Customer Reviews

The Last Colony

5 star:		(58)
4 star:		(44)
3 star:		(12)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

An advance copy of John Scalzi's The Last Colony arrived today. I sat down after class, telling myself I'd just read a few pages, and lost the rest of the work day. (More than once, a new John Scalzi book has done terrible things to my productivity. Thank God for tenure.) It brings to an immensely satisfying conclusion the trilogy that began with Old Man's War (which I reviewed here). Scalzi returns to John Perry as the POV character, this time in a story that's more political mystery than military sci fi.

What the Colonial Union is up to and why becomes the critical question for Perry. Until he figures it out, after which stewing on a response becomes even more critical.

Scalzi has written passionately about the need for science fiction to become less insular:

"... if you look at the significant SF books of the last several years, there aren't very many you could give to the uninitiated reader; they all pretty much implicitly or explicitly assume you've been keeping up with the genre, because the writers themselves have. The SF literary community is like a boarding school; we're all up to our armpits in each other's business, literary and otherwise (and then there's the sodomy. But let's not go there)."

"... Fantasy literature has numerous open doors for the casual reader. How many does SF literature have? More importantly, how many is SF perceived to have? Any honest follower of the genre has to admit the answers are "few" and "even fewer than that," respectively. The most accessible SF we have today is stuff that was written decades ago by people who are now dead."

"Thanks to numerous horrifying lunchroom experiences growing up, SF geeks are probably perfectly happy to be let alone with their genre and to let the mundanes read whatever appalling chick lit and/or Da Vinci Code clone they're slobbering over this week (Now, there would be a literary mashup for the ages: The Templars Wore Prada! It'd sell millions!)."

But not Scalzi. Instead, he's been writing immensely accessible novels (except maybe The Android's Dream, which tellingly is my least favorite of his novels to date). Despite its SF trappings, for example, TLC reminds me more of Allen Drury's novels of political suspense, with a little Robert Ludlum-style wheels within wheels conspiracy theory story thrown in too, than it does most SF. Indeed, to continue the analogy to political thrillers, there's even a subplot that's a variant on the good old sleeping killer story. All of which means that, if Tor can manage the marketing trick, the OMW to TLC trilogy ought to reach readers who ordinarily would never be caught dead in the sci fi section of their bookstore.

Perry's solution to his political problems has considerable elegance, as does Scalzi's plotting and writing. (No hack writer he.) The pace is quick, and the plot is taut. There aren't a lot of subplots and most of them end up being essential. (There's one subplot involving spears whose purpose I haven't quite figured out and about which I won't say more for risk of offering spoilers. But once you've read it, maybe you can explain to me whether that story line is anything more than local color.)

Do you need to have read the first two books in the series for TLC to make sense? No. As one reviewer has written: "John Scalzi has styled this novel to stand well on it's own. The book starts with great humor that brings the reader into the story easily and comfortably. You never get the feeling that your starting from the back of the series. John gives you two pages of intro in John Perry's universe and then blasts off."

Having said that, however, you'd be missing a real treat. If you haven't already read the first two novels, grab them too and then set aside a couple of days to immerse yourself.

This is a sequel to OLD MAN"S WAR and THE GHOST BRIGADES. Unfortunately, the author claims that it is the end of this story line and I, for one, am disappointed.

John Perry has been a soldier and an officer of the human army tasked with defending humanity's colonies from a very nasty universe. Now he is retired and living with the wife and child he loves, He is surprised when he is selected to go with his wife to manage a new colony but packs up the family and takes the job. No sooner does he arrive when he and all the other colonists learn that they have been hoodwinked by the bureaucracy. They are pawns in an ongoing stellar war and in the attempts of the bureaucracy to maintain power over all humans.

John manages to hack off just about everyone when he manages to keep his colony from being wiped out. He saves his people and then embarks upon a grand scheme to see that such things cannot happen again. It is very surprising.

It is entertaining and very quick to read. I wish there would be more.

I liked this novel a lot, although I did not think that it was as good as "Old Man's War." Here, the scenario is simple (no spoilers here). John Perry and Jane Sagan have settled on a colony world and are generally happy with their lives. The Colonial Union then taps them to lead the colonization of a new world. More would be telling, but be assured that there are plenty of surprises.

This novel turns on some very imaginative speculations about interstellar politics in the context of the "Old Man's War" universe. These did hold my interest. As always, I enjoyed reading about John Perry and Jane Sagan. Here I found the characterizations and speculations about the aliens to be a little disappointing--not nearly as interesting as in "Old Man's War." The aliens are all-too-humanlike in their behavior, and this was a bit of a disappointment to me. The Consu connection (no spoiler here) is never adequately explained. I found the ending to be a little disappointing, and frankly, it is not conclusive. A fourth novel in the series is necessary to clean it up, but Scalzi says that there will be no fourth novel. I am betting that this turns out not to be the case. (Remember Asimov's Robot novels?)

This is a fast and interesting read, and if you liked the previous two novels in the series ("Old Man's War" and "The Ghost Brigades") you will like this one too. Recommended.

A "Hollywood-ending" conclusion to what was otherwise a very well thought out series.

If in "Old man's war" Scalzi introduced us to a harsh universe where humanity has to fight, and fight hard, for every palm of space it wants to colonize, and in "The ghost brigades" he masterfully blended big strategy and personal conflict down to its resolution by superhero Dirac (who in the end convincingly exemplifies the victory of mind -or spirit- over matter), in "The last colony" his characters feel like over-powered cast members of a weekly SciFi show, surrounded by red-shirts with no other role in the plot but to die, more concerned with their happy little family than with interstellar affairs. The big strategy still works, to a point, the exploration of the logic of the imperialistic state starts promisingly and John Perry's banter with friend and foe still mostly shines, but in the end everything falls flat, into cliches, either half done or disappointingly unnuanced.

Cartoonish invulnerable characters, never wrong or in real danger? Check. Empowered mommy who always knows best and can kill an army with a fingernail? Check. (She reads minds too!) Pinocchio complex? Check. Twice for good measure. Deus (i.e., Consu) ex machina? Check!! The villains are also really good people, inter-racial brotherly love is the latest coolest newest thing and for some unexplained reason even the werewolves disappear halfway thru the book as soon as a little bit of sunlight shines on them. Somehow the "harsh" universe evolved into this bland experience of cotton candy, unicorns and pregnancies ...

Too bad Scalzi fell in love with his characters to the point he coudn't bear to kill any of them (or even their pets or their secretaries), or at least put them through pain or conflict anymore. Inevitably, by the last line of the last page everybody is deliriously happy --except the reader!

"The Last Colony" is not up to the level of its predecessors, which were some of the best science fiction- or just plain fiction- I've ever read. It seemed at times like the author was up against a deadline and cut some corners. What happened to the werewolf-like natives of Roanoke ? They receded into the background after one encounter. And the book suffers from some atrocious editing- Croatan is repeatedly misspelled, and there are too many sentences containing simple grammatical errors. I wish Scalzi could have taken more time with these great characters and sent them out in style.

The Last Colony, by John Scalzi, is the finale to a series (Old Man's War, The Ghost Brigades) on a futuristic society expanding throughout the galaxy. I have not read the other books in this series. What I can tell you is that The Last Colony works as a stand-alone book. I never once felt like I was missing material that affected my ability to understand the plot and the characters (although I suspect I would have enjoyed the book even more if I read the other books).

In The Last Colony, a small group of colonists find themselves caught (bait?) between two warring galactic powers. They are a sacrifice one side is willing to make, and the other anxious to accomplish. However, the colonists have different plans.

Enjoyable to the max. I look forward to reading more of Scalzi's work.

Overall, I highly recommend this book. I didn't like it as much as the previous books in the Old Man's War series, but I still thought it was a fine book. The difference between this book and its predecessors is in the way the characters are portrayed.

In the current novel, John Perry is no longer a soldier; that difference changes the entire tone compared to the previous books in the series. Likewise, Jane has become comfortable and happy with her life outside the military. Not a bad thing, but it makes this book feel qualitatively different from the previous books. I'd say this novel is only tangentially "military science fiction", though there is plenty of military action. Overall, it's well crafted.

If you appreciate wry humor in your Science Fiction, this is the novel for you. John Scalzi is witty and imaginative and has crafted another fine story.

This book is like watching your favorite TV series, in its 9th season, after all the writers and a few of the main actors have left....there's just no heart left in it. That and there wasn't ANY of the magic of Old Man's War here. Old Man's War is one of my favorite books of ALL time. LOVED IT, read it often... The Lost Colony, cash grab. Scalzi is starting to smell like Orson Scott Card. If you think you'd like to read more in this universe, do yourself a favor and just read Old Man's War again.

The Last Colony

This book is the latest in John Scalzi's series of super humans, and while many have considered him the next Heinlein, that bit gets bandied around way too much. He is not the next Heinlein but he is an phenomenal writer. The Old Man's war series (This is book 3 of the series) is some of the best writing to come out of the "brat pack" of authors (Sagan, Scalzi, and Doctorow) that are setting down some of the newer riffs in modern science fiction writing.

The last colony is a book about love, hope, betrayal, and stubbornness, and how all of that will overcome the best laid machinations of government and military. When you promote someone and give them freedom of action to do something, never be surprised that they will work on their own agenda rather than yours.

The story starts off with the Hero John Perry and his wife Sagan are talked into leading a colony after the events in Old Mans War and Sagan's story in the Ghost Brigades. We also learn how Zoe (adopted daughter) has become the icon of an alien race without emotions, and how the starting to be teenage daughter deals with that, along with colonizing a new planet. Of course everything also goes wrong, the combined space races have declared a moratorium on new colonies without approval of the interstellar alliance. If you do they wipe out your colony from orbit, which is not the way that you want to end your day. The interesting part about this is the colonial defense group does not want to be part of the alliance, but along comes Perry and Sagan. And things do not end up the way that anyone expected them to be. While there is no planned follow up and Zoe's Tale is not yet available, this is one universe that is worth exploring, and hopefully Scalzi will continue the story because it is compelling, interesting, and just plain fun to read science fiction.

Rated this book 5 stars, this is a must purchase, but get the whole series, this is the 3rd in the series, and you will really want the background information.

I enjoyed this book.

At first I thought it was going to be a fight to the death with the natives, or something like it, a la Frank Herbert and "The Jesus Incident". Then that scenario's whisked away for something else (BTW, whatever did happen to the werewolves?), which is quickly replaced by something else, etc.

There are a couple of moments when you go "Well, isn't that convenient!", particularly when the special forces do their thing to the fleet, and the Consu technology shows up out of nowhere, but hell, that's just picking nits. The bottom line is that I was hooked enough to read the whole thing in a couple of sessions over the weekend.

It's an enjoyable book where, in the end, all turns out well among honorable foes.