Author: Joe Haldeman Winner of the Nebula Award back in 1975, The Forever Wardepicts the consequences of an interstellar war which is a war taking place between two distinct species from different planetary systems: in this case, humanity and the Taurans. In the novel, human soldiers travel across galaxies in order to engage in futuristic combat with the alien threat; however, unlike other sci-fi novels like Robert Heinleins Starship Troopers, the depiction of combat isnt the central concern of the book, nor is the glorification of future technologies. In fact, the novel is far more concerned with the personal consequence of war than war itself. For example, due to time dilations, the characters in the story only experience a few years of actual combat despite several decades passing by on Earth. In that time, human society has developed drastically, most notably in regards to the prevalence of alternate forms of sexuality, something that the returning soldiers have great difficulty accepting. In many ways, Haldeman uses science-fiction as a backdrop to tell a story about the Vietnam War; the title suggests a degree of futility, and the way the soldiers are treated upon their return mirrors the treatment of Vietnam veterans in the 1960s. In a sense, the novel is about trauma; however, its also about memory, and the ways a society can choose to forget certain unflattering details of its own past.
