Old Man's War

This isn't the first of John Scalzi's books I've ever read. But Redshirts is a bit of a one-off. It's not connected to any of his other series, and it's not really considered indicative of the rest of his body of work. By going back to the beginning, I feel like I'm finally going to see what the hype is all about.

Old Man's War is a lot of fun. It's a classic science-fiction setup, with a never-ending war between humanity and a series of alien species. The twist being that all the soldiers are septegenarians. You can enlist in the army on your seventy-fifth birthday in exchange for a new, younger body, a chance to see the universe, and a possibility of settling on one of the new colonies, assuming you survive your ten years of military service.

The book follows John Perry. He and his wife had intended to sign up together, but she died a few years prior. So, with nothing really to live for and not knowing what to expect, he  joins the military by himself. Perry quickly makes several new friends and proves himself to be a useful tactician. The alien species he finds himself battling are infinitely weird and brutal. And honestly, the whole middle of the book starts to feel a bit like a movie montage of different battles.

But towards the end, the mysteries start unspooling. Perry survives a situation he shouldn't have and starts to become privy to the weirder secrets of the army he serves in. Just as things are really starting to get interesting, the book comes to a close, with the promise of lots of plot to come in the rest of the series. It took a while for the plot to really show up, but once it did I was hooked. I can't wait to see what else this universe has in store for me and John Perry.

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