Military Science Fiction
Starship Troopers by Robert A. Heinlein: service, citizenship and war
An influential, readable, deliberately provocative novel. A good war story wrapped around a political argument that has not stopped being interesting. Read it knowing the book is making a case, agree or disagree, and you will get what it has to offer.
Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card: the child they built a fleet around
A sharp, efficient, genuinely unsettling novel that most readers finish in a weekend and keep thinking about for years. Read it for the plot, and notice that under the plot it is a book about adults deciding what a child is for.
The Forever War by Joe Haldeman: the war that outlives you
A short, furious, humane novel, and one of the very few war novels in the genre written by someone who had been there. The science fiction is simple and the argument is not. Read it for the time dilation and stay for what it says about leaving and coming home.
Old Man’s War by John Scalzi: old soldiers, new bodies
A confident debut with a premise strong enough to carry a series and a narrator good enough to carry the book. Funny for as long as it can be and serious when it has to be. Read it for the hook and stay for how honestly Scalzi takes the consequences of his own idea.
Duty Before Honor by Gus Cadle: a short, sharp war story
A short, sincere military story with one idea and one turn, and it lands both. Fifty-one pages is not enough room for the setting the author is reaching for, and he seems to know it. Read it in a sitting and expect a twist rather than a campaign.
Sword by D. Rebbitt: a fleet learning how to attack
Fleet combat with a real sense of cost. Read it for the tactics and the command politics, and start the series at book one rather than here.
Machine World by B. V. Larson: Earth’s only export is its soldiers
Fast, pulpy military science fiction that knows exactly what it is. Read it for McGill and the pace, having started at book one.
The Last Marines by Lawrence N. Oliver: two hundred years too late
A man-out-of-time military story with a genuinely good hook. Read it for the premise and the two leads, and go in forgiving of the prose.
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