The Forgotten War

By Joe Haldeman

I wonder how I got to be my age without anyone turning me onto this book. A friend recommended it and I am so glad he did. It reminds me of all the wasted opportunities we have with friends and colleagues to find out the books that have moved or impacted them.


I have critiqued sci fi books or alternate reality books for not going deep enough into the worlds they are creating. This book is a shining example of how to do that simply and effectively. The story spans great expanses of time and effectively explores many different earths through future history.


This was a great book to follow my re-read of Ender's Game and will be a great set up for some of my future reads as I plan to explore more deeply the war/sci fi genre.


"So here we were, fifty men and fifty women, with IQ's over 150 and bodies of unusual health and strength, slogging elitely through the mud and slush of central Missouri, reflecting on the usefulness of our skill in building bridges on worlds where the only fluids an occasional standing pool of liquid helium." Location 269


"Sergeant Cortez was another story, a horror story." Location 319


"Relativity propped it up, at least gave it the illusion of being there the way all reality becomes illusory and observer-oriented when you study general relativity. Or Buddhism. Or get drafted." Location 714


"Desperate fun, as I said. Unless the war changed radically, our chances of surviving the next three years were microscopic. We were remarkably healthy victims of a terminal disease, trying to cram a lifetime of sensation into a half of a year." Location 2319


Book 9