The Forever War [Kindle Edition]

Joe Haldeman (Author), John Scalzi (Foreword)

Book Description

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A THOUSAND YEAR CONFLICT. ONE SOLDIER LIVES THROUGH IT ALL. CAN HE MAINTAIN HIS HUMANITY?

The Forever War is a science fiction classic that chronicles the life of William Mandella. Due to the time distortion associated with deep space travel, he is present during both the first and the last battle of a thousand year old conflict with the alien Taurans. A masterpiece of not just science fiction, The Forever War illustrates the futility of all wars and their effect on the human soul.
The Forever War won all major science fiction awards including the Hugo, Nebula and Locus. Ridley Scott, director of Blade Runner and Alien, is currently adapting this classic for film.

This is the author's preferred version and includes a foreword by John Scalzi, author of Old Man's War.

REVIEWS
"If there was a Fort Knox for science fiction, we'd have to lock Joe Haldeman up and throw away the key." — Steven King

"The Forever War is brilliant-one of the most influential war novels of our time. That it happens to be set in the future only broadens and enhances its message." — Greg Bear

“The Forever War is not just a great science fiction novel, it’s a great Vietnam war novel—and a great war novel, without qualification—that is also science fiction. A classic to grace either genre.” — Iain Banks

JOE HALDEMAN'S LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARDS
2010 Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Award for Lifetime Achievement
2009 Robert A. Heinlein Award
2004 Southeastern Science Fiction Lifetime Achievement Award
1996 New England Science Fiction Association Skylark Award (along with Gay Haldeman)
1989 Interzone Poll All Time Best Science Fiction Author

LITERARY AWARDS
2005 Nebula: Best Novel (Camouflage)
2004 Southeastern SF Achievement Award: Novel (Camouflage)
2004 James Tiptree Award (Camouflage)
2002 Asimov’s Reader Poll: Poem (January Fires)
2001 Rhysling Award: Long Poem (January Fires)
1999 Spanish Science Fiction Association Ignotus: Best Novel (Forever Peace)
1998 John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel (Forever Peace)
1998 Hugo: Best Novel (Forever Peace)
1998 Nebula: Best Novel (Forever Peace)
1997 Locus: Collection (None so Blind)
1995 Hugo: Short Story (None So Blind)
1995 Homer: Short Story (None So Blind)
1995 Science Fiction Chronicle Reader Awards (None So Blind)
1994 Southeastern SF Achievement Award: Short Story (Faces)
1994 Nebula: Best Short Story (Graves)
1993 World Fantasy Award: Best Short Story (Graves)
1991 Hugo: Best Novella (The Hemingway Hoax)
1991 Rhysling Award: Short Poem (Eighteen Years Old, October Eleventh)
1991 Nebula: Best Novella (The Hemingway Hoax)
1984 Rhysling Award: Long Poem (Saul’s Death)
1979 Analog Analytic Laboratory: Science Fact (This Space for Rent)
1977 Hugo: Short Story (Tricentennial)
1977 Locus: Short Story (Tricentennial)
1976 Hugo: Best Novel (The Forever War)
1976 Locus: Best Novel (The Forever War)
1976 Ditmar Award (The Forever War)
1976 Nebula: Best Novel (The Forever War)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

In the 1970s Joe Haldeman approached more than a dozen different publishers before he finally found one interested in The Forever War. The book went on to win both the Hugo and Nebula Awards, although a large chunk of the story had been cut out before it saw publication. Now Haldeman and Avon Books have released the definitive version of The Forever War, published for the first time as Haldeman originally intended. The book tells the timeless story of war, in this case a conflict between humanity and the alien Taurans. Humans first bumped heads with the Taurans when we began using collapsars to travel the stars. Although the collapsars provide nearly instantaneous travel across vast distances, the relativistic speeds associated with the process means that time passes slower for those aboard ship. For William Mandella, a physics student drafted as a soldier, that means more than 27 years will have passed between his first encounter with the Taurans and his homecoming, though he himself will have aged only a year. When Mandella finds that he can't adjust to Earth after being gone so long from home, he reenlists, only to find himself shuttled endlessly from battle to battle as the centuries pass. --Craig E. Engler

Review

"To say that The Forever War is the best science fiction war novel ever written is to damn it with faint praise. It is, for all its techno-extrapolative brilliance, as fine and woundingly genuine a war story as any I've read."
--William Gibson, author of Neuromancer, Spook Country

"There are a handful of moments when an American science fiction novel abruptly and seemingly effortlessly satisfied every possible expectation conveyed not only by the genre's ambitions, but of those of the whole literary landscape with which it was contemporary: Sturgeon's More Than Human, Dick's The Man In The High Castle, LeGuin's Dispossessed, Gibson's Neuromancer. The Forever War is one such book, and like those others still carries with it that air of recognition and possibility."
--Jonathan Lethem, author of Gun With Occcasional Music, Fortress of Solitude

"Perhaps the most important war novel written since Vietnam . .  . Haldeman, a veteran, is a flat-out visionary . . . and protagonist William Mandella's attempt to survive and remain human in the face of an absurd almost endless war is harrowing hilarious heartbreaking and true  . . . like all the best works of literature THE FOREVER WAR takes you apart and then, before you can turn that last page, puts you back together: better, wiser, more human.  Simply extraordinary."
--Junot Diaz, Pulitzer Prize winning author of The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

"If there was a Fort Knox for Science Fiction writers, we'd have to lock Joe Haldeman up."
--Stephen King, author of The Shining, The Dead Zone, The Stand

"The Forever War is not just a great Science Fiction novel, it's a great Vietnam war novel - and a great war novel, without qualification- that is also Science Fiction.  A classic to grace either genre."
--Iain M. Banks, author of Use of Weapons, The Player of Games, Matter

"FOREVER WAR is brilliant--one of the most influential war novels of our time. That it happens to be set in the future only broadens and enhances its message."
--Greg Bear, author of Moving Mars, Eon, The Forge of God

“A parable whose lessons are needful learning once more.”
--John Scalzi, author of Old Man’s War, The Ghost Brigades, Zoe’s Tale

"I first read this twenty years ago and have never forgotten the wonder and fury it kindled at the time.  Anyone who talks about the glory of war has obviously never read it.  A beautifully detailed and intensely personal account of a conflict which lasts for over a thousand years, as told by one grunt who lives through it all.  Only a writer as skillfull and knowledgeable as Haldeman could use war's dark glamour to lure the reader in and then deplou the sam fascination to show just what kind of effect this orchestrated barbarism can have on the human soul."
--Peter F. Hamilton, author of Pandora’s Star, Judas Unchained, The Dreaming Void

“In a literature of ideas, The Forever War is a titan: a book filled with mind-bending ideas about relatavistic time-distortion and world-shaking ideas about the futility of war. In today's world, where we think declaring war on abstract nouns like TERROR is a winning strategy, we need THE FOREVER WAR."
--Cory Doctorow, author of Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, Little Brother X

“It is to the Vietnam War what Catch-22 was to World War II, the definitive, bleakly comic satire.”
--Thomas M. Disch, author of Camp Concentration, 334

"The Forever War does what the very best science fiction does. It deals with extremes both societal and teleological; it places a frame around humankind's place in the universe to show us what is outside the frame; and it functions simultaneously at the literal and metaphorical level.  Inarguably one of the genre's great novels, it is also among the finest novels ever written about war."
--James Sallis, author of The Long Legged Fly, Drive, Cripple Creek

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• File Size: 639 KB
• Print Length: 292 pages
• Page Numbers Source ISBN: B004CJNLHO
• Simultaneous Device Usage: Unlimited
• Publisher: Ridan Publishing (August 29, 2012)
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
• Language: English
• ASIN: B005BVM9YI
• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• X-Ray: Enabled
• Lending: Enabled
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,190 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
  • #1 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction > Science Fiction > Time Travel
  • #2 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction > Science Fiction > Classics
  • #9 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction > War

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

202 of 207 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars TERRIFIC January 4, 2002

By B.D. Milligan

Format:Mass Market Paperback

I was somewhat taken aback by the style of this novel at first. After reading a few dozen pages, however, I could clearly see why this book is considered classic military science fiction. This is a fascinating contrast to Starship Troopers.

Haldeman's style is terse and effective, seasoned with a sly sense of humor throughout. The protagonist, William Mandella, is a likeable military everyman with whom a reader readily identifies. The battle scenes are particularly well done, allowing a reader to easily follow the action without the confusion that would plague a less skillful account.

The Forever War is notable for its exploration of the temporal effects of faster than light travel, i.e., Mandella's tours of duty last hundreds of years on earth, while for him, only a few years pass. Mandella goes forth to battle, having no idea what type of home will await him in the unlikely event that he survives. Eventually, Mandella is rendered a human anachronism, a veteran in command of troops he can barely understand.

The parallels with Vietnam were mostly lost on me, as I'm too young to relate, but the theme of coming home to a world one no longer recognizes is more than ably developed. Another theme that gets a lot of play is that of the unintended consequences of social engineering as Earth's society "evolves." Some of the changes to Earth that Mandella witnesses are disturbing, many are humorous, and the final chapter is extremely unusual and thought-provoking.

More than just a cold military fantasy, The Forever War has a surprising emotional impact as well. Best of all, Haldeman makes his points with subtlety and humor, not by nailing them into your skull. A terrific read that I would recommend to anyone without hesitation.

155 of 166 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Space opera with a humanistic heart. Superb! January 17, 2004

By Claude Avary

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

Haldeman originally wrote this novel as an allegory of the Vietnam war, told through the eyes of a reluctant soldier caught up in a battle that never seemed to end, while the world he left behind changed drastically. However, it applies to all wars, in any time, and the book has never lost its timeliness.

Main character William Mandella serves in the war against the mysterious Taurans, which, because of time dilation udring his spaceship travels, lasts for seven hundred years while Mandella ages only ten. Earth alters, lifestyles completely change, and Mandella wonders the purpose of the senseless warfare.

Although specifically allegorical, Haldeman's novel is powerful enough to apply to all combat. In a way, this could be seen as the opposite to Heinlein's _Starship Troopers_, with reluctant soldiers caught in purposeless combat, and a hero who is neither more skilled or heroic than any other solider around him-he has merely lasted longer than the others. The book has many great touching moments in between the furious combat scenes (a few of which are confusing), such a Mandella's separation from his love Marygay Potter, and a sad return to an Earth that has aged beyond their understanding.

A deserving classic of many awards, and I'm sure it will never age as long as warfare is still with us.

70 of 77 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Space 'Nam January 18, 2000

By jj

Format:Mass Market Paperback

"The Forever War" is authored by a Vietnam Veteran who uses the colorful setting of the future "Forever" War as an allegory for The 'Nam and the feelings of its vets. This powerful book grabs the reader quickly and throws him straight into the first-person world of William Mandela, would-be physics professor turned soldier by the Earth's military fight alien Taurans in a war with nebulous origins. Due to complications posed by relativity, each time the combatants engage, the battle is completely lopsided because one race will have the technological advantages endowed by time on their side. For example, if Earth sends a mission that takes 300 years for the mission to reach it's goal, the enemy already had 300 years to prepare and upgrade defenses, so the mission's tech is obsolete. Then, if the Taurans attack our outpost, the same thing happens. With no communication between the two races, no chance of winning, but the ever present chance of defeat, an eternal war is created. Halderman also captures the disorientation experienced by GIs who came back from horrific combat, and were expected to instantly adjust to 1960's "Ozzy and Harriet" American culture. The "Forever War" has a cynical ring that I instantly loved, as well as sublimely juxtaposing the positive and negative potentials of humans as individuals and a race. The military details are right on target, from the lingo and attitudes to soldiers' attitudes. Overall, I'd definitely recommend "The Forever War" to anyone with an interest in Sci-Fi. It'll also teach you about the motivations of warriors who turn peacemakers.

More About the Author

Joe Haldeman has served twice as president of the Science Fiction Writers of America and is currently an adjunct professor teaching writing at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Amazon Author Rankbeta 

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#68 in Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Science Fiction

#69 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction

#68 in Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Science Fiction

#69 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction