io9
David Drake hit a career snag in the late 1990s. Drake, who had helped to create the military science fiction genre with his Hammer's Slammers books, saw a shrinking market for novels about interstellar warfare. So Drake switched to fantasy, and then space-opera. Now, Drake is back writing more Hammer's Slammers stories, and military SF seems to be having a comeback. What happened?
There was a boom in military SF in the early 90s, which ended up harming the genre, Drake writes on his website. Military SF
had been so hot a genre that quite a number of opportunists had gotten into it despite their lack of knowledge of the military and/or skill at writing. I'd seen this coming (the downsizing of the US military had by itself removed millions of potential readers from barracks where they had a great deal of time on their hands), but I couldn't get anybody to listen to me.So Drake (whose first novel was fantasy) moved back into epic fantasy with 1997's Lord of the Isles, and space opera with the Lt. Leary series. His career has stayed diversified since then, but he's returned to the Hammer's Slammers stories. And Nightshade Press has put out the Complete Hammer's Slammers.
Meanwhile, the military SF genre seems to have gained a new lease on life with John Scalzi's Old Man's War series, John Birmingham's Axis of Time trilogy, and Richard Morgan's Broken Angels, a sequel to Altered Carbon about a space war. The Military SciFi site lists a bunch of new and forthcoming military SF books, including John C. Wright's Null-A Continuum, the anthology Warfear, Jack Campbell's The Lost Fleet: Courageous and Starfist by David Sherman and the awesomely named Dan Cragg.
I wrote to David Drake to ask him if he thought military SF had bounced back, and here's what he said:
Yes, Military SF has rebounded, though it's also being confused with the rebound in space opera. Quite a lot of what's being called Military SF today—including my RCN (Leary/Mundy) series—is really space opera, in my opinion.So I had to ask Drake what the difference was between space opera and military science fiction, in his view. He responded:There was always a lot of space opera around, but media tie-ins filled that niche until the collapse of the Star Trek franchise. There's now room for Honor Harrington, Miles Vorkosigan, et al; and these series tend to be lumped in with Military SF.
But the US is also at war, and it's not politically correct nowadays to hate soldiers the way it was in the '70s when I started writing the Hammer series.
Some of what's appearing is patriotic and indeed triumphalist, the sort of thing that was a staple of Astounding under John W Campbell. That doesn't happen to be what I write (or ever wrote); but there's room for me too.
Mostly now I'm writing space opera and fantasy, though. That's not due to a change in the market so much as me having gotten my head a little straighter since I wrote Redliners. I'm now able to write what I want to write rather than feeling a compulsion to do harsher work.
The bad places are still there in my head — The Darkness is one of my most recent stories and one of my bleakest — but I'm not forced to look at them all the time.
The difference is intent: a focus on adventure rather than a focus on the military. There's an enormous amount of warfare in both the Skylark series (by Smith) and the Cities in Flight series (by Blish), but those are space operas. Whereas Starship Troopers (Heinlein) and Dorsai! (Dickson) are military SF. In my parlance.It definitely makes sense that military SF would have more popularity during a war. Military SF helps people process the realities of war, either by critiquing or by idealizing (and sometimes both in the same book.) Also, many of the most successful video games of recent years, like the Halo series, have been military SF. Most of all, as our own natural resources get scarcer, it's harder and harder to imagine encounters with extraterrestrial sentients that don't involve fighting over land, or water, or power sources. Call it the new Hobbesian cosmos.
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Most of all, as our own natural resources get scarcer, it's harder and harder to imagine encounters with extraterrestrial sentients that don't involve fighting over land, or water, or power sources. Call it the new Hobbesian cosmos.
That being the problem with Military SF: it's as unimaginative and nearsighted as our policy makers. Why imagine a future in which super-efficient solar and wind power creates a culture of exploration and creativity when you can just use tactical nukes to steal scarce resources form aliens?
Having read a stack of these types of books over Xmas, I found myself disappointed and annoyed. I like good SF (military or otherwise), but I've read better Executioner and Able Team novels. Never a big fan of Drake either.
I found myself drifting towards older SF novels after that binge.
Only series I enjoy is the Lost Fleet. Not great, but it is a decent time waster. Not gotten bloated like Honor Harrington.
In my less than profound opinion, Starfist is a waste of time.
@Gyrus:
Sadly, that will never happen because it has been our nature. It's been our (stupid) way. The explorers gave way to the conquestitors in a matter of a decade when the "OLD" world met the "NEW" world. I think the Haldeman's Forever War showed that when the UNEF went from the United Nations EXPLORATORY Force to United Nations Exploratory FORCE.
Never, EVER, under ANY circumstances listen to anyone in the scifi community when they tell you something is dead. Things are dead in scifi the way comic book superheroes die. Scifi people just LOVE to pronounce things dead, even their ENTIRE GENRE.
Frankly, the entire SF genre is rather incestuous. Bits and pieces get grafted onto other parts all the time. It's one of the few genres where you can literally take two completely random concepts/ideas, mash them together and make it work. You can always take whatever the new idea on the block is, add robots/telepathy/aliens/AI and go with it.
What this leads to is that in order to define ANY fixed sub-genre within SF, you have to really narrow your criteria. So, it doesn't take much drift before you can't find anything that matches the narrow criteria any more. What has happened is that the stories and ideas have evolved, not died, but the specific criteria you are looking for is no longer valid.
I don't recall reading much of Drake, though I certainly know the books.
So Webber (honor Harrington) isn't military sci-fi? I know his later novels are more intruige and polotics, but the characters are primarily military, correct?
Maybe I'm getting things confused with the Starfire books.
I read Hammer's Slammers, but was more taken with Laumer's Bolo books and stories, since it was often interesting to watch him weave tales of war machines trying to come to grips with their function.
How about Forever War by JHaldeman. That's one the greatest in the Military SF genre. And some elements of awesome weaponry in Revelation Space by Alastair Reynolds. Indeed the full visual effects of m-sf can be seen in games nowadays. Haven't played Halo, but the Home World series is one of the best in space wars. An interesting ending to the article. It is like we would eventually end up in a space war, maturing fast technologically and being paranoid of everything at the same time. Maybe our first contact will be our last contact as well.
@Seth L: I'd call it MilSciFi - or at least weapon pr0n... what with the paragraphs and pages describing vectors, delivery systems, technical advances, and such.
The Axies of Time series is a perfect example of opportunism, the third book was an incredible disappointment. Stick with Hammers Slammers and Old Man's War, both awesome series. Historical military fiction has exploded during this time though so don't miss out on Gate of Fire or Imperium!
@Gyrus: Unfortunatly, I don't think it's going to happen.
The thing that appeals to me most isn't a particular genre, but a focus on characters who make sense. It's one reason Bujold's Vorkosigan novels are favorites: each of the characters is damaged in some essential way, and they react to whatever outre situation they find themselves in through that lens.
The first season and a half of Battlestar Galactica did this too, superbly.
A lot of so-called military sci-fi might as well be later-stage Tom Clancy, focused on technology and acronyms to the detriment of story, motivation, and empathy for the characters.
I've never read MilSF outside of RH or WH40K. But then, why would I?
@Seth L:
Sometimes it's not possible to pigeon-hole an author's works in one specific sub-genre. Weber could be classed as Military, Political and Space-Operatic, since he incorporates elements of each. In another area, however, he is going somewhat more 'pure military' with his resurrection/tribute to Keith Laumer's BOLO series. Even these, however, could not be called pure military science fiction. Mostly, it's hard to find a pure ANYTHING in Science Fiction, anymore.
And for those interested in single works of military scienct fiction, might I also recommend A.E. Van Vogt's WAR AGAINST THE RULL ... ? Be nice to see THAT made into a movie, some day. Also don't forget Keith Laumer's PLAGUE OF DEMONS: another excellent, stand-alone work.
@Ryan.H:
Agreed.
40k people. Games Workshop is doing their job, and spreading the 41st millinium love around. I kid.
Man-Kzin Wars?
@strider_mt2k: Known space always struck me more as sociology-with-guns than MilSciFi. I'd put The Culture there as well.
Richard Morgan's Broken Angels, a sequel to Altered Carbon about a space war
I think we read two separate books. I read it as having a war as a backdrop, but about a thriller/heist situation, where deserters from differnt sides attempt to steal a valuable alien artifact off of a battlefield.
I would like to throw in the ring John Ringo's Posleen War Series, and his team up with Weber that produced the "March" series, March Upcountry, March to the Sea, etc... although not sure that would be considered true MilSF.
Glen Cook has some good Mill-Fantasy. And don't forget Harry Turtledove's books.
...and before Keith Laumer wrote about robotic battle tanks in his Bolo stories back in the 1970's, you had Fred Saberhagen's Berserkers; Borgs in print thirty years before there were Borgs on the TeeVee.
As someone else has already pointed out, everything that was old is new again. Isn't that why we have Apollo on Steroids taking us to the moon in the Future, dredging up from the past, when NASA was keen. Steroids are still bad for us, aren't they?
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