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| The Forever War |
This is the weirdest sci fi book I’ve read since Ringworld, and just as unlikable. The idea is fascinating – time travel via space travel, but the execution is deeply flawed. The military stuff bored me to tears but at least I don’t know enough about tactics, strategy, and physics to know if it makes any sense.
You know what doesn’t make any sense, though? The social sciences. We know that the more things change, the more they stay the same, but this author thinks that the more they change, the gayer everyone will get. That’s right, people don’t get more diverse as time marches on, it’s an inevitable march to homosexuality and homogeneity. While the main character is running around in space, fighting completely pointless battles, the people back home are being encouraged and/or forced into homosexuality and sameness of thought, action, and so on. This is the anti-Star Trek view of the future. Embrace diversity nothing, we’re all going to be the same, gosh darn it.
Added to that weird concept (which isn’t a passing fancy by the way, it’s continued for over 1,000 years into the future) there is the extremely problematic issue of sex within the ranks. Women and men are assigned random bed partners and no one gets to say no. If the women don’t want to give it up, that’s just too bad, they shouldn’t have joined the army. Oh, wait, they were drafted.
So, let’s get this straight – the army drafts men and women, force them to have sex with each other, and that’s okay? This isn’t happening 1,000 years in the future, either, this is the near future stuff. This is what this author thought would happen in a co-ed army. All I can say is that I am really glad I don’t live in this guy’s brain. Even one trip via this novel was one trip too many.
I gave this three stars when I finished it, but can’t remember why. It’s barely a two star book.
