Fool's War - Book Review
Fool’s War
by Sarah Zettel started off very strong for me, but I was left a bit disappointed. Initially, I was captivated by the futuristic setting, and the initial main character, Katmer Al Shei. The female muslim engineer, captain and shareholder in the tradeship Pasadena feels very solid, and provides for a unique perspective in a sci-fi novel. When Dobbs, the real main character, a female Jester is brought on board to up the rating of the vessel’s rating, things get interesting as things quickly start to go wrong aboard the vessel (Entertainment is highly valued, to stave of the boredom of interstellar travel.)
Unfortunately, as the realities of the situation are revealed, we quickly leave a hard-feeling sci-fi world and enter into a fluffy emotional-cyber-space world. This is where things went a bit off for me. Had this later portion of the novel kept more of a hard science feel, I’d definitely recommend this book, but as it is, I’d primarily recommend it for the unique point of view… certainly worthwhile, but I feel it was weakened by the softening of the plot.