The Epsilon War (The Epsilon Wars Book 1)

Epsilon Eridani

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He soon becomes the objectively oldest surviving soldier in the war, attaining high rank through seniority rather than ambition, as he is essentially a pacifist who acts mostly from talent and a melancholic sense of duty. He and Potter who has remained his last link with the Earth of his youth are eventually given different assignments, meaning that even if they both survive the war they will never see one another again due to time dilation. After briefly contemplating suicide, Mandella assumes the post of commanding officer of a "strike force", commanding soldiers who speak a language largely unrecognizable to him, whose ethnicity is now nearly uniform 'vaguely Polynesian ' in appearance and who are exclusively homosexual.

He is disliked by his soldiers because they have to learn 21st century English to communicate with him and other senior staff, and because he is heterosexual. Engaging in combat thousands of light years away from Earth, Mandella and his soldiers need to resort to medieval weapons in order to fight inside a stasis field which neutralizes all electromagnetic radiation in anything not covered with a protective coating.

It turns out to be the last conflict of the war. Humanity has begun to clone itself, resulting in a new, collective species calling itself simply Man. Unlike its predecessor Man is able to communicate with the Taurans, who are also clones. It is discovered that the war started due to a misunderstanding; the colony ships were lost to accidents and those on Earth with a vested interest in a new war used these disappearances as an excuse to begin the conflict. The futile, meaningless war, which had lasted for more than a thousand years, ends. Man has established several colonies of old-style, heterosexual humans, just in case the evolutionary change proves to be a mistake.

Mandella travels to one of these colonies named "Middle Finger" in the definitive version of the novel where he is reunited with Marygay, who had been discharged much earlier and had taken trips in space to use time dilation to age at a much slower rate, hoping for Mandella's return. The epilogue is a news item from the year announcing the birth of a "fine baby boy" to Marygay Potter-Mandella. The novel is widely perceived to be a portrayal of the author's military service during the Vietnam War , and has been called an account of his war experiences written through a space opera filter.

Haldeman received a letter from Robert Heinlein congratulating him on his Nebula Award, which "meant more than the award itself". It was first published as a serial in Analog Magazine before its first book publication in Since then, many editions of The Forever War have been published.

Editions published prior to were abridged for space by the original editor omitting the middle section, a novella titled You Can Never Go Back. These early paperback editions have "a white cover showing a man in a spacesuit with a sword, with symbolic clocks all around," according to the author, with alternatively the first hardcover edition featuring a large hourglass with planets falling through it.

The edition restored many expurgated sections, primarily dealing with the changes that befall human civilization over the course of William Mandella's life. This version's cover "has a futuristic soldier who looks like Robin Williams in a funny hat," as Haldeman notes, "But alas, not all of the changes got in, and the book has some internal contradictions because of things left over from the [earlier version].

In , Avon published the version that Haldeman called "definitive", with "everything restored" and "a less funny cover illustration.

It featured as the first novel re-printed in the series, and the cover shows a close-up of Marygay Potter with soldiers and spaceships in the background. This is the same version as the Avon publication and has the same Author's Note. In , Haldeman, at the request of Robert Silverberg , wrote Marygay's first-person account of her time of separation from Mandella.

It included not only the military details but also the difficulty of coping as a lone heterosexual woman with a society where same-sex relations are the inflexible norm. The story was included in Silverberg's anthology Far Horizons , and later was the title story in the collection of Haldeman stories A Separate War and Other Stories In his "Notes on the Stories" for that collection, Haldeman commented that "it was fun to write her story, both as a bridge to the sequel Forever Free and as an oblique commentary on The Forever War , twenty years later.

The cover depicts a futuristic gun barrel stuck into the ground with a smashed spacesuit helmet placed on top. The author's note at the start of the book describes the edition as containing the definitive versions.

The Emissary (The Earth Epsilon Wars, Book 1)

The most recent print edition was released in with an additional foreword by John Scalzi. The cover art depicts a soldier in a spacesuit in a jungle environment. The cover art depicts a soldier in a war torn setting looking down at the helmet of a fallen comrade. Stuart Gordon adapted the novel for Chicago's Organic Theater Company in , in part as a reaction to what Gordon considered the "ultra-sanitized video game" style Star Wars brought to science fiction.

Young as William Mandella. Belgian comic writer Marvano has, in cooperation with Haldeman, created a graphic novel trilogy of The Forever War. With some very minor changes and omissions to storyline and setting, it faithfully adapts the same themes in visual style.

In October , Ridley Scott announced that, after a year wait for the rights to become available, he was making a return to science fiction with a film adaptation of The Forever War. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. This article is about the science-fiction novel. For other uses, see The Forever War disambiguation.

The Forever War comics. Destiny Lost 1. Ignite the Stars with Amy DuBoff 2.

New Canaan 3. Orion Rising 4. The Scipio Alliance 5. Attack on Thebes 6.

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