by John Scalzi
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Product Description
John Perry did two things on his 75th birthday. First he visited his wife’s grave. Then he joined the army.
The good news is that humanity finally made it into interstellar space. The bad news is that planets fit to live on are scarce—and alien races willing to fight us for them are common. So: we fight. To defend Earth, and to stake our own claim to planetary real estate. Far from Earth, the war has been going on for decades: brutal, bloody, unyielding.
Earth itself is a backwater. The bulk of humanity’s resources are in the hands of the Colonial Defense Force. Everybody knows that when you reach retirement age, you can join the CDF. They don’t want young people; they want people who carry the knowledge and skills of decades of living. You’ll be taken off Earth and never allowed to return. You’ll serve two years at the front. And if you survive, you’ll be given a generous homestead stake of your own, on one of our hard-won colony planets.
John Perry is taking that deal. He has only the vaguest idea what to expect. Because the actual fight, light-years from home, is far, far harder than he can imagine—and what he will become is far stranger.
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Average Customer Review:
0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
 Aces, 2008-11-19
Just a really good homeworld kinda sci-fi story. Easy techno stuff, great lead character. makes you want to be green.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
Old Man's War, Good Indeed, 2008-11-13
The question you need to ask yourself about this book isn't whether you should read it, it's why haven't you read it yet? Old Man's War is very nearly a perfect Sci-Fi book. Everything is in place, and artfully done.
The book starts out be clubbing you over the head with its incredibly compelling main character, in the best possible sense. John Perry is so relatable, so human, that you might wonder partway into the first chapter whether you've accidentally picked some sort of biography instead of a work of Science Fiction. John doesn't go out of his way to explain gadgetry or how his world is different from yours, he just lives his life, and lets the explanation come naturally.
The universe that John Perry eventually involves himself in is very well thought out, and always intriguing. There are twists and turns, and conventions are constantly thrown out the airlock. I would rather spoil as little as possible, so the short of it is that this is fairly hard Sci-Fi on a galactic scale, with plenty of starships and war. Throughout that, however, there's always a healthy sense of character and the overall universe. The technology is in place to further the story, and not the other way around.
There have been numerous comparisons to the Robert Heinlein, and in my opinion those comparisons are both completely on and completely off. They're on in that Scalzi is incredibly capable at adapting modern-day politics and drama into a more futuristic setting. This makes for not only compelling reading, but something that seems eerily possible. The comparisons are off in that Scalzi doesn't go off into pages and pages of thinly veiled political rants- much more of the book is direct experience, with a lot less space spent on treatises and exposition.
Old Man's War is my favorite Sci-Fi book of the year, and I say that after having just finished works written by both Heinlein and Larry Niven. Scalzi easily equals either of these genre heavyweights. I immediately picked up the two sequels, The Ghost Brigades and The Last Colony after reading this book, and I can assure you that you might as well do that yourself, because you're going to want to finish the whole story arc. There are two spinoff works, The Sagan Diary and Zoe's Tale, that are not critical to the main arc, and that I can't recommend as strongly.
I highly recommend this book to anyone who's at all interested in Sci-Fi.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
Entertaining, fast-paced book, 2008-11-10
This was a highly entertaining and fast-faced look at what war may be like in the future. The history of characters connected me to the individuals and I was upset when they were gone.
I can't wait to read the next book in the series.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
 Uneven but entertaining, 2008-11-02
I gave the story four stars - but only because they don't give you a choice of 3.5 stars, which is where I feel the story is.
The basic story? (no spoilers) Earth recruits senior citizens to fight in its colonial wars. No one on Earth knows what happens when you enlist, because when you do no one ever sees you again. At age 75 the protagonist, Perry, joins and is thrust into the gallactic wars. The book chronicles his tour of duty (part of it, at least).
There are some places where the story is very good and moves along nicely. But in other places it lapses into schmaltz. In general though the story line holds together just fine - and in some places is very funny and - perhaps even thought provoking. However, it's an uneven ride and you often have to deal with dialogue that runs too long, some cheesy melodrama and pasteboard characters (of which there are WAY too many to remember). All in all though it's worth reading. As others point out, it ain't Dune -- but then again, not much is.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
Publisher's Weekly hit it dead on, 2008-11-02
I have just finished reading this after
Variable Star(Spder Robinson collab) and Stranger in A Strange Land, and this definitely felt at home, just from these reviews alone, we put authors like Mr. Scalzi in Heinlein's shadow, I'd like to think of it as in Heinlein's lineage, as he's affected sci-fi readers. All I can say is damn, this book was satisfying.
There is some of the darkest humor/irony in this book and just had to share:
One of the alien species in this book look like deer devastate a human colony and breed babies into Veal (gutwrenchingly disgusting to think of).
Another thing I couldn't stop thinking was the image of hot she-hulks (green superhuman women).
That's enough spoiler from me, read it!
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