Typhoons & Wars

Yay, even more books!

I just finished the last in the Japan Mystery series:
The Typhoon Lover.

Not my favorite of them, but it was nice to have Rei back in Japan.

Also, I reread Heinlein's Starship Troopers.

In December I read John Scalzi's Old Man's War and also the Ghost Brigades. These reminded me of Starship Troopers, because they are also about being drafted into an interstellar war (well, technically, volunteering for one, I guess). I very much enjoyed Scalzi's novels -- they have some interesting ideas about what would happen if you could draft older people into the army and then replace their bodies.

I also would recommend Joe Haldeman's Forever War if you wanted to read about future war -- it's commonly given as the "antidote" to Starship Troopers, being as it's a bit less pro-war. The protagonists there really are drafted. Haldeman's Forever Peace is maybe even better. It's not a sequel in the strict sense (none of the same characters) but it is thematically related. I really love Joe Haldeman -- I own every book he's published including the Star Trek novel and a few written under a pseudonym (and really, probably for the best that they are -- mermen aren't, perhaps, the best action hero-types).

Currently I'm reading Shannon Hale's The Goose Girl.

It's really good so far -- I'm maybe half-way through it. Isn't the cover gorgeous? This is the audiobook, but it's the same as my paperback copy. I really love the crackling effect.