Sign in with Facebook***Dave Hill's Reviews > Redshirts: A Novel with Three Codas
Redshirts: A Novel with Three Codas
by John Scalzi (Goodreads Author)
by John Scalzi (Goodreads Author)
I devoured this book.
It's a quick, even light, read, but it had me excited to pick back up again in a way that recent books I've read have not. Call it "Last Action Hero" heavily overlaid with "Galaxy Quest" in concept, it goes from light humor to existential self-examination, touching along the way on cheap SF memes and Hollywood sausage-making and the nature of reality and a bit of Heinleinian "World as Myth" ... but a lot more than just that.
A bit over two-thirds of the book is the "novel". My original thought was that the three codas were simply to pad out the page count, but in a sense they are the most serious stories of all, paying off on the main novel with people, and situations, left behind. They elevate the book from clever if largely impersonal conceit to a real story.
Funny and poignant, and always witty, it's highly recommended. I'll definitely be back to this book.
It's a quick, even light, read, but it had me excited to pick back up again in a way that recent books I've read have not. Call it "Last Action Hero" heavily overlaid with "Galaxy Quest" in concept, it goes from light humor to existential self-examination, touching along the way on cheap SF memes and Hollywood sausage-making and the nature of reality and a bit of Heinleinian "World as Myth" ... but a lot more than just that.
A bit over two-thirds of the book is the "novel". My original thought was that the three codas were simply to pad out the page count, but in a sense they are the most serious stories of all, paying off on the main novel with people, and situations, left behind. They elevate the book from clever if largely impersonal conceit to a real story.
Funny and poignant, and always witty, it's highly recommended. I'll definitely be back to this book.
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Gary
(last edited Jun 13, 2012 08:14am)
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Jun 13, 2012 08:13am
Glad to hear Redshirts is good. I recently read the Old Man's War series and became a fan of Scalzi, so this is on my list. I'll probably wait for the paperback, though. I'm a big Star Trek fan, and loved Galaxy Quest's parady/homage, so hearing that Redshirts reminds you of that is a very good thing in my book.
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I enjoy pretty much anything Scalzi puts out. There are also some elements in this book that resemble some in his "Agent to the Stars," which I also recommend.
Haven't read Agent to the Stars yet (I only read Old Man's War a couple months ago), but that's on my list, too. As is pretty much everything Scalzi's written.
I agree with you that the three codas are easily the best part of the book --even though I predicting the ending once the final chapter started, I still found myself emotionally affected. The starship aspect of the story was okay, and I laughed thinking about Chekhov the whole time. But after awhile I became a little tired of it because everyone seemed to to accept all these weird revelations so easily -- particularly the "real world" characters. Dahl's final comments about the real nature of their world helped lampshade that fact, but still it was irritating.
