Glad I Didn't DNF | Forever War by Joe Haldeman

The beginning of this book was difficult for me to digest, but I kept reading and glad I stuck with it.
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[@sxbarral]

Very nice review! :) Joe Haldeman, who had been badly injured in Vietnam, meant Forever War to be a counterweight to Starship Troopers. Where the latter glorifies war, the former offers a vision of how dehumanizing and senseless it is. He would come to also express that in more of his novels, other than the “Forever” series.

[@B0BsBooks]

Forever Peace is also a winner so I will be reading that as well. It may make me rethinking the ranking of this book.

[@sxbarral]

Looking forward to that review. 🙂 I personally think it’s not at the same level, but still plenty to enjoy about it. Specially because of Haldeman’s writing style, extraordinarily well paced and crisp.

[@HyperboreanAnchovy44]

That is untrue Joe Haldeman did not write forever war as a reaction to starship troopers.

[@superhetoric]

​@@HyperboreanAnchovy44that's not what OP said

[@Calcprof]

Haldeman wrote Forever War after he wrote a (non sf) novel based on his experiences in Vietnam and his re-entry into civilian society. The novel did not sell well at the time (War Year, in fact it may not have actually sold to a publisher at the time???). So in a classic sf turn, he then used sf to write commentary on the present.

[@TheJimSkipper]

I have that exact copy of The Forever War. It’s a great novel!

[@charlest1828]

I typically don't read vintage sci-fi books, but I enjoy reading "old" or out-of-print books, when I can get my hands on 'em. Love the concept of reviewing books w/out barcodes! New subscriber who will watch / enjoy your other videos! 😃

[@B0BsBooks]

Thank you for watching and I'm glad you like the concept.

[@MemphisJones]

Same, great concept!

[@bookfantastic]

Thanks for this review. I got bogged down in the beginning of this book as well, but I plan to finish it. Just picked up a 1st edition paperback of sequel Forever Peace which won both the Hugo and Nebula. Maybe this one will be easier to get into.

[@B0BsBooks]

That’s lucky you found forever peace!. I do hope you return to the book, it does progress better than the first part would indicate.

[@pufles65]

I don’t blame you for putting down the book for awhile then coming back to it. The first third would have bothered me a lot too. I’m like you when I read the words become pictures and it’s like watching a movie. I love that saying getting lost in a good book😊💐👍

[@B0BsBooks]

That’s exactly it. The imagery is too vivid and I needed a break.

[@benHaskett1]

This book is was brought me to your channel. I'm about 60% through and found myself chuckling at Haldeman's predictions for Earth in 2023, sometimes in awe. Great review.

[@benHaskett1]

And now I'm done. What an ending! Very solid, very emotional. Looking forward to the other two books in this trilogy.

[@B0BsBooks]

Me too. I managed to find a copy of Forever Peace another Nebula winner, but not the third book. The 2023 predictions, honestly kept me reading after the harshness of the first 1/3 of the book, because they were amusing and some a little on the nose.

[@jerryrichardson2799]

I read Haldeman a long time ago. _All my Sins Remembered_ is my favorite. I read _The Forever War,_ and _There is no Darkness_ by him, as well.

[@B0BsBooks]

I found a hard cover of All My Sins. I think I may tackle that before Peace and Camouflage.

[@matthewmcfadden6332]

Interesting review. I am about 1/2 way through this now. I like this format of reviewing older novels.

[@B0BsBooks]

That’s very kind of you to say thank you.

[@asumazilla]

The waste atoms can be reused / recycled, but there needs to be some energy input. You could have extra stored somewhere on ship for travel over a fixed distance that's planned. For infinite timescale you need to be able to maintain the isotope abundances, since some isotopes decay so the chemical composition will shift slowly.

[@B0BsBooks]

I thought of this, but there never seemed to be a mention in the book of such storage, but I may have missed it when he’d write about the ship tours I would kind of disassociate.

[@asumazilla]

@B0BsBooks I haven't read this book, I just meant in reality. Thanks for your book review, I will check back for more.

[@bookjack]

Glad this one came around for you. I felt similar. Glad I read it, but I wont be putting it on any top 10 lists

[@B0BsBooks]

Same!

[@Jenna.A.]

I'm kinda having the same issue with The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series...The time problem, not the icky feeling bit. I started the read-a-long with Moid's channel April 1st & finished book 1 on day 1 & got halfway through book 2, not realizing that everyone else was reading a single book a month. So I put the breaks on reading the series until about 2 weeks ago. Then I had to re-read book 1 because I forgot most of it (fibro brain). And while I'm enjoying it, I'm struggling to speed through it the way I did in April. I start book 3 today. And I actually added 3 extra books to my TBR for the series: Zaphod Plays it Safe (A short story included in my omnibus that I read after I re-read book 1), The Salmon of Doubt (supposedly set in the same universe, chronologically it would come after book 5) & Eoin Colfer's: And Another Thing (part 6 of 3 published in 2009 after Douglas Adams passed away & approved by his widow). IDK I think I'm struggling because I've now put too much on my plate & pushed it off to the last minute, as the read-a-long completes in August. I guess I'm feeling overwhelmed. That & because I've been reading so much, I've been missing out on all my favorite content creators videos! So my KZbin backlog is absolutely ginormous!!! 1st world problems right lol

[@Rumham7291]

I was talking to someone about how problematic women are treated in this book, but it is important to note that this book was written around of the summer of love and it being a science fiction book, writing a future about promiscuity being radically different isn't that crazy. Therefore, I don't think writing about an alternate future where this is normalized says anything about how the author feels about women or how women should be treated now. It is really a very small part of the book so i didn't let it bother me too much.

[@B0BsBooks]

I realized 2/3 into the book that the writing in the book at the beginning is more the hyper masculine toxic treatment of women he experienced in the military while he was in Vietnam and not necessarily how Haldeman get about them himself, which made the rest of the book much easier and enjoyable the read. The beginning was just so hard (harsh) but the payoff was worth it and I’m glad I stuck it out until the end.

[@flacornmallrat]

I found the ending to be so refreshing, which is interesting considering its age. Also, I thought the sexual dynamic in the first third of the book was pretty on the nose, considering their 1990's background.

[@texicano_fxdls3411]

I'm enjoying this book, about 1/3 through, and I probably enjoyed it because I was in the military.

[@B0BsBooks]

My partner was ex Army. When I was getting frustrated, I talked to him about it and he helped me to keep going. I am very glad I stick with it.

[@allegedkurd]

So I read this one because people mentioned it as a sort of companion/counter to Starship Troopers, and I can definitely see where Haldeman is coming from in terms of how he seeks to show the dehumanizing and senseless nature of war and militarism, but it's interesting to see what devices he chooses to achieve that. The sex stuff really put me off, and you're not the only person to mention that, and while I speculate that's just how Haldeman envisioned a fully integrated military (using each other the same way that Haldeman likely saw servicemen engaging with sex workers) for morale purposes, it's bizarre, especially now as our modern, more-integrated military grapples with sexual assault and sexual harassment.

[@B0BsBooks]

I believe Haldeman, as he experienced how his fellow service men treated and regarded women, that the only way to fully integrate without issue was to set it up as a system that fully embraced and benefited men (complete sexual promiscuity, taking consent completely out of the picture). As you mentioned, because consent is a thing, our modern integrated military is rife with SA and SH, because while society has made movements in the last 50 years, we still live in social patriarchal system. I haven't read Starship Troopers (but loved the movie), and I believe I need to remedy that to see how it changes how I feel about this book. Thank you for mentioning it.

[@Rumham7291]

@@B0BsBooks i feel like if you loved the Starship Troopers movie, you are going to hate the book. The two are nothing alike and I feel there is a lot of self insert from Heinlen and his love of corporal punishment. yikes.

[@MemphisJones]

Vet here: Taps is the end of day, or end of life.

[@B0BsBooks]

Thank you. I actually like being close enough to hear it. Not so much the munitions practice, but the trumpets are nice.

[@MemphisJones]

@@B0BsBooks it's something how you can become accustomed to music as a trigger, but it's def a trigger, I either become tired or sad when I hear it now. You are near an Army base I assume 😂 no jet engines or shaking windows to allude to an Air Force base.

[@MischaKrilov]

"Pedantic" :) My first video of yours, enjoyed it!

[@B0BsBooks]

Glad you enjoyed it!

[@johnLee-bb2do]

I love when people refer to this as vintage Sifi. I guess they would put Dune in this category:)

[@B0BsBooks]

Dune won the first Nebula award, and is almost a decade older so yes 💕 it’s also on the list to read this year.

[@Jenna.A.]

Considering that the term vintage refers to any item that's 20 years old or older...YES, this book & Dune would be called "vintage". Even strictly antique dealers consider an item to be vintage if it's 40 years old or more. So the answer is still a resounding YES!

[@skeller61]

I’m planning to read this at some point. From your review, I can see why you didn’t like part of it; however, if you understand it as an allegory written by a soldier who was in Vietnam Nam, it sounds like he was describing the experiences he went through. There were a lot of hookers in Vietnam, and a lot of scared American men who realized the next time they went to battle could be their last. This, I’m sure, made them act in ways that should make civilized people cringe…cringe, but not turn away from. His experience of alienation upon return to the states, where most people could not possibly understand what the soldiers’ experiences were, is the reason many of them ended up homeless and with mental issues. I’m glad you made it through. As a veteran myself, I’m looking forward to reading The Forever War just to see how he translates his real experiences into sci-fi, I’m sure partly as a therapy for himself.

[@B0BsBooks]

I believe you are correct in that he was doing art therapy creating this book; however, 50 years later it does make it harder to relate to a modern audience. Despite having a degree in history, I've always been more drawn to social history and history as told through objects. Militaria has never been something that engaged me other than the scientific advancements and some social changes from it. I had a discussion with my partner after reading this book (he's an Army DV) and I know that a lot of the toxic machismo is a prevalent part of the American Military, so I know that Haldeman is writing from real experiences that would still tap into today's soldier, but for it to continue for another 50 years to be read and suggested is tenuous in my opinion.

[@dustinneely]

I'm reading this now and having a very hard time getting through it. The coed unit structure is ridiculous. I'll keep reading because of this review...but I think the 1st section is total crap. I enjoyed "Starship Troopers" immensely. This doesn't hold a candle to Heinlein.

[@PoptartParasol]

What does dnf stand for?

[@B0BsBooks]

Did Not Finish. Just stop reading and never pick it back up again. My apologies, my other book tubing friends use it so much I forgot to explain in the video

[@vintagesf]

I wonder if the ick factor was the point as it moves towards a monogamous relationship.

[@B0BsBooks]

It very well may have been. After finishing the book in it’s entirety that seems plausible, but at the time it appeared that it would carry on. I’m glad it didn’t, but I had no way of knowing. This is one of the few books I’ve finished though, that I would really like to discuss with the author.

[@tarnetskygge]

probably not, it was written in the "free love" '60s/'70s when the counterculture was a lot less prudish about such ideas than our current prevailing culture is

[@PipBoykin]

My aim for the upcoming year is to read all the books in the SF Masterworks series, and The Forever War is the first one. I read TFW recently during several train trips. I knew the book recieved several awards and is held in high regard, but it just didn't work for me. For me it was the first 1/3rd of the book, more or less the setup or introduction, was pretty good. However, the remainder of the book didn't deliver. It's a completely linear story, told only from the point of view of Mandella. This is very different from the books we have today. Except for Mandella you don't get to know the other characters in the story, they're little more than a list of names. After reading TFW I watched some inteviews with Joe Haldeman on YT and he mentions while fighting in Vietnam he already wanted to write "his war story" and that right from the outset he wanted a SF setting. Unfortunately the amount of SF in the book is very low. The time dilation feels as something the author only uses to create the situations he wants in his story. A MacGuffin, basically. Another book reviewer commented "the book works as an allegory for the Vietnam War but not as a story". And that is pretty accurate, I think. TFW feels more like a book outline, the basic plot of a story, and still needs fleshing out and expanding. It feels unfinished. All in all, for me, TFW scores a 4 / 10.

[@ulyssesk7325]

going by light speed brings you into the core future, that's your perceived past btw. if it matters.

[@ulyssesk7325]

do not mischance true time with perceived one

[@chasx7062]

LOL, i think you are supposed to read books to challenge your worldviews instead of reinforcing them?

[@B0BsBooks]

People read for many different reasons. Some for enjoyment, some for escapism, some to learn a new skill or expand their vocabulary, some do read for different lived experiences, views or thoughts. If you read to challenge your own world views; I don’t think you would have left such a dismissive and condescending comment.

[@chasx7062]

@@B0BsBooks In my defense, i did listen to the end of your video LOL

[@Kenji17171]

First

[@B0BsBooks]

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