John Scalzi, Old Man's War

Old Man's War

John Scalzi

Tor, Jan 2005, $23.95, 316 pp.

ISBN: 0765309408

When he turned seventy-five, earthling John Perry visited the grave site of his wife of forty-two years, Kathy, interred in an Arizona cemetery. He reflects how much he misses her, how he hates coming here, and that her last words dealt with finding vanilla as she was making pancakes when she stroked to death. With nothing to keep him here, John abruptly decides to join the Colonial Defense Force struggling to defend or annex other worlds in deadly competition with alien races for control of the few hospitable planets.

As a recruit, John receives standard gear to include a much younger healthier body that is beyond the ability of most non-government citizens to buy except the affluent. Like his brothers and sisters in arms, he bonds with them as they are his family and his hope to survive one skirmish after another, in many cases against superior aliens. As his comrades die and collateral damage devastates the civilian population, John begins questioning the worth of a war that enables a few to economically gain a lot at the cost of others even as he begins to ponder whether he is still human.

Paying homage to Heinlein (Starship Trooper the book not the movie), John Scalzi provides a tense, anti-war, military, science fiction thriller that will leave fans pondering what is war good for. Readers will also wonder about who benefits from scientific advances and military operations and what actually a human is as science changes Homosapiens. The storyline is action-packed once John enlists as the audience get inside his head while he goes from "youthful" awe to experienced cynic. OLD MAN'S WAR is a terrific tale of a belligerent future in space.

Harriet Klausner