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July 06, 2002

The Forever War - Joe Haldeman

Future War Love Story

Private Mandala is enlisted in the war against an alien race who are threatening all of humanity. For training he is sent to a freezing world where he learns to wear a fighting suit, a kind of space suit that he can live in for weeks and fight in any terrain. Training is tough, and many are wounded or killed, and then they are sent into battle. Sex in the army is obligatory and performed on a rota basis, but gradually Mandala becomes attached to Marygay Potter. After the campaign, they return to Earth together, and due to time dilation it's 20 years in their future. They try to adjust to a world where homosexuality is the norm, violence is everywhere, and jobs are non-existent. But Marygay's parents are killed in a gunfight, and Mandala's mother dies because her usefulness quotient is too low to entitle her to medicines, and so they reenlist.

They are sent on separate missions, Mandala making a jump to a planet as far away as humans have ever ventured. He knows that if he returns it will be centuries in the future, and his likelihood of seeing Marygay again is minimal. Against all odds he survives and returns to find that the war is over, and that it had been a huge misunderstanding anyway. Humanity now consists of clones of a perfect human specimen, except for a couple of planets where breeders live. He finds a note from Marygay, who is waiting for him one one of the planets, and is making time dilation jumps every month to 10 years in the future, and so they do manage to meet.

This is a novel about Vietnam. The futility of war, and the alienation of returning home after war, written by a Vietnam veteran in 1974, could be very dry and bitter in other hands. Haldeman manages to make it into an exciting space opera, but one based on the harsh realities. People die; people are mutilated; people lose their loved ones; and all of this is finally revealed to have been for nothing. The technology is fascinating and believable, and the battles with the aliens make your heart pump. The enduring memory though may be the lovers reunion. All through the second half of the book there is a tension; will they ever manage to meet again, and if so, how vould they manage it. There is a relief when they do finally meet, that would have been turned into a huge disappointment is Haldeman had been cruel, and would have spoiled the book.

Even for people who have never heard of Vietnam, or think that science fiction may have moved on in the 40 years since it was written, this is a book that gives a clear anti-war message that hasn't dated, and is a bloody good read too.

AE0.5

Posted by se71 at July 6, 2002 11:20 AM

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