Forever Haldeman

Between moving, commuting, traveling, and the like, I've been spending a lot of time in transit - which more or less sucks. On the "less" sucking side, its given me the opportunity to do some reading, and I've recently "discovered" the works of Joe Haldeman.

Haldeman is probably best know for his Hugo and Nebula award winning novel "The Forever War" (published in 1974), and it had been on my I-should-read-that-but-probably-won't reading list for a while. To make a long story short(-ish), I finally got around to reading it.

It's good. Quite good.

So much so that I've been devouring my way through all of his works. His writing is definitely of the "hard" sci-fi genre, but closer to Asimov, in spirit, than say, a Stephen Baxter. That is to say, the science is grounded in very real extrapolations of existing technology (and theories), but the technology is a backdrop to explore the human social condition - particularly warfare. For example, "the Coming" is not about an impending alien visitation, whatever the book jacket says, which I think might have lead to some confusion/disappointment with readers and reviewers. Rather than wallowing in the ideas of science (which, normally, I love doing :)) Haldeman writes, for lack of a better term, "chick sci-fi": its about the relationships.

The only real criticism I have - the only thing I'd argue keeps Haldeman from being more commercially renowned - are the way he closes his novels. The endings are satisfying, but oddly abrupt. I've read more than a few of his novels at this point ("Old Twentieth", "The Coming", "Forever Peace", "Camouflage", etc.) and although none of the ending are bad (at all - they're logical, exciting, and compelling), none of the endings are what I'd call great either. They do the job, but spartanly.

In any case - highly recommended. Go enjoy.