dialogue that sounded like human beings might say it or any sort of ability to extrapolate human society or even any understanding of what humans are like. You just had to have a good idea and you could write a classic! The show more Forever War is that classic.

Here is the good idea at the core of this festering waste of words: war is hell, and relativistic war is extremely prolonged hell. Are you amazed? Are you awestruck? Are you stunned with Haldeman's brilliance yet? Well, you better be, my friends, as that is literally ALL HE HAS for you in this book.

The rest of it? Oh my LORD. The hero is -- well, if he had more depth or dimension, I would probably hate him, but as it is, he's just a cardboard cutout of a neckbeard's MMPORG persona. There's a girl. She is technically also a soldier, but obviously she is really just there as window dressing/the object for Our Amazing Hero to moon over. There are future societies, each more ridiculous than the last (my favorite bit of ridiculousness: in the future, tobacco is illegal because it's a waste of farmland, which, fine, but marijuana is distributed free by many governments, because -- I guess it does not require growing?) There's a plot that is barely coherent and a war no one, including the author, gives a single shit about.

And now I must issue a trigger warning; I will spoiler cut this for my friends who need to avoid descriptions of rape. The women in this book are supposed to be equal. They are in the army, they fight on the line, they are Modern Women. But they are ALSO expected to be camp followers. When they arrive at a station inhabited mostly by men, they are required, by law and custom, to have sex with anyone who wants them. Yup! A group of heavily-armed women who are nonetheless subject to culturally enforced rape. And that may be the fantasy of every lonely, pathetic dude incapable of actually interacting with women, but it for sure isn't something I want or accept in my supposedly-equal futures.

So. Just to be sure no one ever feels they have to read this amazingly awful classic, I'm going to spoil absolutely everything of value about this book. Here we go:

War sucks. Don't have one or be in one if you can possibly help it.

The end! And now you never have to read this awful, awful book, you lucky person, you. show less

I thought I'd give this graphic novel and shot even though it's not my usual preferred form of reading. It was interesting and I learned a few things about what happened in the first years after WWII in Europe assuming the story was based on true events. I had trouble following some things and I didn't really love the artwork, but it could be because I'm not to used to reading these kinds of books.

The Forever War is about a soldier, drafted to fight in a war against an alien enemy. Since the war is being fought light years from earth, and since he is shipped out and returned to earth or other bases repeatedly and at relativistic speeds, his subjective time becomes seriously compressed relative to the passage of time on earth. With each return to earth or to a base, he is growingly out of touch with earth culture.

The metaphor is the VietNam War experience for US soldiers in the 60s and show more 70s, and the author, Joe Haldeman, was a VietNam Vet.

So far, so good, and interesting. And I did get into the book -- it was a fast, engaging read. But I don't think, beyond the mere fact of the VietNam metaphor, I am going to be thinking about this book a month from now. Haldeman's character is thin -- I don't feel like I knew him that well -- and, I suspect as a consequence, the disorientations he experiences just weren't that deep or detailed for me.

I understand there is a movie in the making. I'd see the movie, now that I've read the book. A good director might make something more of the book than my experience in reading it (the movie, for me at least, could actually be better than the book!).

The book won numerous awards for science fiction, so maybe others saw something I didn't. show less

It's almost exactly the same book as Starship Troopers, but still good. A rip-roaring read, plus bonus points for considering the effects of relativistic time dilation on interstellar war. Crikey.