Suvudu Universe

Book Name: The Eternity Brigade
Author: Stephan Golden
First Published: 1980

See Original Post Here

Stephan Golden was born in Philadelphia. When he was 13, his parents moved to California and he has been a resident of the Golden State ever since. He studied Astronomy at UCLA and this was the time when the first of his science fiction short stories began to publish. After he earned his Bachelor’s degree, he took work with the U.S. Navy as a civilian space scientist. The steady paycheck was good with the Navy, but his writing continued to take off. He began to publish his first novels at this time. After a few years with the Navy, he decided to write full-time. He took a job working as a writer and editor for a pornographic humor paper known as the San Francisco Ball. He has also worked as a game designer and manual writer for games. Mr. Golden has served as the editor of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America Bulletin and has been their Western Regional Director. He is still busy writing novels and has over 40 titles to his name.

Mr. Golden has been married twice, first to Kathleen Sky and then to fellow author Mary Mason. He has co-written books with both of them and he and Mary are still working on a series of novels today.

Jack Hawker is an American soldier who has lived and fought in a war during a time near to our present day. He has no one to come home to, so when he is offered a chance to join a new army program where the soldiers are cryogenically stored until they are needed for the next war, he volunteers. When Hawker awakens, he is years in the future and disoriented, but he fights with his unit, bonding with his fellow soldiers. At the end of the war, he and the other soldiers of the brigade are stored again.

The story moves on through centuries of time where the methods of warfare and civilization itself changes beyond reason. The soldiers of the brigade are no longer frozen, their patterns and memories are captured in giant databases where they can be called upon at will to fight for who ever holds the keys to the machines. Eventually, the database is duplicated and Hawker finds himself fighting against versions of himself. Life and death loses its meaning since whenever a soldier falls in battle, he or she is recreated for the next battle with only the memories of that one battle lost.

Hawker has no life and he has been cheated of death. He longs to die for real, to end the madness of being a soldier at war for all eternity. He devises a plan to cheat the system and find his way out of the madness.

I understand that Mr. Golden has reworked this novel and has published a “final edition” of the novel in 2010. I have not read this edition of the book, but instead remember the original novel that was published in 1980. It is a story that has stayed with me all these years and one that I feel is worth re-reading today. It reminded me of Joe Haldeman’s The Forever War and indeed, Mr. Golden does credit this author as inspiration for his own book.

The Eternity Brigade is a fast read with a chilling concept at its core. There is combat on Earth, in space and on other planets, plenty of sex, and the certain loneliness that soldiers in any time period faces. Sometimes the aliens seem more out of an episode of Star Trek than what we think of aliens in fiction today, but for all its small flaws, somewhat weak world building, and flat secondary characters, the story of Hawker and what he faces is a story that will grip you while reading and then stay with you for years. Give The Eternity Brigade a read. I believe it should be on the must-read list of science fiction aficionados.