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Title: Readable, but flawed
Review: As a typical Campbellite hero myth, dressed up in a sci-fi cloak, this book is engaging enough. It has enough of a plot and adequate characterization to sustain its length.However, it fails as sci-fi. True science fiction, in my opinion, needs a hook, a concept that justifies its status as speculative fiction. Arthur Clarke has a mysterious spacecraft, Rama; Grege Bear has a physics-defying structure from the future orbiting the earth, and Herbet blends politics and a Messianic religion to create Dune.Battlefied Earth, unfortunately, has none of these. The story could quite easily be transplanted into a mundane setting: make the Psychlos invading Romans, and Johnny and his clan the subjugated Celts of 56 BC, and the story could remain precisely the same. There is no food for thought, no mind-expanding concept. Just typical pulp sci-fi.
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