SF Masterworks Group discussion

Private William Mandella is a reluctant hero in an interstellar war against an unknowable and unconquerable alien enemy, but his greatest test will come when he returns home. Relativity means that for every few months' tour of duty centuries have passed on Earth, iscolating the combatants ever more from the world for whose future they are fighting.

I enjoyed this. The jumps in technology after each time phase are impressive. There are some quite funny situations; one of the most interesting was William Mandella's reactions on his return to a society where homosexuality was the preferred option! Quite gruesome at times, feels like a vietnam story set in deep space!

I just read this and it was excellent, the best thing being that it's allegorical message is still as pertinent to day as it was thirty five years ago.

Yes, the time lapse is used to create a black humour — tragic, amusing and politically profound. War, what is it good for — absolutely nothing, and even less in space and when it spans decades, centuries even.

The whole pointlessness of a war that goes on for so long is hammered home at the end with a nice ironic point (I won't give away the ending).