Book Review: Agent to the Stars

One of my favorite authors still writing today is John Scalzi. If you haven't read "Old Man's War" then you really need to. Before he wrote that he wrote a trial novel. Just to see if he could write a novel he wrote "Agent to the Stars" and posted it on his blog for free. He asked that people who like it send him a dollar. $2,000 later he told people to stop sending him dollars.

The book was eventually picked up for a very limited run. Apparently, these copies can be picked up on Ebay and similar places for several hundred dollars.

Recently he updated a few references (UPN became Cartoon Network - stuff like that) and it got published again. You can pick it up in most bookstores.

In this book, aliens have been watching Earth for decades. Mostly, they've been watching our television programs. Finally, they decide to make first contact. But, well, look at how aliens are depicted on television and in movies. Sure, Spielburg tends toward friendly aliens and Star Wars and Star Trek have a good mix of friendly and hostile humanoids, but for the most part aliens are here to eat us or enslave us or something. The aliens in this book look like giant globs of snot and smell like the bathroom of a truck stop. They're gonna need representation to help give them a friendly face. So they got an agent.

This agent has the difficult task of figuring out how to make creatures that look like The Blob welcome on Earth. To get to know them better he has one stay at his house. The blob and the neighbor's dog become friends. So much so that when the dog has a heart attack the blob takes over the dog's body. Personally, knowing they can do that makes them that much less trustworthy in my eyes. But the story goes on with a cute little doggie alien. At least until something else happens.

The story is full of holes. It doesn't explore the situation. It doesn't think things through. But it's funny. Scalzi creates some great stories, but more importantly he writes well. His banter is brilliant.

I highly recommend this or anything else that Scalzi has written.