Customer Reviews

Berserker Fury (Berserker Series/Fred Saberhagen)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

I don't mind the "Battle of Midway" angle. I do think it could have been concealed a little better, but maybe the author wanted us all to see it. I actually got some entertainment out of seeing how he would work in certain historical events.

The side-story about our opening-scene protagonist was so-so. I could take it or leave it. Mr. Saberhagen's done better, and I've read worse.

Here's my main beef. This book reads like he wrote 10 pages at a time, and then just randomly shuffled the sections together. We haven't even fought the battle yet when we read about the analysts' thoughts on the outcome. Kinda makes it hard to even pretend you don't know what's going to happen at that point.

That's just one example. We constantly read about characters referring to things that they won't find out about for another 20 pages. And other nonsense along those lines. It made for very infuriating reading.

Mr. Saberhagen needed someone to read through his computer print-out and move a couple pages around.

BErserker Fury was a space version of the Battle of Midway, but the real battle was less confusing. Time seems to have no meaning, as your point of view changes in both time and space, like a bad Doctor Who movie. Sometimes I don't know what character I am reading about. I happen to be a great fan and even sent him e-mail once, but this book could of been A LOT better if somebody else had gone over it with a magic marker and helped him cut out parts that were not needed.

I have hear good things about the berserker series and was hoping that the reviews were wrong. How *wrong* I was. This book is terrible. It is written in a detached, all-knowing, third-person perspective, with almost no character development.

In fact you don't find out much of anything about the characters till the last 1/4 of the book. Nothing is ever explained, it reads like a bad enclyopedia. This book not even worth the shipping I paid for it.

You may or may not be annoyed that Saberhagen is lifting much of his plot from WWII- let's face it, Jerry Pournelle and many others are guilty of the same crime. What is more frustrating here is the author's stunted, wooden writing style. Often, he finds it necessary to repeat the same facts over and over again, as if he's straining to fill up space. Plot and characters aside, the actual use of the language itself is so frustrating that the book is unreadable.

Looking at so many of the other customer reviews here, with one star or two out of five, I believe the book has been underrated.

True, the book has weaknesses, but the final 75 pages are excellent, even brilliant. However, in the opening two-thirds of the book the narrative goes so flat I had to go over to speed reading mode to just get through some of it. Naturally, readers who just get bored to death and quit are never going to reach those final chapters.

In the final 75 pages or so, Fred Saberhagen stacks up with David Weber and David Drake as a master of future war.

I thought I was so clever, recognizing the Battle of Midway (WW II) as re-described in Fred Saberhagen's novel. Now I get to Amazon reviews, and see that almost every reviewer has picked up the identical parallel.

Final remark -- the Berserker novels by Fred S. are very uneven. I reviewed one and gave it about 5 stars as simply EXCELLENT. A different one I just panned as dull, whacko, and without any ending. It just stopped in the middle.

Some of these Berserker novels are excellent, but a few are real dogs. Sadly, I suspect that the author is just out for the bucks. By now he is a "big name," so just dumps out anything, whether it is decent or just junk. He doesn't care, as long as he gets the check. The editors at the publishing house don't care either. He is riding on his reputation, and they know he can still sell some to the poor saps who believe in him.

Bear in mind, SOME of these berserker novels are really good. Hard for someone starting into them to know which ones, though.

Fred Saberhagen holds the distinction of being both the best and the worst author I have ever read. He's either great or terrible on any given piece - with nothing in between. When Saberhagen writes a good story, it's very tight, adventurous, and thought provoking. Good examples are his Berserker short stories, A Century of Progress, and The Dracula Tape. When Saberhagen writes a dog it's plot is shallow or nonexistant has little action, and gives the impression that he and the characters just don't care what's going on. Examples of his dogs are Merlin's Bones, Dancing Bears, The White Bull, many of the novels in his Swords series, A Question of Time, and (of course) Berserker Fury.

Saberhagen hasn't written anything realy good since about the mid-80's, and most of his REALLY good work was done in the 60's and 70's. Fred Saberhagen desperately needs an agent and a publisher who will tell him when he's churning out worthless drivel, and then will ride him like a drill sergeant until he starts turning out the gems he's capable of.

Mr Saberhagen must have been put on a short time table for the completion of this book. The book is just a shallow rewrite of the WWII Battle of Midway (and or the movie by the same name) and put in space. Most of the details, tactics and personal events of the actual battle off Midway Island have been retained and only slightly altered so they would relate to space. The supersecret decryption of berserker codes just like the U.S.Navy did to the Japanese. The number of carriers involved is the same. Individual ship histories just prior to and during the battle are the same. The actual U.S. Navy Task Force numbers 16 and 17 remain the same in Berserker Fury and perform the same role as they did at Midway. I don't remember if "Void" fighters have always been in the Berserker series of books but its amazing how similar the name and performace compare to the Japanese "Zeros" used at Midway. If blatantly copying history wasn't distracting enough this book was just not put together very well. I get the distinct impression of a lack of review. Time lines were confusing and often appeared to be out of sequence. Details were repeated unnessessarly and I found myself asking "why is he repeating this stuff here?" I have enjoyed Mr Saberhagen's books in the past and expect to in the future but Berserker Fury gave me the impression that his publisher told him to produce a book in 3 weeks and he did.

The tautly-written opening scene is well-deserving of the novel's title, but its ever-increasing redundancies eventually decay into a fragmented, non-sequential narrative toward the end of the book. Unfortunately, that turn of events hopelessly distracted this reader from what could have been wonderful character development, and lessened the impact of two characters' unexpected sacrifices.

I found the name of the planet Uhao interesting and different, until I realized that it was merely "Oahu" spelled backwards. Only in Chapter 28 was the "familiar name letter reversal" ploy *really* annoying, when Saberhagen tossed off Nodrog (Gordon), Adnilem (Melinda), and Egroeg (George) inside of 3 paragraphs.

I first noticed Saberhagen becoming redundant in "Berserker Kill" (1993), but it was painfully obvious in "Berserker Fury." While his early Berserker stories are well-crafted and crisply written, this novel is not. If Fred's succeeding Berserker novels are written this poorly, I'm strongly tempted not read any further in the series. In the end, the foreshadowing isn't followed through to its full potential, which is just plain disappointing to the reader.

In brief, at this point in his writing career (1997), Fred Saberhagen is in dire need of an editor who understands science fiction *and* literature, and would be able to gently shepherd him back to excellence again. "Sadder still to watch it die/Than never to have known it." --Rush, "Losing It," _Signals_

Not vintage Sagerhagen. I read half, could not force myself to continue, and actually threw the book away! Kierkegaard is more readable and interesting.

Saberhaen has developed in "Berserker Fury" a complete, yet bland parody of the famous WWII Battle of Midway. Although the setting takes place far in humanity's future, the novel makes parallels so blatant that anyone who has read or seen the movie "Midway" has no difficulty in the associations. The principal battle location is a space island 'atoll' called Fifty-Fifty -- another moniker for Midway? The combat space vehicles are called 'carriers', 'battleships' and 'cruisers'. Beserker fighters are called 'Voids' - a moniker for 'Zeros'. The pricipal human commander is Admiral Nuguance, while at Midway he was Admiral Spruance. The battle for Fifty-Fifty is set up through the breaking of the Beserker combat codes. And the parallels go on and on. Saberhagen even goes so far as to strand a shot down human pilot in the middle of the Beserker fleet who is able to watch the entire battle unfold, much like the original scenario. The parallels are so obvious that this novel cannot be taken as a serious work by the talented Saberhagen. Let us hope that any future Beserker stories, to which we have all come to love, are not of like ilk.