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Zoe's Tale (Old Man's War #4)

by John Scalzi (Goodreads Author)

3.72 · Rating Details · 16,560 Ratings · 1,107 Reviews

How do you tell your part in the biggest tale in history?

I ask because it's what I have to do. I'm Zoe Boutin Perry: A colonist stranded on a deadly pioneer world. Holy icon to a race of aliens. A player (and a pawn) in a interstellar chess match to save humanity, or to see it fall. Witness to history. Friend. Daughter. Human. Seventeen years old.

Everyone on Earth knows th ...more

Hardcover, 335 pages

Published August 19th 2008 by Tor Books (first published August 2008)

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Best Science Fiction of the 21st Century

121st out of 515 books — 5,522 voters

Best Science Fiction With a Female Protagonist

49th out of 884 books — 2,210 voters

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Community Reviews

(showing 1-30 of 3,000)

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Jan 19, 2012 Dan Schwent rated it really liked it

Shelves: sf, christmas-2010, 2011, the-scalz

Zoe Boutin-Perry, teenage colonist and idol to the Obin race, gets stranded on Roanoke along with her parents, John Perry and Jane Sagan. While the Roanoke Colony survive with the Conclave breathing down its neck?

Zoe's Tale is a retelling of the previous John Scalzi book, The Last Colony, from Zoe's point of view. Instead of being a pointless rehash, Zoe's Tale ends up being an emotional tale and completely worth the effort.

Re-telling The Last Colony from Zoe's point of view served multiple purp ...more

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Jun 21, 2015 mark monday rated it liked it

Shelves: futuristik, teenworld

John Scalzi: Young Adult Author?

YES! this enjoyable book was not just enjoyable for its story, but also for how it helped me realize that John Scalzi has been writing like a YA author since the beginning of his career. it just took an actual YA novel penned by him for me to realize that.

he has so much in common with the modern YA authors I've read:

- pleasant but generic writing style that has no interest in impressing its reader with challenging prose

- pleasant characters who are sympathetic but ...more

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May 21, 2015 Bookwraiths rated it it was ok

Shelves: scifi, library

Originally reviewed at Bookwraiths Reviews

After enjoying the first three books of Old Man's War, I decided to read Zoe's Tale even though I was familiar with a common complaint of its detractors-- specifically that it tells the same story as book three. But like the optimist I sometimes pretend to be, I thought this one would still be enjoyable. Unfortunately, I was wrong.

This novel is exactly what the title suggests: it is the Zoe (John Perry and Jane Sagan's adopted daughter) version of The L ...more

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Jan 27, 2014 Alex Ristea rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: library, mmpb, series, science-fiction

This was a 3-star book until the last hundred or so pages, where it really shined and Scalzi reminded us why he's one of the kings of modern science-fiction.

Zoë's Tale (that's right, dear readers, I looked up that trema for you) is essentially a re-telling of The Last Colony from—you guessed it—Zoe's point of view, much in the same style as Ender's Shadow.

But it's so much more than a simple regurgitation.

Where The Last Colony replaced politics for The Ghost Brigades's action, Zoe's Tale is a sto ...more

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Jan 31, 2015 Lindsey Rey rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: science-fiction, 2015

[3.5 Stars]

Ultimately, I just don't particularly enjoy books that are the same story as a previous book told in a different POV.

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Jan 23, 2013 Erica Anderson rated it really liked it

Shelves: science-fiction, 2013-reads

I think "John Scalzi" is actually a teenage girl who's too smart for her own good. I began this book with the expectation of dropping it after a few chapters. How much could the perspective of a teenage girl interest me, after all, especially when channeled through a male writer?

In Zoe, Scalzi has created a sympathetic, believable and incredibly perceptive character. Though she's more self-aware and clever than any teenager I've ever known, I was willing to go along with it simply for the pleas ...more

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Aug 20, 2015 Krbo rated it it was ok

ne, ne čitam ja tako brzo kako bi se moglo reći po počeo/završio ovdje zapisanom

preskakao sam i to velikim koracima - jednostavno ovo je nepotrebna knjiga koja opisuje potpuno istu radnju kao i prethodna no drugi je POV - ovaj put Zoein.
lako se vidi i po ostalim recenzijama da to baš nije dobro sjelo velikom broju čitatelja, a Scalzi se na kraju u "Zahvalama" opravdava na sve moguće načine (uglavnom mi smo ga namolili da to uradi)

obično u takvim Rashomon radovima (napisao je još dvije poslije pa ...more

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Mar 02, 2016 Michael Cairns rated it really liked it

Shelves: scifi

This was a fun, fast, sci fi yarn, the type unashamed newspaper reviewers would call a 'romp'.
We pick up Zoe as she's turning from naive teenager into someone far more aware of her place in the world. And what an amazing place is it. Zoe forms the treaty between humans and another race of people called the Obin. Her father helped them out before he died, so she has become their link to him and the person they use to model their new found consciousness on. The book explains it much better, you'll ...more

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Jul 31, 2014 Mark rated it it was ok

Shelves: science-fiction

What a cynical cash grab this book feels like. Good grief. What else can you say about a book that came out the next year after the previous book where the author proclaimed, in post-text notes, that the story had been concluded?

And yet, before long, there arrived Zoe's Tale, a story told in parallel to The Last Colony, first-person in the perspective of Zoe Boutin-Perry, as you might expect from such a titled book. It's basically like if you take The Last Colony and take out 85% of the good pa What a cynical cash grab this book feels like. Good grief. What else can you say about a book that came out the next year after the previous book where the author proclaimed, in post-text notes, that the story had been concluded?

And yet, before long, there arrived Zoe's Tale, a story told in parallel to The Last Colony, first-person in the perspective of Zoe Boutin-Perry, as you might expect from such a titled book. It's basically like if you take The Last Colony and take out 85% of the good parts. Zoe Gumps her way around the periphery of the story, occasionally re-hashing conversations that already took place, verbatim, in the previous book, with little added value to giving us her perspective on those matters.

There is no tension to be found in the story because the reader of the series is already aware of exactly who does and who doesn't die, and when. There is little entertainment to be found in this teenage angst-heavy story if only because these people don't feel like teenagers stuck on a 20th century-ish tech seed colony. The sense of humor is just so particular, so right now, just this very specific kind of snark that's apparently preserved exactly through the centuries, as humans expand across the fabric of space.

There's little cultural differences to be seen or explored through the ten different groups of colonial people. There's just a whole lot of sarcasm that's very aware of the fact that it's trying to be a book with a lot of sarcasm, rather than just feeling like a book that has sarcastic characters, if that makes sense. About all that's missing is some kind of fourth wall-breaking monologue.

Across the whole book, there is approximately one real, earned emotion. The stuff I slogged through to get to it was not worth the payoff. It's all the more frustrating because there were very scattered interesting parts or phrases, especially more towards the end of the book, once we get out into the things that Zoe experienced on her own, off Roanoke, that Perry, the previous book's narrator, could not have known. The parts with the Obin, the Conclave, and the Consu in particular are mostly solid, even if these also have a tendency to skip over what could have been some of the best parts. Before that, it's a whole lot of meh.

The author addresses some of this in the acknowledgements at the close of this book, observing that he felt like he had left things out of the last book, with readers having pointed out that the werewolves were never really resolved (which, I mean, they weren't) and that he resolved the plot with a deus ex machina - which, again, he did, since Perry knows nothing of Zoe's journey and the device she returns with.

To all of that, I would say WRITE A BETTER BOOK THE FIRST TIME. The only thing this tack-on book does is make the third book seem in retrospect like a lazy, incomplete effort, which he is now trying to solve by patching a second lazy, incomplete effort over it. Plot the previous book better and perhaps it would have been a bit longer, but it would have been a stronger book. Maybe he could have had Perry and Zoe telling these tales side-by-side within the same volume. As a separate entry to the story, it does not measure up. Highly disappointed.

I'm annoyed at myself for checking out the fifth book of the series concurrently, as I now feel obligated to read it despite having just plowed through this morass. Oh well, down the hatch. ...more

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Sep 23, 2008 Michael rated it really liked it

Shelves: science-fiction, read-in-2008

John Scalzi returns to his popular "Old Man's War" universe with a parallel novel to the last entry, told from the perspective of Zoe Boutin Perry. Covering the same time frame as the previous entry, "The Last Colony," "Zoe's Tale" examines the ins and outs of the story from Zoe's perspective as a teenage girl and the lynchpin of peace agreeement between several interstellar races.

Hearing how Zoe thinks and reacts to things is fascinating and even though we may know where things are going, Scal ...more

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Feb 09, 2015 Mpauli rated it it was ok

Shelves: genre_sf, rating_2-stars, orga_read-in-2015

The book is really difficult to rate, so let me explain quickly why it is only a 2 for me. Zoe's Tale on its own might be a 4 star read. It is filled with the usual Scalzi humor, its prose is very accessible and Zoe is a likeable character.

My issue with the book is that it is "only" a companion novel to the last book in the series. It tells exactly the same story and therefore it has zero tension. It clarifies 2-3 plotpoints from the The Last Colony, but I'm not sure if I needed a whole book for ...more

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Jan 12, 2009 Danielle rated it it was ok

Recommends it for: anyone who had issues with lack of explantions from Last Colony

Shelves: pans, sci-fi, ya, 2009-read

First impressions: This DEFINITELY reads like a YA book, even though it was shelved in the adult section of my local library. Zoe is an annoying little wench. Everyone just has the perfect retort for every comment. The weird part about it being a YA book is that it's not a stand-alone novel; if I hadn't already read the entire Old Man's War series, I don't think this would make sense. Or at the very least, it would come across as trite.

Many of the initial chapters say things like "My dad gave t ...more

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Jan 08, 2016 Kaethe rated it it was amazing

Shelves: humor, fiction, age-ya, adventure, feminism, romance, music, colonization, skepticism, strong-smart-female-protagonist, scifi, friendship, beloved, native-peoples, dogs

2012 January 2

Scalzi totally nailed it. I really, really, really want Veronica to get to this soon, and tell me what she thinks. Telling the same story from a different point of view allows him to expand on bits that received less attention in The Last Colony, but it also allowed him to tell more about the regular lives of the colonists, and how they manage to amuse themselves. I loved it, snarky teenaged heroine and all.

~~Library~~personal copy.

2014, September 2

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Sep 28, 2008 Jennifer rated it it was ok

Shelves: adult-books

This inter-galactic science fiction about a teenage girl who is destined to save her planetary colony from certain destruction has a promising start. But I ultimately lost interest due to the fact that every bit of information was conveyed through dialogue, including scenes that would have been better served being experienced first hand by the reader through descriptive action sequences--like battle scenes and explosive attacks. After awhile I grew tired of just hearing about what happened throu ...more

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Apr 26, 2010 Nikki rated it really liked it

Shelves: speculative-fiction

Mmm, brain candy. And I don't mean that in any kind of bad way. This isn't hard SF, it's easy to read, easy to follow, nothing too complicated. It's more about people. I think I liked this more than I liked The Last Colony, though I gave that a similar rating -- it was good to get into Zoe's head, good to see things from a different perspective, and this way you could get to know the Obin a little better, and see what happened behind the scenes, so to speak.

I love Enzo's character, and totally f ...more

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Jul 24, 2016 Tudor Vlad rated it really liked it · review of another edition

When I found out that this book was basically a retelling of The Last Colony, but from the point of view of Zoe I was reluctant, I admit, I even rolled my eyes a bit. It just didn’t seem that having the events of The Last Colony told from a different POV was gonna be interesting or add much to the story. Always a pleasure to be proven wrong.
This was really good, or at least I thought it was. I even enjoyed the slow parts. Zoe is a fascinating character, and I could read hundreds of pages of inte ...more

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Jun 19, 2013 Kat Hooper rated it liked it

Shelves: audiobook

Originally posted at FanLit:
http://www.fantasyliterature.com/revi...

Zoe’s Tale, the fourth book in John Scalzi’s OLD MAN’S WAR series, is the same story we were told in book three, The Last Colony, except it’s from Zoe’s perspective. Zoe is the 17-year-old daughter of the traitorous scientist Charles Boutin. Jane Sagan and John Perry adopted Zoe when she was a small child and they’ve been farming on one of Earth’s colonies for years. Now, though, the family is off to lead the settlers of a new c Originally posted at FanLit:
http://www.fantasyliterature.com/revi...

Zoe’s Tale, the fourth book in John Scalzi’s OLD MAN’S WAR series, is the same story we were told in book three, The Last Colony, except it’s from Zoe’s perspective. Zoe is the 17-year-old daughter of the traitorous scientist Charles Boutin. Jane Sagan and John Perry adopted Zoe when she was a small child and they’ve been farming on one of Earth’s colonies for years. Now, though, the family is off to lead the settlers of a new colony called Roanoke (uh-oh). When they get there they realize they’ve been duped and life on Roanoke has a lot more going on than just terraforming a new planet.

While I was reading The Last Colony there were several times I wondered “what’s Zoe doing?” or “what does Zoe think about this?” or even “is Zoe the sweet innocent teenager her parents think she is?” I guess John Scalzi knew I was wondering those things, because the sole purpose of Zoe’s Tale is to let us know what Zoe was doing and thinking all this time. Thus we hear the same plot again — there isn’t really any plot progression — but we do get to know Zoe and we get information about the events that only Zoe experienced in The Last Colony. Mostly these occur at the end of the story when Zoe has a major role in saving Roanoke colony.

I liked getting to know Zoe in this novel, but I found the lack of new plot to be disappointing. I also was not convinced by Scalzi’s characterization of Zoe, mainly because she and her teenage friends banter with each other as if John Scalzi was writing their dialogue. They’re just too clever to be believed.

My favorite characters in Zoe’s Tale were Hickory and Dickory, the aliens who revere Zoe’s father and act as Zoe’s bodyguards. Their lack of a sense of humor, literal interpretation of human speech, and deadpan delivery of their lines is charming. I listened to Tavia Gilbert’s narration and she does a wonderful job with them (and Zoe and the rest of the characters, too). Hickory and Dickory also supply some background information about one of the alien races that I hope we will see more of in a future installment.

If you’re not interested in a sometimes angsty teenage girl’s perspective of the events that occurred in The Last Colony, there’s no reason to read Zoe’s Tale. If you haven’t read The Last Colony you could read Zoe’s Tale instead — you’d be caught up with the story so far. I don’t know if Scalzi plans for Zoe to be protagonist in a future book. If she is, then I’ll be glad I read this story of her childhood and teenage years.

I’m giving Zoe’s Tale 3.5 stars for those who haven’t read The Last Colony. In that case it’s an enjoyable novel with a lot of plot and some great characters. If you have read The Last Colony, I’d give this book a 3 star rating. It’s just not enough new plot. ...more

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Nov 12, 2015 Paul rated it it was amazing

I wondered where Scalzi was going to go with this installment of the Old Mans War series and lo and behold he cheekily sells us the previous book The Last Colony all over again. But far from being short changed its actually a great idea.
As i said this book is pretty much the same as The Last Colony, but retold completely from Zoe's perspective.
So basically you read the whole book knowing exactly where its going but the added detail and gaps filled, along with the new perspective make this a gr ...more

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Aug 01, 2016 Rob rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: audio-book, science-fiction, old-mans-war, read-2015, own, author-male

Executive Summary: Easily the weakest in the series so far, but the second half of this book makes up for the slow start. 3.5 Stars rounded up.

Audio book: The audio is fine. It makes sense that they switched to a female narrator instead of William Dufris. Tavia Gilbert makes me feel like I'm listening to a teenager. I'm not sure that's a good thing, but it certainly fits the narrative. This is a series that works well in audio, and this one is no different.

Full Review
I've dragged my feet on li Executive Summary: Easily the weakest in the series so far, but the second half of this book makes up for the slow start. 3.5 Stars rounded up.

Audio book: The audio is fine. It makes sense that they switched to a female narrator instead of William Dufris. Tavia Gilbert makes me feel like I'm listening to a teenager. I'm not sure that's a good thing, but it certainly fits the narrative. This is a series that works well in audio, and this one is no different.

Full Review
I've dragged my feet on listening to this one. I liked The Last Colony fine, but not so much that I really wanted to read it again from Zoe's perspective. I was unwilling to skip it though before continuing on with the series, so I finally pulled the trigger.

I'm happy to report, that Mr. Scalzi does a good job of writing a companion novel. He goes into detail on things that were minor plot points in the original novel, and leaves major plot points as minor details in this one. If you haven't read Last Colony first, this book wouldn't be nearly as good.

As I was never a teen-aged girl, I can't speak to how well Mr. Scalzi captures that voice. I've heard complaints that he doesn't do a very good job. I have no complaints, but your mileage may vary.

My major issue was I felt like the first half of the book was slow. Things picked up eventually, but I didn't find it as fun as the first three in the series. Instead of the politics and military stuff, there is a lot more of teenager's problems. Relationships with friends and dating. It's not really my cup of tea.

But Mr. Scalzi always writes pretty fast paced stories, and the humor is still pretty good. If you're a completionist like I am, you'll want to read this, and should enjoy it fine. If you're on the fence about reading it, I'd say you can probably skip it without issue. Or so it seems without having read The Human Division.

It does fill in some much needed details about Zoe's actions at the end of Last Colony, and for that alone I think it's worth reading. ...more

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Jul 21, 2012 Laura rated it really liked it

Recommended to Laura by: Cousin George

Shelves: terraforming, being-human, evolution, coming-of-age

This book cracked me up. I am reasonably sure it was not written as a comment on Twilight. And yet. The POV teenage girl character, Zoe, is such a critique of Bella that I kinda want to leave her something in my will.

Like Bella, Zoe is the unreasoning object of devotion of alien creatures. Zoe’s father gave them a gift that their gods withheld from them. Zoe is the object of devotion, protected and cherished. Devotion that also makes her a target.

(Full disclosure: I have never read Twilight. I ...more

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Sep 13, 2012 David Sven rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: sci-fi

Zoe's Tale is a retelling of the previous book in the series The Last Colony from Zoe's perspective (My Review of The Last Colony http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...). Its basically exactly the same story minus most the interesting bits told by a teenage girl. As much as I enjoyed that story the first time around, after 80% into this last book it was really dragging.

The only redeeming feature of the book was the next 15% which deals with Zoe's diplomatic mission to the Conclave. We didn't ...more

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Mar 29, 2016 Dragana rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: science-fiction, young-adult, clean-romance, aliens, cute-pets, colonisation, setting-other-planets, friendship, banter

Zoe's Tale is not a new story. It's a companion novel to the The Last Colony or to put it plainly: it's the same events told from different point of view.
I never liked this parallel-novel trend, they were always too similar to original and mostly boring. But I love John Scalzi's writing, so I decided to give it a shot.

Likes:
+ Zoe's sarcastic flare copy/pasted from John Perry is in full assault mode trough the whole book. I enjoyed her verbal sparring.
+ Completelly focused on Zoe and we really ge ...more

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Aug 07, 2012 Chris Hawks rated it really liked it

Shelves: owned, reviewed

Much like Orson Scott Card did when he revisited the events of Ender's Game from a different viewpoint with Ender's Shadow, John Scalzi uses the fourth volume of his Old Man's War series to retell the plot of The Last Colony. I like to think that Scalzi pulls it off better than even Card did, mainly because the whole same-story-from-different-perspectives thing works even better with first-person narratives, and Scalzi's narrators couldn't be much more different: a 90-year-old (mentally) ex-sold Much like Orson Scott Card did when he revisited the events of Ender's Game from a different viewpoint with Ender's Shadow, John Scalzi uses the fourth volume of his Old Man's War series to retell the plot of The Last Colony. I like to think that Scalzi pulls it off better than even Card did, mainly because the whole same-story-from-different-perspectives thing works even better with first-person narratives, and Scalzi's narrators couldn't be much more different: a 90-year-old (mentally) ex-soldier, and—in this book—a 17-year-old girl.

It's the teenage-girl viewpoint that gets this book labelled as "YA", I guess, so it amuses me that it's by far the longest book in the series. (To be fair, the language is toned down considerably from previous books, but that comes from being about a bunch of teenagers instead of adults and ex-soldiers.) Speaking as a middle-aged dude, I think Scalzi pulls of the "voice" of a teenage girl quite well. And indeed, it's being able to connect with the main character through her narrative that makes this book work—even more than in previous volumes. Presumably you know the plot of the story already, having previously read The Last Colony, so that plot takes much more of a background role in this book, while the story here focuses more on the characters and their relationships with each other. And it works, it really does. Even when I knew what was going to happen, Scalzi keeps things fresh by not rehashing territory covered in the previous book; choosing instead to show what transpired in-between key events, or what Zoe was up to "off-camera".

Now, if you haven't read TLC yet—or previous books, for that matter—I think Zoe's Tale will work for you. Scalzi puts in enough detail, I believe, for the reader to make sense of what's going on. But I'll go out on a limb and guarantee that you will get much more out of this book having already read that one. Likewise, I find myself appreciating TLC much more now that I've essentially read it again, but from another perspective and with some of the gaps filled in. The two books together make for a more fulfilling reading experience than either one of them by itself.

It's not a perfect book by any means, but it's nice to get to know a number of characters better that were more or less peripheral in TLC, and to have some plot-related things explained a little better. And apparently Scalzi is incapable of writing something that's not an absolute page-turner. ...more

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Jan 17, 2009 Ron rated it liked it

Shelves: science-fiction, young

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Jan 06, 2010 Michael rated it liked it

Shelves: 2000s, fiction-that-speculates

Along with legions of others, I'm a fan of John's blog, The Whatever. (Well, it's actually just Whatever, but for some stupid reason it amuses me to say THE Whatever. Anyway.) And, when you read someone's blog, you're entitled to refer to them on a first-name basis. I don't know why I feel this way, but it just seems right, doesn't it? Anyway.

So, me and John go way back. Like four months. And for all of that time, I've been curious to get my hands on one of his books and see if they live up to t Along with legions of others, I'm a fan of John's blog, The Whatever. (Well, it's actually just Whatever, but for some stupid reason it amuses me to say THE Whatever. Anyway.) And, when you read someone's blog, you're entitled to refer to them on a first-name basis. I don't know why I feel this way, but it just seems right, doesn't it? Anyway.

So, me and John go way back. Like four months. And for all of that time, I've been curious to get my hands on one of his books and see if they live up to the hype. And, there's a good chance that I haven't read enough contemporary SF to be a good judge of what a sufficient level of hype for any given book is. Even though I've been reading a ton of SF / Fantasy, I think I've only read 2 books published in 2009. So, it's a non-expert opinion that I express now when I say the hype level is higher than necessary.

Zoey's Tale takes place in the Old Man's War universe, the same universe as several other novels, and actually takes place at the same time as the novel The Last Colony. As far as I know, she's a minor character in The Last Colony, and Scalzi--I mean John--wanted to spend some more time with this particular character, and also extrapolate on her role in The Last Colony. Apparently, her contribution in TLC served as a kind of deus ex machina which John wanted to show wasn't really the author trying to take the easy way out.

Anyway, Zoey's step-parents are in charge of a planet colonizing mission and are taking groups from nine different planets to settle on planet Roanoke. The risks of planet colonization are great: they're part of the Colonial Union, and an intergalactic organization called the Conclave doesn't want to let any races who aren't a part of the Conclave settle on any planets. So, Roanoke is going to run the risk of being found and destroyed by the Conclave. Also, did I mention how frickin hard it is to settle a totally unsettled planet?

Then: Surprise! This isn't even Roanoke! It's a different, more dangerous planet than you were expecting. Welcome to a planet-wide swamp. And, by the way, watch out for nasty things in that swamp with weapons. And THEN, after everyone's used to this comfy scenario, things get hairy. That's the plot's opening.

Zoey is a sarcastic 17-year-old girl who just happens to have two Obin bodyguards, and who happens to be the equivalent of Mother Mary to the entire Obin race for reasons I won't spoil for you. These two aliens, who are large and look like a combination of a giraffe and a spider (that's basically the only description we get), are around Zoey most of the time, and are both charming and hilarious and scary. Both of those.

The Good:
I was hooked from paragraph two. John is good at creating suspense, and the galactic situation going on in this series is just full of potential. Zoey is a fun character, the Obin are a really cool race, and John Scalzi's writing is entertaining enough to make this very hard to put down. I enjoyed this one enough that I'll probably hunt down some more of his books and tell you about them later.

The Bad:
Well, we have a lot of good guys here, and some ethereal badguy presences such as the idea of the Conclave, and then we have some characters between like....ummm.....well, I guess we have goodguys and badguys. But, we're basically talking about a space opera, so what were you expecting? What didn't work for me, though, was the way everything works out so super-hunky dory in the end, despite how totally shitty things get. When put in a situation where just about everyone looks like they're going to get killed by badguys, ALL of the goodguys live and some badguys die. But not the big badguys. Just the little ones who don't have names and aren't necessary for next season's show.

The Ugly:
Reading this book confused me a little. I knew this was a nominee for the Hugo, so I was expecting something on par with Cory Doctorow's Little Brother. Since China Mieville didn't get nominated, I was expecting something BETTER THAN The City & The City. But as far as I could tell, we didn't have any deep messages going on in this book, other than the starry-eyed idea that if you really get to know people and be nice to them, they'll probably be won over and stop trying to kill you. Since I fundamentally think this is wrong, that message made me feel a little sick to my stomach during the last few chapters of this book. In other words, when I finished this book, I started really wondering why it was a Hugo Nominee.

So, I did a little research and discovered the Hugo awards are nominated by people who attend WorldCon and pay a certain amount of money. In other words, these awards are given out by The People. Specifically, The People Who Can Afford to Go To WorldCon and Then Also Afford to Pay More Money To Vote In the Hugos. Fair enough. Except now I'm starting to wonder what I've gotten myself into with my resolution to read a bunch of contemporary SF and fantasy...is this the cream of the crop? Or is this just something everyone agrees is pretty entertaining?

After all of that, my final verdict that Zoe's Tale is a three-star book: entertaining, worth the time investment to read it if you're into this kind of thing, but purely entertainment. Just like his exemplary blog, The Whatever.
...more

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Nov 24, 2013 Bernie Charbonneau rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: ebook, sci-fi

I’ve enjoyed this series from Mr. Scalzi and this being the fourth novel in The Old Man’s War intergalactic struggle was looking forward to the continuation in this adventure. It has been about a year since I read the previous book but was still aware of all the characters. I remember that the previous novels were easy reads and enjoyable. This latest tale is described through the view of a teenager that has been a major character throughout this series. This is my flaw with this book. This just ...more

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Feb 17, 2013 Fred Hughes rated it really liked it

Author John Scalzi has answered our wishes to know more about John Perry and Jane Sagan’s adopted daughter Zoe. Zoe’s father had attempted to destroy all of humanity but was defeated by the Colonial Defense Force.

Zoe’s story plays out as we get to see from her perspective what she was seeing, and doing, that was only hinted at in the applicable Old Man’s War series.

Who else has two alien body guards and a step Dad and Mom who have to run a new colony on a hidden planet. While Zoe is adopted, sh ...more

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Sep 20, 2014 Mike rated it liked it

Shelves: scifi

Scalzi tries to pull off an "Orson Scott Card" parallel sequel. Zoe's Tale is to "The Last Colony" as Ender's Shadow is to ________. Come on, you can answer the SAT/ACT question can't you? This one does not come off quite as good as Card's sequels do but it is decent. Zoe's Tale is definitely YA, lot's of teenage hormones, banter and hijinx. I enjoyed it and the last quarter of the book gets serious in a good way. You must read The Last Colony before you get this one. But Zoe's Tale will bring s ...more

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Jul 19, 2015 Patrick rated it liked it

Pleasant enough lightweight science fiction from Mr Scalzi - the kind of thing that works well for me after a long day at work - though as with Charlie Stross, I can't help finding Scalzi more interesting as a blogger and public speaker than as a writer.

This is another novel in the 'Old Man's War' series that is essentially a re-telling of Heinlein's Starship Troopers with a more modern sensibility and without the right-wing militarism that Heinlein might or might not have been satirising (thoug Pleasant enough lightweight science fiction from Mr Scalzi - the kind of thing that works well for me after a long day at work - though as with Charlie Stross, I can't help finding Scalzi more interesting as a blogger and public speaker than as a writer.

This is another novel in the 'Old Man's War' series that is essentially a re-telling of Heinlein's Starship Troopers with a more modern sensibility and without the right-wing militarism that Heinlein might or might not have been satirising (though Verhoeven definitely was with the film version) but as humanity is now at least somewhat established in the galaxy, it is not simply a novel about war and unknowable killer aliens, but about political in-fighting and factionalism not just between the different alien races, but the different groups of human colonists.

It's marketed as science fiction but perhaps inevitably given it is narrated from the point of view of a seventeen year old - Zoe - I couldn't help thinking it might belong in the YA section of the bookshop as (albeit with the proviso that I haven't really read much of the stuff) all the cliches of the genre appeared present and correct. The hostile or at least indifferent authorities; the young person upon whom fate has bestowed the task of saving humanity (I did rather like the knowing nod to that cliche in that because of her father's past, she was the subject of an inter-species treaty); the awkward on-off first romance; the battles that had to be kept from the subject's parents (the scene with the werewolves reminded me more than a little of episodes from the first couple of series of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which, now that I think about it, is quite possibly both a significant influence on this book and the source of most of what I know about YA fiction...)

It's not a great book by any means. I never really found myself believing in the world in which it was set - the colony on the new planet seems to be established with no more difficulty than a homestead in 19th Century US. But it's good fun and it made me kind of nostalgic for the sort of pulpy action/adventure science fiction I loved at the age of 12 ...more

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Sep 14, 2011 Matt rated it it was amazing

Shelves: own-it

Another excellent read in the Old Man's War universe. I am sad that this is the last tale of it because I enjoyed all four books. Hopefully one day Scalzi will revisit it.

Highly recommended to all sci-fi fans (but read them in order!)

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John Scalzi, having declared his absolute boredom with biographies, disappeared in a puff of glitter and lilac scent.

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“Hickory clicked something to Dickory in their native tongue; Dickory clicked back. Hickory responded, and Dickory replied, it seemed a bit forcefully. And then, God help me, Hickory actually sighed.” — 3 likes

“Oh, God,” I said. “Thank you so very much for the mental image of Dad as a teenage sack of hormones. That’s the sort of image that takes therapy to get rid of.” — 2 likes

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