The Last Colony - John Scalzi

Just stop at Ghost Brigades

I read both of the previous books: Old Man's War and Ghost Brigades and this Last Colony was a huge let-down.
There are several brief part of this book that got me somewhat interested, but overall it is rather boring.
Writing is down right bad. Scalzi's characters all talk as if it was the same person. John Perry, who in the first book was wisecrack, here becomes just a guy who has to be the one to finish the already annoying conversations.
Almost no new ideas or technology were introduced - although some were stolen from, for example, The Forever War.
If Old Men's War was an "A-", Ghost Brigades was a solid "B", this barely scrapes by with a "C-"
Don't read it, just stop at Ghost Brigades.

Not the strongest of the 3 but a good wrap up novel.

I gave this a 3, it was an enjoyable read but not up to the quality of the first or 2nd book. Still, Scalazi is a great writer so if you enjoyed the first 2 books I would recommend this. This books attempts to wrap up some of the major problems facing Humanity and surprisingly our leads play a big role in this. It focuses on John & Jane Perry, the protag's of the first 2 novels.

Something I would have liked to have seen is the reunion of John & Jane. In the first book they "meet" and she turns out to be a clone of his former wife. They begin a relationship that is sidelined due to their service in the war - understandable. And there was some remorse there, the chance of them both living thru the war was very very slim. So it was bittersweet for them to have met and not "be together" At the end of the 2nd book Jane is discharged as a reward for service and she gets to adopt a daughter and also gets to have John discharged early also. Great! But we don't get to SEE that. The CU says its happening and then this book takes places many years later - 8 years? So they are a happily married couple with their teenage adopted daughter. Awesome - but they would have been great to SEE! Its the old "show us" don't "tell us" rule of writing.

Complaints: the books veers wildly from 1 plot to another. First its about the Perry's being drafted to lead a new colony and thats starts getting "good." Then its about a Galactic Federations' attempt to squash Humanity and the Colony issues are sidelined. Then its about Earth being kept in the dark about all the above machinations and John Perry attempts to do something about all this. Jane Perry is in the book a lot, but is sidelined to supporting role. She was really the more interesting of the 2 IMHO.

So, its good fun read if you like the first 2 but its very different. There is a lot of talk in the book, especially at the beginning and it takes a long time for any action to kick in. I don't mean to sound like I hated it but it could have been a much much better book.

Scalzi spreads his wings...

John's work on the latest installment in this universe delivers on the promise made in Old Man's War. The whole of human entry in a hostile universe is held in the balance with a desperate set of double cross, political machinations. Scalzi's very likeable, irreverent characters must shepherd a new human colony (named Roanoke) through a ban imposed by a monolithic alien alliance.

His development of the Obin, the teenage charge of his two protagonists and the politics of the human empire are fist rate. Shades of Heinlen and Asimov creep into the well written text. The novel continues to introduce new technology, societal concerns and interesting ethical dilemmas.

I found Scalzi's style getting better with each page and the twists and turns in the books to be genuinely surprising. My only regret is that this appears to be the last book in this universe from an emerging master.

Bravo!

Preface: For those of you who have not read the two previous books in this trilogy by John Scalzi, Old Man's War and The Ghost Brigades, this book might be confusing; while this story can stand alone, to some extent, the fictional universe and most of the characters all come out of the first two books.

In this universe, humans have spread out into the stars, created colonies, and formed the Colonial Union. They also found other intelligent races, many of whom were into colonizing planets -- sometimes the same planets humans wanted, or ones humans had already colonized. The Colonial Defense Force was formed to protect the human colonies, and fight the inter-species wars. Where does the Colonial Defense Force get its recruits? That story is told in "Old Man's War", where we meet John Perry, who leaves Earth to become a soldier. He later marries Jane Sagan, whose story is the focus of "Ghost Brigades".

Story of "The Last Colony": John Perry and Jane Sagan have survived their tours of duty with the Colonial Defense Force and, with their adopted daughter, Zoe, retired to administrative, civilian jobs on the human colony, Huckleberry. Then, their former boss, General Rybicki, talks them into becoming colony leaders of a new colony, Roanoke. Along with settles from ten different human colonies, they arrive at Roanoke -- except it is the wrong planet! They find out that the Colonial Union has stranded them there, intentionally and without contact with anyone else.

Why did this happen? The mystery gradually unravels, with universe-wide political and military aspects, putting the colony of Roanoke in the crosshairs of just about everybody, including the Colonial Union. Can John Perry and Jane Sagan lead their colony and help them survive? Are Perry and Sagan savvy enough, tough enough, clever enough, and daring enough to not only unravel the mystery, but find a solution that saves every character in the book? There are enough twists, turns, and surprises here to please any roller coaster enthusiast.

The Writing: My first John Scalzi book was Old Man's War, and I felt that it was ten steps beyond "good". That continues to be true here, with characters that are well-developed and realistic, despite their fantastical natures. The Savitri character was a lot of fun, as she acted as Perry's assistant and continually bantered with him and kept him humble. The pace is good and the flow is fairly even, although the part after the founding of the Roanoke colony is a bit slow, and I wondered if the book was going to be too similar to Allen Steele's "Coyote" series. When the pace picks back up, though, watch out! It is like watching a chess game where half of the pieces are trying to take control and be the one playing the game. John Scalzi comes close here to the complexity of Frank Herbert in Dune, 40th Anniversary Edition (Dune Chronicles, Book 1) ("a feint within a feint within a feint"). Overall, there is little less action than in the previous two books, but this one also comes off as more personal and interactionally rich.

Just when you think it is over, then Bam! The ending is not only beautiful but left me with a true admiration for the character of John Perry, and a wish that he was running for office, so that I could vote for him.

-- Chris McCallister, author of Coming Full Circle

I'm going to turn up the chorus...

...by adding my voice to it. I discovered John Scalzi via word of web right here on Amazon and took a chance on the first in this series "Old Man's War".
I loved it so much I went right for "Ghost Brigades" and got all Summer of '67 on that one, too.
So, "The Last Colony" was next in the deck and, surprisingly, turned out to be my favorite of the trio.
Now I'd give all three books four stars but Scalizi's Zelazny-esque wicked sense of humor and lean but bomb-pumped prose really shines on this, the latest in the series.
I was going to say "last" (seeing as how he alluded to it being so in his acknowledgments) but I see (Yay!) that another book "Zoe's Tale" is scheduled to be published in August of this year.
Happy, that makes me.

If you love Military SF with heart, soul and humor you will love all three of the books in this series.
An aside, you might wonder why I didn't give them five stars? Well, as wonderful as they are I tend to save that fifth shiner for books that I will read a billion times over a lifetime. Books like "Lord of Light", "Neuromancer" and "Dune" get my cinco de starro ratings, but it doesn't mean that Scalzi's books aren't superb reads...because trust me, they are.