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What Members Thought

I am surprised this was so acclaimed. I was underwhelmed. Honestly, I've come to find that I don't like books that are mostly about training and / or boot camps. If you are going to write a book about fighting aliens, just get on with the fighting. I read almost half the book before I gave up and they were still in boot camp.
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Fuck yeah, Scalzi! I don't know why it took me so damn long to read this, but now that I have, I am here to tell you that this? Is an AWESOME read. Think Ender's Game with old guys. Think Heinlein but much easier to digest. Think funny and touching yet military SF.
It's hard to do this justice without spoilers, so I'll just play SF bingo:
- post-colonialistion: check. Interestingly, Earth seems to be pretty shut off from the rest of the universe. There's no space travel until you leave - and once ...more
It's hard to do this justice without spoilers, so I'll just play SF bingo:
- post-colonialistion: check. Interestingly, Earth seems to be pretty shut off from the rest of the universe. There's no space travel until you leave - and once ...more

This was very good. Just about everything a good scifi novel tend to be - engaging, interesting, and easy to read. There's no real feat of language here, but that's not the point of the novel. It's here to tell you a good story, and it does exactly that. None of the characters were particularly deep, but I liked all of them. The story touched upon a few interesting philosophical topics that have tremendous potential for elaboration and deeper thought, but it doesn't go into any of them. Which is
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Jun 23, 2013
Liz
rated it
really liked it
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
21st-century,
science-fiction
I really like John Scalzi. He has this amazing talent to get me to read books that are usually far out of my ordinary interests (I say I don't like military sf. We ignore my obsession with Miles Vorkosigan when I say this).
He's also funny. Not in a Douglas Adams sense, but in the sense that his characters have great senses of humor and he is brilliant at the subtle deadpan. Okay, so maybe a little like Douglas Adams.
But there's a deeply interesting story at the heart of the book and an adventuro ...more
He's also funny. Not in a Douglas Adams sense, but in the sense that his characters have great senses of humor and he is brilliant at the subtle deadpan. Okay, so maybe a little like Douglas Adams.
But there's a deeply interesting story at the heart of the book and an adventuro ...more

Apr 07, 2011
Heath
rated it
it was amazing
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
read-in-2011,
nook-book
This was a 2nd or maybe a 3rd reread. Still enjoying and funny. Onward to the rest of the series (bit by bit) between new books.

A good quick space opera. Interesting characters and ideas make this a fun book to read. Action aplenty and a love story to boot. I'd highly recommend it to any fan of Hard SF and any Heinlein fan.
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Fast read reminiscent of Heinlein and Card's Ender's Game .
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Mar 13, 2012
Sandi
rated it
liked it
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
scifi-fantasy-horror-althistory,
read-2012
First in a science fiction series that had an interesting set-up, likable characters, and lots of space opera type action.

Dec 31, 2010
Lucy
marked it as to-read

May 19, 2011
Vj
marked it as to-read

Sep 13, 2012
Kristy
marked it as recommended-by-goodreads

Jan 01, 2013
Michael
rated it
it was amazing
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
science-fiction,
sword-and-laser

Feb 26, 2015
Dylan
marked it as to-read

Jun 05, 2018
John
added it