Dec 31, 2021
"Get off my planet, you son of a bitch."
Papa Fuzzy, Fuzzy Nation (by John Scalzi)
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Croatia
seen from United States
seen from Malaysia
seen from United States
seen from Canada
seen from United States
seen from Poland
seen from Australia
seen from United States
seen from Indonesia
seen from Malaysia
seen from United States
seen from China
seen from Türkiye
seen from Spain
seen from United States
seen from Germany
"Get off my planet, you son of a bitch."
Papa Fuzzy, Fuzzy Nation (by John Scalzi)
Book Rating: ★★★★★ (5/5 stars) Audio Book Rating: ★★★★★ (5/5 stars) Total Rating: ★★★★★ (5/5 stars)
John Scalzi is the type of author who can repurpose any storyline and make it, well, hilarious and relevant to the times. Fuzzy Nation retells the story of Little Fuzzy by H. Beam Piper (which I have not read, unfortunately) and puts a more modern twist on it. This is outside of just the technology, but also the treatment of women (and there are multiple powerful women throughout the story) as well as environmentalism.
While the story itself is a predictable tale of colonialism gone awry and deterred by the native species, Fuzzy Nation takes an intricate look at law, witnesses, and the uniqueness of a potential new life form to tell its tale. Jack Holloway is a smart character, and while equally fooling the reader, he does the same to his fellow acquaintances. Although, he never manages to fool his bomb-exploding dog Jack.
If you want a fun novel, I would recommend picking up or listening to Fuzzy Nation because you will be waiting for the surprises Jack Holloway has in store with each page. Plus, who want to hear about smart fuzzy creatures…as well as a dog who detonates bombs?
Read the Full Review
Fuzzy Nation
★★★★☆
Fuzzy Nation, by John Scalzi, is a remake of an earlier sci-fi novel by H. Beam Piper. It tells the story of Jack Holloway, a surveyor on the planet Zara XXIII, owned by Zaracorp. He is your classic case of a guy falling upwards. He worked as an attorney and got himself fired by punching a client. He got himself a large settlement from the company that wanted him to get the case to a mistrial. He is smart, but he clearly knows it. He’s also arrogant, and is always acting in his best interest. At the start of the novel, he discovers a large seem of sunstones. The author makes them sound like the diamond market, tightly controlled and valuable. The owners of the seams of sunstones drive up the value. Jack is poised to become very rich.
| Read more |
Because I am an Extreme Scalzi Fan, I’m 100% biased about wanting people to start in certain places, learn his style as an author, and then move on to other, more experimental books. This is self-serving: I want to maximize the number of people I can convert into ways of the Scalziverse. Wondering where to start? Well, here is a guide to some of John Scalzi’s back catalogue, by me, an Extreme Scalzi Fan.
My current sci-fi reading list:
Night Train to Rigel (Quadrail series #1) - Timothy Zahn
Trading in Danger (Vatta’s War #1) - Elizabeth Moon
The Last Colony (Old Man’s War #3) - John Scalzi
Fuzzy Nation - Also by Scalzi.
Archform: Beauty - L. E. Modesitt, Jr.
No particular order other than they’re all after Night Train, which I’m reading right now.
Top 5 Saturday: Retellings That Have Stuck With Me
The Top 5 Saturday weekly meme was created by Amanda at Devouring Books.
Rules!
Share your top 5 books of the current topic—these can be books that you want to read, have read and loved, have read and hated, you can do it any way you want.
Tag the original post (This one!)
Tag 5 people (I probably won’t do this bit, play along if you want)
The Upcoming Schedule Is:
5/9/20 — Books with a Number…
View On WordPress
So Tor is reissuing three of John Scalzi’s standalone novels with new covers. I like the first two, but I’m just not feeling the cover for Fuzzy Nation.