Forever Peace

As a preface to Forever Peace, Haldeman says, "This book is not a continuation of my 1975 novel The Forever War. From the author's point of view it is kind of a sequel..." From a readers point of view it has little to do with The Forever War, though it is usually listed as the second in a series. In terms of reading order, I think it doesn't matter at all which is read first.

Forever Peace is a kind of military sci-fi cyberpunk intrigue story. It isn't really cyberpunk in the same way as Gibson's Necromancer, which defines the genre, but it does have a touch of that. It's built around a kind of cyber-tech version of the Vulcan mind meld. The story tension continually builds throughout the story, reaching climax at the end, a real page turner as they say. The ending does seem a little rushed, almost as if the author felt that the climax had been reached and so, just wrap it up.

There was an odd device that Haldeman used throughout the book. He switched back and forth from first person the third person. I found it mildly annoying when the protagonist was "I" in one paragraph and "he' or "Julian" in the next.