Old Soldiers

Beneficial Accidents

Date of Review:  8, February, 2008
Space Opera:  Multiformat Ebook, Softcover, Hardcover
No Illustrations

For over a decade, some of the finest minds in Science Fiction have postulated the ability to "download" a human psych and memories to a very powerful computer, and thus save a personality in much the manner we save CD's and DVD's today.  In this book, David Weber postulates the accidental "downloading" of a human persona into the galaxy's most advanced fighting machine.

Synopsis:

Death and annihilation are the only winners. Its the end of the Melchorian - Human war. Both sides have battered the other to a bloody pulp.  Not much is left. What is left, is scattered by both sides like seeds in the wind, to cultivate and create new colonies, new civilizations.

This is the story of one such effort, closely followed and tracked by a cadre of Melchor, which choses in this novel to fight the Humans to end of existance.

It is also the personal story of Maneka Trevor and her Bolo Lazarus, how they survive each other's guilt from previous battles, how they create a plan which ensures the colony survival. What neither counted on was either or both of them surviving.

The Melchorian commander is about to try to grant their fondest wish.

Impression: 

David Weber is noted for his socialistic underpinnings to a well thought out space battle sequence.  In short the very definition of Space Opera.  He doesn't disappoint in this book.
This is a fitting companion to the first work BOLO!  What was just a footnote at the end of the previous work, is expanded and explains the ending to both books. 

All of us will be waiting now to read the next possible ending of the Melchorian war, where the Melchorians survive and then run into the mixed survivors.

Perhaps E. E. Doc Smith might have left the original novel hanging as a very tiny, "where did these characters come from?" but not David Weber.

He winds and twists an alternate ending to Melchorian and Human around one of the basic argumentative tenants in todays Science Fiction ... the downloading of a human psych and memories to a computer.  In this case a huge battle computer.

He side steps the internal conflict the accidental downloading might raise and how to solve it; by concentrating on the events which lead up to the event and then some sixty planetary years later.  Given that in the BOLO universe, these huge fighting machines have their own personalities, it seems like a waiting subplot with built in conflict is free for the taking.

David Weber knows what he writes best, and he wisely stays away from the venues which do not enhance this carefully crafted niche.

For fans of pure Space Opera, this is a great read, well worth the afternoon it takes.  If you are hoping given the premise, David Weber will step out of form and delve deeper into the controversy about downloading human psyches to computers, you will be greatly disappointed.


RATING:  7 Campfires

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Citations:

Link to Powells, Cover art from Soft Cover

Author / editors / anthologists:

David Weber

Title & length: 

  Old Soldiers

372 pgs

Publishing House & date:

Baen Books, ( http://www.baen.com )
Riverdale, NY 10471
January 2005, February 2007

ISBN & LCCC :

ISBN:         10: 1-4165-2104-6
ISBN:         13: 978-1-4165-2104-4

Comparable publications:

        Bolos!
        Troll
The Complete Bolo by Keith Laumer
The Honor of the Regiment
The Unconquerable

The Triumphant by David Weber & Linda Evans
Last Stand
Old Guard
Cold Steel

Bolo Brigade by William H. Keith, Jr.
Bolo Rising
Bolo Strike

The Road to Damascus by John Ringo and Linda Evans

Targeted readership:

Although written as PG material, do to the sensitive nature of discussions about what war is and is not, the reviewer feels this book is best targeted for 17 and up. 

0 Flames for sexual content.

Author's credentials:

(Excerpted From Wikpedia)

David Mark Weber is an American science fiction and fantasy author. He was born in Cleveland, Ohio in 1952. In his stories, he creates a consistent and rationally explained technology and society. Even when dealing with fantasy themes, the magical powers are treated like another technology with supporting rational laws and principles.

Many of his stories have military, particularly naval, themes, and fit into the military science fiction genre. He challenges current gender roles in the military by assuming that a gender-neutral military service will exist in his futures, and by frequently placing female leading characters in what have previously been seen as traditionally male roles, he has explored the challenges faced by women in the military and politics.

His most popular and enduring character is Honor Harrington whose alliterated name is an homage to C. S. Forester's character Horatio Hornblower. Her story, together with the "Honorverse" she inhabits, has been developed through 13 novels and four shared-universe anthologies, as of spring 2006.

Reviewer & reviewer credentials:

MD Johnson is a mountain northwest regional -- freelance author, living in Payette, Idaho. His writing interests include poetry, romance, westerns, science fiction, travel, and history. His work has appeared in a diverse range of publications including True Romance and Ballyhoo Stories. He has republished the 1935 western classic historical novel, “The Bitterroot Trail” as the anthologist. In early 2008, Mr. Johnson was nominated to join the National Book Critics Circle.

If you have a book or an ARC, you would like Mr. Johnson to review, please address your questions to him at queries@pencraft.biz.