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A review by furicle
Camouflage by Joe Haldeman
3.0
A very easy to read book, I breezed right through this one.
The premise is interesting, even if a bit hard to swallow, with two aliens among us and a mysterious artifact pulled out of the ocean.
Following the aliens through history has some really great moments of history brought to life, I wish he'd done more of it.
In fact, since both aliens are immortal I thought the whole time line was pretty rushed. Even though they keep telling themselves they have all the time in the world, most of the action is in the last couple of months, with a time line covering millions of years.
One alien is much more developed than the other as a character. I think it could have been a little less lopsided, although the emphasis on one is needed. Developing them is the main point of the book, and the best parts of it.
Reading the other reviews, I was surprised to note how much the sex in the book seemed to push people's buttons, and different people took it completely differently. I don't think there complaints are in the book as much as they are part of the reviewers viewpoint. At any rate, it didn't upset any of my preconceived ideas, so I didn't think it was objectionable. :-)
My real problem with this book is the humans. They start out as interesting, independent, big thinkers but then just dwindle away in importance. The love story takes over, and science pretty much gets tossed out the window. Sure, you can wave the Clarke 'indistinguishable from magic' quote around to try and help, but it still feels like cheating. Better hand waving was desperately required to save the ending.
All in all, worth reading, but not Haldeman's best by a fair margin.
The premise is interesting, even if a bit hard to swallow, with two aliens among us and a mysterious artifact pulled out of the ocean.
Following the aliens through history has some really great moments of history brought to life, I wish he'd done more of it.
In fact, since both aliens are immortal I thought the whole time line was pretty rushed. Even though they keep telling themselves they have all the time in the world, most of the action is in the last couple of months, with a time line covering millions of years.
One alien is much more developed than the other as a character. I think it could have been a little less lopsided, although the emphasis on one is needed. Developing them is the main point of the book, and the best parts of it.
Reading the other reviews, I was surprised to note how much the sex in the book seemed to push people's buttons, and different people took it completely differently. I don't think there complaints are in the book as much as they are part of the reviewers viewpoint. At any rate, it didn't upset any of my preconceived ideas, so I didn't think it was objectionable. :-)
My real problem with this book is the humans. They start out as interesting, independent, big thinkers but then just dwindle away in importance. The love story takes over, and science pretty much gets tossed out the window. Sure, you can wave the Clarke 'indistinguishable from magic' quote around to try and help, but it still feels like cheating. Better hand waving was desperately required to save the ending.
All in all, worth reading, but not Haldeman's best by a fair margin.