The Ghost Brigades
Ratings403
Average rating4
In the afterword of this book, Scalzi acknowledges that it's hard to write sequels, especially when the first book in the series was as acclaimed as OLD MAN'S WAR was. THE GHOST BRIGADES, while interesting and thoughtful in its own right, was simply not the same “feel” as OMW and sort of falls short, but was interesting enough to keep reading through to the end.
In OMW, one of the characters we meet is Jane Sagan, a member of the Ghost Brigade, the Colonial Defense Force's Special Ops group. This book is partly Jane's story, and partly the story of Jared Dirac, a Ghost Brigade clone of Charles Boutin, a man who has turned traitor against the CDF and has unified three alien races in an unprecedented alliance to stop the CDF once and for all. Dirac and Sagan must race against time to figure out why Boutin has sold out the CDF, and Dirac tries to piece together his “father's” story.
All in all, it was a good book. It obviously won awards. Scalzi's simplistic prose is still crisp and interesting, but John Perry was missing from the book. After OMW, I wanted more Perry, and without him and his glib dialogue, this felt like an entirely different book in an entirely different series. It was still worth reading, but I felt a little cheated because of the change in characters.
That's the author's prerogative, though. I still enjoyed the book and downloaded the next one in the series, THE LAST COLONY. Perry is back in that one. I hope I will enjoy it, as well.
Mainion Old Man's War -kirjan ensimmäinen jatko The Ghost Brigades kertoo siirtokuntien puolustusliiton pahamaineisesta aaveprikaatista, erikoisjoukoista, jotka on rakennettu kuolleiden ihmisten DNA:sta. Nämä supersotilaat kloonataan, kasvatetaan viikoissa aikuisen kokoisiksi, koulitaan muutamassa viikossa ja alle vuoden ikäisinä sotilailla on jo monta taistelua takanaan.
Tiedemies Charles Boutin, joka tietää ihmiskunnan sotilassalaisuuksia vähän liiankin kanssa, on loikannut muukalaisten puolelle. Petturi Boutin jätti jälkeensä kopion tietoisuudestaan, joka istutetaan yhden tällaisen supersotilaan aivoihin. Siirros näyttää epäonnistuvan, joten sotilas otetaan hyötykäyttöön — mutta entäs jos petturin tietoisuus nousee pintaan ja muistot palaavat?
Kirjassa on runsaasti futuristista toimintaa, mutta myös mielenkiintoisia ajatuksia. Millaiset moraalit voi olla kolmevuotiaalla supersotilaalla? Mikä tekee ihmisestä petturin? Millaista on kantaa toisen ihmisen muistoja? Scalzin tapaan kirja etenee toimivasti, viihdyttää ja mietityttää. Oivallinen teos, mutta Old Man's Warista kannattaa aloittaa.
Kirjan alku on, muuten, aivan nerokas. (3.2.2011)
Felt like some light well written SciFi and that is exactly what you get wioth Scalzo. Quickly re-read the first book and then plowed into 2 and 3
This book is not a continuation of the prior book's main character's story but does mention him in passing. It is in the same universe and does include one of the characters from the prior book but this books main character is new.
Still alot of interesting technology and ethics to contemplate, still good writing.
I liked this one better than the first in the series. It's still all-military, but it was much more about the characters and their conflicts more than the battles themselves. I may just continue to read the series.
It's science followed by fiction followed by science followed by fiction.
Far too dumbed down to be enjoyable. Far too predictable to keep me interested.
This is my 3rd 3 star Scalzi so I'm guessing I'm just not his audience?
As the title indicates this second book in the Old Man's War series focuses on the Special Forces of the Colonial Defense Forces (CDF) of the Colonial Union known as the Ghost Brigades. As we learned in the first book, unlike the regular CDF forces who are taken from Earth's elder population, volunteers that sign up for off-world military service for a second chance at a youthful, enhanced existence, the Ghost Brigades are generated from the DNA of volunteers who died before they could become regular CDF soldiers. With generated personalities and even greater enhancements the Ghost Brigades from day one are created solely to be supreme military fighters and they and their missions are, for the most part, kept separate from the CDF regulars. Both CDF regulars and the Ghost Brigades are sent out to protect human colonists on worlds threatened by various alien races and most of their ranks never live to finish their term of service. And, even if they make it to the end of their period of service, they may never return to Earth.
We met one of those Special Forces soldiers in the first book, Jane Sagan, who was generated from the DNA of the dead wife of the main character in that book, John Perry, a CDF regular. When it is discovered that a traitorous CU scientist has escaped, leaving a dead clone of himself as a deception and working with three alien races to defeat the CU forces, which could possibly lead to the extinction of humanity, Jane Sagan and her Special Forces team is brought in to lead a dangerous mission to recapture the scientist and defeat the alien plot.
A kink in the mission is that Jane must use and watch a new member of her team, Jared Dirac, who was created from the DNA of the dead clone of the traitorous scientist Charles Boutin and whose consciousness was experimentally downloaded into the new soldier. Wanting to know what had made Charles Boutin turn traitor and where he fled to, the experiment to try and recreate Charles Boutin so he could be interrogated didn't appear to work and Jared Dirac develops his own personality and becomes a good Special Forces soldier. However, as time goes on memories from Charles Boutin begin to creep into Jared's consciousness. Through their integrated Brain-pals Jane must keep watch on Jared to make sure he remains loyal to the mission and eliminate him if he starts to show the same traitorous tendencies as Charles Boutin.
As in the first book the action is non-stop and there are new surprising reveals about the Colonial Union and its never ending conflicts with alien races, raising many questions. These reveals will most certainly be further delved into in the next book in the series.
An enthralling story for the second book in this series. At one point, I think the author made a mistake in describing the process of transferring consciousness differently than it worked in the first book - but maybe the mistake was in my recollection. I was impressed with the way the author took the viewpoint of the villain, and almost made me believe that the villain was the good guy.
Mit einen neuen Protagonisten ist Teil 2 eine indirekte Fortsetzung des ersten Teils. Der R. A. Heinlein Einfluss ist noch da, aber nicht mehr so extrem Starship Trooper'esque wie in Old Man's War.
Zwar erfährt man viel über die titelgebene Geisterbrigade - wie sie leben, was sie ausmacht und was sie von regulären Klonsoldaten unterscheidet (Im Endeffekt sind sie die X-Men in Scalzi's Kolonial Space Opera) - mir fehlte aber etwas die Exposition des ersten Teils, da die Geschichte etwas fokussierter ist und weniger zwischen Subplots das Universum erweitern.
Und was mich etwas gestört hat: Es tauchen einige ausserirdische Wesen auf. Bei diesen wird auf Geschichte und Wesen eingegangen, aber irgendwie wird nie erwähnt wie sie eigentlich aussehen. Was soll das?
Randnotiz: Außerdem dachte ich bislang dass es sich hier um eine Trilogie handelt, fand aber raus dass es insgesamt 6 Bücher sind. Ich hoffe wirklich dass diese Reihe auch über 6 Bücher spannend bleibt.
Didn't love it quite as much as the first in the series...but almost. Proper spacey type sci-fi
This was a great, mind boggling story where it puts your social morals, to the test.
Short review: I like Scalzi as a writer. He is entertaining and interesting. But he also can by cynical and dark. It has been five years since I read the first book. I skipped to books 5 and 6 and then returned to book 2. I probably should have re-read book one, but I didn't. So it took me a little while to remember what I needed to remember.
The plot is fine, but the story of the books is mostly that leaders and institutions are all bad and that the only ones that are good are the occasional low level grunt. Everyone else is either trying to destroy things or allows things to be destroyed to keep their power in place.
Hard to recommend, even if the writing is good.
my full review is on my blog at http://wp.me/p1pu8r-czi
Con este libro reafirmo mi opinión sobre Scalzi: es un excelente escritor. Su frescura para contar la historia y su gran sentido del humor hacen que te enganches desde el principio. Todavía estoy por conocer más de sus obras pero no cabe duda de que La Vieja Guardia me parece, hasta el momento, increíblemente buena.
En esta segunda entrega un científico militar llamado Charles Boutin ha traicionado a la humanidad filtrando información de las Fuerzas de Defensa Colonial y, por si esto fuera poco, ha logrado aliar tres razas alienígenas en nuestra contra. La única esperanza parece ser un soldado llamado Jared Dirac el cual ha sido creado a partir del ADN de Boutin y cuyo cerebro tiene parte de su conciencia. ¿Podrá la Unión Colonial y sus Brigadas Fantasma detenerlos antes de que preparen su ofensiva?
It was a good follow up to the first book. It fleshed out the universe and laid a lot of good crumbs for the next. It didn't hold me as tight as the first book though I'm excited to pick up the next.
prima treime 2/5: multe pagini didactice, unor de 15 ani, pastișă după ”Jocul lui Ender”
restul, 5/5: poveste interesantă, twist-uri bune, dialoguri naturale. minus doar la faptul că în continuare nu oferă suficient military pt gustul meu.
I really enjoyed Old Man's War and saw people were kind of upset that this wasn't a continuation of John's story, instead focusing on other characters including Jane.
The focus this time out is on the Special Forces, who are basically the amalgamation of recruits that died before reaching their 75th birthday to enlist in the CDF officially. They start off as a blank slate and develop alongside their Special Forces mates which helps to turn them into the ultimate soldiers. The Special Forces were perhaps the part of the first book that had the most intrigue going for them so the departure to focus on this branch of the military was a welcome one.
The story is based around a rogue scientist defecting to ally three hostile alien races together against humanity who left behind a digital version of his consciousness, which is decided should be placed in a Special Forces clone of him. Of course, nothing ever goes according to plan and instead we end up with an abnormal Special Forces agent under Jane's command and a whole lot of secrets to uncover.
It's a fun read and did a great job of expounding on one of the most interesting characters from the first book in Jane while building up this whole universe and continuing its story.
Maybe this is more of a 3.5 stars but I'm feeling generous :)I really liked the characters, particularly Jared and the whole concept of consciousness and individuality in this world.The “he said/Jane said/etc” is not as pronounced in this book as it is in [b:Redshirts 13055592 Redshirts John Scalzi https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1348617890s/13055592.jpg 18130445], probably because the dialogue is broken up more. Perhaps Redshirts is not a good book to judge [a:John Scalzi 4763 John Scalzi https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1407277112p2/4763.jpg] by (I was very disappointed by it).Onwards to [b:The Sagan Diary 61664 The Sagan Diary (Old Man's War, #2.5) John Scalzi https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1388321306s/61664.jpg 15558795]
Executive Summary: A fun sci-fi space opera. You won't get deep plot, just a fast-paced military story...IN SPACE!Audio book: This is the second book I've listened to by William Dufris. He's pretty good. He speaks clearly and with good inflections. You can tell the characters apart. He did seem to use the same voices as from [b:Cryptonomicon 816 Cryptonomicon (Cryptonomicon, #1) Neal Stephenson https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1327931476s/816.jpg 1166797], so I kept thinking of characters from that book. Overall though, I enjoy him as a narrator. Full ReviewSomehow I hadn't heard of [a:John Scalzi 4763 John Scalzi https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/authors/1236228326p2/4763.jpg] before last year. I remedied that by reading 4 of his books, starting with [b:Old Man's War 51964 Old Man's War (Old Man's War, #1) John Scalzi https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1391208186s/51964.jpg 50700] with my book club.He's not the kind of author to appeal to everyone. From what I've read he mostly writes popcorn fiction. The sort of stuff that would make for a good summer action movie. This book is no different. There isn't some deep plot with twists and turns or a lot of complex characters involved in complex schemes. What you do get is enough plot to keep you interested while the characters go about cracking wise and blowing stuff up. This isn't so much a sequel to [b:Old Man's War 51964 Old Man's War (Old Man's War, #1) John Scalzi https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1391208186s/51964.jpg 50700] as it a stand alone novel that takes place in the same universe after the events of that book. There are references back to it, but almost no character overlap or important plot details to remember.In a way this feels almost like book 1 again because you have the protagonist Jared Dirac going through the training of the Ghost Brigades. That said, there are things you are assumed to know about the universe Mr. Scalzi built in the first book, so it's not like you should skip that book.We learn a lot more about the universe in this book, especially the Ghost Brigades of course. You're also treated to same humor as the rest of his books, which I always enjoy.Overall I enjoyed it and plan to continue on with [b:The Last Colony 88071 The Last Colony (Old Man's War, #3) John Scalzi https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1388776675s/88071.jpg 18279847] soon.
John Scalzi's writing is something I enjoy reading as stress relief. It's fast-paced, quirky, sarcastic sci-fi with a stronger influence on the effects of crazy future technology than on the causes. I didn't like this book as much as “Old Man's War,” mostly because I miss John Perry as the narrator, but I still enjoyed exploring the themes of Scalzi's future. The first chapter throws you right into the plot twists, and from there on you know to believe absolutely none of your preconceptions.
Ghost Brigades more or less ignores the CDF corps of the rejuvenated elderly and focuses instead on the “child” army, born fully formed and programmed to serve. I don't think this is as fertile ground as the earlier subject and part of me expected more of their childish nature to stick around longer than the introductory chapter. That said, I'll grant Scalzi leeway here because children raised in war are likely to lose childish attitudes quickly, and there is all the training Special Forces goes through.
That said, I had a bit of trouble with the Colonial Union not doing a better job of programming them. If you are training soldiers from birth to do all the nasty things regular humans have a moral compass pointing decidedly away from, it seems to me you should do a better job of indoctrinating their ideals. Jared should never have gotten far enough in his questioning of the Colonial Union if they really are as vicious as everything else in the book leads us to believe. Then again, there's twists about the Colonial Union at the end too, and I may be judging too quickly before the series is finished. Still, if the Nazis could convince people that killing children was okay, I think a future with computers literally plugged into our brain should be able to do that.
To me, Special Forces worked better as mysterious allies than point of view protagonists. However, they were useful in illustrating the most interesting theme to me: identity. Scalzi proposes a body, mind, and soul/consciousness trifecta of identiy. Jared Dirac is born with the body and mind of another person (as opposed to Jane Sagan, who was only born with someone else's body). The soul/consciousness, however, is uniquely Jared's and can only be changed by revolutionary and terrifying procedures. Jared's struggle to deal with someone else's memories invading his own consciousness was fascinating to watch, and I love the way Scalzi interjects them over time.
The Obin, on the other hand, have no consciousness at all. They are basically bees with technology... which is a scarier image than I really like. The Rraey intrigue me in their “charitable” efforts at improving the universe, and I'm sure we're not done exploring that culture.
I also really liked the Gamerans. I'm hoping they figure more prominently in the later books because that's what'd I'd be making if I had the ability to build my own being from whatever DNA was around.
I'm not quite sure how I feel about the colonialism and expansion themes. Like Jared, I don't feel I have all the information. Since the first book, I've disliked the pictures of an earth that keeps sending soldiers out to win planets without really telling them why. It's ugly and a little uncomfortably realistic. Then, just when it was getting a little too heavy-handed a moral for me we find out that Boutin's Conclave is not necessarily made up of peace and goodwill either. That twist keeps me interested, and I'll definitely finish off the series. The only other thing that bugged me would probably bug me if I reread OMW too. I usually read pretty fast, and I tend to skip speech tags, but someone pointed out that Scalzi overuses "said." Then I listened to the audiobook of his serial, and the amount of "He Said She Said" forced me to turn the thing off. It doesn't bother me reading because I speed over speech tags, but now that I know it's there, I can't un-read them.I feel I'm being a bit too severely critical. I still enjoyed this book as the sci-fi adventure it is, and I enjoyed musing over the ideas it suggests. It's a fast read and character banter is one of Scalzi's strongest points. Still, there were a bit too many loose ends and needling questions for me to love it as much as I loved Old Man's War. 3.5 stars, but I'll definitely keep moving with the series.