Forever Peace

For a book with “peace” in the title, and its prominent theme, this book has some scenes of phenomenal violence. I'm talking splattering gore, “Did that really just happen? Holy God” violence. The final scenes definitely left me shaken.

But Haldeman's a badass, and he hits on so many smart ideas, that I'm willing to forgive the violence and even entertain the prospect that he's making some other, grander point with it. Anyway, it's near future Earth, and America is laying some harsh smack down on a Latin American (coughIraqi/Vietnamese/Koreancough) insurgency. America has also perfected the art of drone warfare, and now, not only does it use remote control bombs, but soldiers plug into shared consciousness machines that operate drone soldier robots down in sweaty, tropical “invented Latin American country”. (Wait, isn't this mech pilot thing a whole manga genre? Note to self: read more manga.)

Anyway, everyone says that staying plugged into the mech/hive brain thing is very, very, very dangerous, and will make your brain mush. Thoughtful Protagonist (whose name escapes me, but who Haldeman thank-God-fully makes non-white) inadvertently gets pulled into an adventure uncovering the potentially ugly truth about the hive mind tech. It involves serial killers. And Zen? Sort of. It's wonderful, seriously.

Anyway, this wasn't as exciting and emotional as the spiritual (if not literal) prequel, Forever War, but all those good ideas, coupled with Haldeman's typically punchy Hemingway-esque writing style, merits a solid 3 stars.