Need some good war-based sci-fi.

[Jared H.]

Hi, all! I seem to be on a bit of a war scifi binge, and I'd like some suggestions.

I've read "Armor," "Starship Troopers," and "When the Devil Dances,"(are the three subsequent books in Ringo's series as good or better?).

I've heard David Weber's good, but I'm not sure where to start. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

[Expletive Deleted]

In terms of Weber, start here (http://www.baen.com/library/). The first two books in the Honor Harrington series, ON BASILISK STATION and THE HONOR OF THE QUEEN, are free for download from Baen's site.

[Gordon Smith]

Look up the works of William Dietz and Keith Laumer if you are interested in 'war-based science fiction'. I greatly enjoyed Laumer's 'Bolo" series.

[BcAugust]

Actually, I'm going to say if you read Weber's sci fi, stay away from the Honor books and go for the other series. Honor is much more space opera(and meant to be) then the others. Mutineer's moon is much better, imo, with the last book being the best.

And I can't believe no one's mentioned David Drake yet. His "Hammers Slammers" are pretty much one of the giants in the genre, and his later stuff is even better. (I'm thinking he's one of the co writers of the Belisarius series, which is part sci fi, and worth a look in any case. Good stuff)

Also, you might want to pick up the BOLO series, by the late Kieth Laumer. I like some of the extended universe stuff better, but it's a good start.

(edited in)- Ah, and the Kzin series. It's a shared universe, and the books past the third are of decreasing quality, but the first three have some good stuff.


Hi, all! I seem to be on a bit of a war scifi binge, and I'd like some suggestions.

I've read "Armor," "Starship Troopers," and "When the Devil Dances,"(are the three subsequent books in Ringo's series as good or better?).

I've heard David Weber's good, but I'm not sure where to start. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

[kane]

A classic: "The forever war" by Joe Haldeman.

And just fun:
The warhammer 40.000 books.

[Shellhead]

The best science-fiction war writers are Jerry Pournelle, David Drake, and S.M. Stirling.

All three writers worship tactical geniuses in their stories. Pournelle also puts a heavy emphasis on honor, as well as the political and economic factors that lead to war. He's my favorite of the three.

Drake, best known for his Hammer's Slammers books on futuristic tank warfare, takes a dim view of human nature and sometimes has a bit of pulp or noir flavor to his writing.

Stirling wrote an interesting trilogy about the modern island of Nantucket being abruptly transported back to the Bronze Age, but his battle scenes feel a bit gimmicky. The good guys always start with superior tactics, superior morale, and superior technology, but they are vastly outnumbered by the bad guys. Then some unforseen complication happens during the battle, then the good guys pull some trick invented by Sun Tzu or some Civil War general and win the day.

I believe that all three of these writers have collaborated with each other on various books.

[Roquefort Raider]

A classic: "The forever war" by Joe Haldeman.


Oh, man, yeah!

It's not only great military sci-fi: it's great, period! (Which is why it won the Hugo and Nebula awards).

[Lightbend]

Oh, man, yeah!

It's not only great military sci-fi: it's great, period! (Which is why it won the Hugo and Nebula awards).

Not sure about Forever Peace, but I just finished the third book, Forever Free.

Oh yeah.

That was good.

And a little weird.

[Toreador]

Might also want to try some of the BattleTech books and the Berzerkers sagas by Saberhagen.

[Jared H.]

Thanks, for the help, everyone! BOLO and "The Forever War" will be the next ones I pick up.

oh, and Toreador, I forgot to mention Saberhagen earlier. I've read "Berserker's Star" and "Berzerker Kill" so far. Any further suggestions on which berzerker books I should look into?

[Atomlad]

For some good small unit action, I like the StarFist series by David Sherman and Dan Cragg.

Possibly my favorite series, Civil War vs. Alien Hordes, the Lost Regiment series by historian William R. Forschten. He also wrote a great Wing Commander book that is a space version of Pearl Harbor- Action Stations.

Space to Space- Honor Harrington series by David Weber.

Anything Bolo is good.

[Toreador]

The only Berzerker stories I can recall is one the Berzerkers go back in time to change a planets' past to get past its shields in the present time and a short story where a fighter pilot plays a chess-like game to delay a berzerker until backup arrives.

[regnak]

First a dissenting opinion on Honor Harrington. I never got the feeling that the villians had a snowballs chance in hell. Early on they seem very Keystone cops like and later when they get some competent people and start doing some damage, Weber produces godtech for his Manties so they slaughter the poor peeps like British vs Zulus. Only the Zulus had a chance to do some damage. All in all I consider that book, Ashes of Victory the worst military Sci Fi novel I have ever read. Also the politics become increasingly inserted into the later novels and can be summed up as "As you know Honor liberals suck." More than a bit heady handed IMO.

I recommend these two books by Richard Fawkes. The villians are actually dangerous and the protagonists are interesting.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0061057959/qid=1111631873/sr=8-2/ref=pd_csp_2/002-1036755-8911218?v=glance&s=books&n=507846

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0060536772/ref=pd_bxgy_img_2/002-1036755-8911218?v=glance&s=books

[Solaris]

I love both the Honor Harrington books and the Mutineer's Moon Trilogy (it's out in hardcover as one big book, titled "Empire from the Ashes"). You might want to try the Mutineer's books first, since it's only a trilogy. I can guarantee it will suck you in right away---very fast paced, and starts you off in book 1 (Mutineer's Moon) right in the middle of a starship mutiny.

TBH, the Honor books started out (IMO) as a modern tribute to C.S. Forrester's Horatio Hornblower books. If you like them, you'll like Honor.

[Kirayoshi]

I'd recommend "Guns of the South" by Harry Turtledove. '80s South African whites, in an effort to preserve their Apartheid government, travel back through time to the Civil War and supply General Lee with AK47s, hoping to insure that the Confederacy would dominate the continent.

Of course, anything by Harry Turtledove is at least interesting. He specialized in military-themed alternate histories. His latest book, "Days of Infamy", is an alternate WWII story in which Japan succeeds in totally occupying Hawaii after Pearl Harbor, and prepares an unobstructed attack on the American West Coast. He also did a series about a fantasy world facing a war very similar to the American Civil War.

[Solaris]

Arrgh. Forgot to mention something:

In the third book of Weber's Mutineer's Moon trilogy, there's a long segment involving gunpowder infantry warfare (much like the Civil War, including cannonry) that's frankly outstanding. It's not the "little toy men on a military board" kind of description, it's the "climbing over the guts of the first three ranks that were blown to smithereens by the hail of bullets" kind of description. You can smell the gunpowder when reading it. He did a great job with it.

[Fenris]

If you can find them, I'd very strongly recommend the There Will Be War anthologies, edited by Jerry Pournelle. There are around nine or ten of them.

They've got a wide variety of military SF short stories, along with a nonfiction article or two and some war poetry.

Unfortunately, you'll probably have to look in used bookstores. But they're well worth the effort of finding them!

[Nakor 408]

In the series, 1632 a bunch of gun-loving hillbillies from Grantville West Virginia travel back in time to Germany 1632. Their main objective is to establish the USE-United States of Europe to battle monarchism(I hope thats a word).He's right up there with Turtledove and S.M Stirling when it comes to alternate reality in my opinion.

[Libaax]

Great thread i have been hungry for some good military sf. Both some fun,action stories. The ones that are more thoughtprovoking is easy to find like Forever Peace.

I dont want space opera stuff either. I want the down,dirty gun to gun military stuff.

Like how in Starship Trooper you saw the infantry fight.

Im wondering where is the best place to start with Harry Turtledove and S.M Stirling ? Help please !

[Rabid Trekkie]

Great thread i have been hungry for some good military sf. Both some fun,action stories. The ones that are more thoughtprovoking is easy to find like Forever Peace.

I dont want space opera stuff either. I want the down,dirty gun to gun military stuff.

Like how in Starship Trooper you saw the infantry fight.

Im wondering where is the best place to start with Harry Turtledove and S.M Stirling ? Help please !

Don't know a lot about Stirling, but I have two of Turtledove's stand alone books which are still unread. He's got quite a few books that aren't part of a series, you'll probably be better off going to a used bookstore to find them though than one of the chain book stores.

Here's a great site I found that has a pretty extensive list of books by a lot of authors: www.fantasticfiction.co.uk

If you want a small sample of Turtledove to see if you like him, I'd suggest the short story collection Masterpieces. Don't remember the title of his entry, could be "The Road Not Taken" but I don't have the book on hand at the moment. It's still a great story that does include one battle and how history can take some radical turns. And most of the rest of the stories in the collection are wonderful. It's a really good sci-fi sampler.

[Beria]

Old Man's War is pretty good.

[Dan Felty]

At the risk of being far, far away from the tenor you're looking for, I recommend Slaughterhouse-Five.

[jabrams007]

Old Man's War is pretty good.

Old Man's War is better than pretty good. It is Excellent. Another book I really enjoyed was Cobras Two by Timothy Zahn which is unfortunately out of print now, but you should be able to get used pretty easily I imagine.

And I don't know if it fits what you're looking for exactly, but Ender's Game is a classic as well.

[sHayden]

Might also want to try some of the BattleTech books and the Berzerkers sagas by Saberhagen.

If you go for Battletech, I'd suggest The Blood of Kerensky trilogy by Michael Stackpole.

[Krichton]

Oh, man, yeah!

It's not only great military sci-fi: it's great, period! (Which is why it won the Hugo and Nebula awards).

That book was more about traveling thru space more than anything.

[Donald M.]

I can't give a first-hand reccomendation of them yet (I have the first two, but haven't got around to reading them.) but I've heard good things about John Scalzi's Old Man's War Trilogy.

[berk]

That book was more about traveling thru space more than anything.Well, you know what they say about war.

[Libaax]

Old Man's was was generic stuff that make military sf dull imo.

One of few impulse buys i seriously regret.....