Hat tip to Tom (one of our most active site denizens) for recommending this story. I knew of Greg Bear but when he was most popular my reading habit was curtailed due to SYFMS (struggling young family man syndrome). After reading Hardfought I’m looking forward to reading some more of Mr. Bear’s stuff.
Hardfought has a pretty complex structure and several important plot elements are intentionally obscured. This makes the beginning of the story confusing. But hang in there. It builds to a good effect. Because of the structure of the story I can’t go into much detail of the plot without spoiling it. Suffice it to say that this is a very interesting take on human-alien war. I liked the way Bear uses the details of stellar evolution (lack of heavier elements in first generation star populations) to define the contrast between the human and alien characteristics. The human characters appear strange to the reader. Their environment and social structures are very unusual and so it takes a little bit of plot revelation to start to put their behaviors into context. The alien protagonist’s behavior and motivation are intentionally inhuman but his interactions with his own species and with humans highlights several traits that make him useful to the resolution of the story.
The story is a meditation on the consequences of total war or war to extermination. I think it is asking whether survival at any cost actually is surviving. If what is left of you at the end is unrecognizable did you actually survive? And I don’t think Bear is answering the question. He is just illustrating the end of the trajectory. It is obvious to the reader what has been lost but everyone gets to decide if the price is too high.
A very interesting read. I’ll have to look through Bear’s other stuff and see what else I should try. Thanks again Tom.