Book notes: The Ghost Brigades by John Scalzi

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The Ghost Brigades: Old Man’s War, Book 2 by John Scalzi

Synopsis:

“The Ghost Brigades are the Special Forces of the Colonial Defense Forces, elite troops created from the DNA of the dead and turned into the perfect soldiers for the CDF’s toughest operations. They’re young, they’re fast and strong, and they’re totally without normal human qualms.

The universe is a dangerous place for humanity—and it’s about to become far more dangerous. Three races that humans have clashed with before have allied to halt our expansion into space. Their linchpin: the turncoat military scientist Charles Boutin, who knows the CDF’s biggest military secrets. To prevail, the CDF must find out why Boutin did what he did.

Jared Dirac is the only human who can provide answers—a superhuman hybrid, created from Boutin’s DNA, Jared’s brain should be able to access Boutin’s electronic memories. But when the memory transplant appears to fail, Jared is given to the Ghost Brigades.

At first, Jared is a perfect soldier, but as Boutin’s memories slowly surface, Jared begins to intuit the reason’s for Boutin’s betrayal. As Jared desperately hunts for his “father,” he must also come to grips with his own choices. Time is running out: The alliance is preparing its offensive, and some of them plan worse things than humanity’s mere military defeat…” -Audible

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Opening thoughts:

I really enjoyed the first book, Old Man’s War, so I was pretty excited for this book. I’m interested in seeing how this story covers the Special Forces and Jane in particular.

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Key notes:

Part One

Chapter 1

• The military commander who was supposedly trying to get him to safety during this bombardment turned on him and shot him
  • Luckily Kainan had a gun hidden in his coat pocket and used it to kill him first
• Kainan was a doctor of the Rraey species and apparently was taken hostage with his crew some time ago and was held prisoner on that planet by an enemy species
  • The person questioning him now was a human trying to figure out their situation. She told him that none of his fellow Rraey survived the attack or were left alive on the base
• The doctor commented on how humans have 3 types: normal, the green military kind, and one made from the genetics of the dead, born as adults with skills and intelligence but no memory
• After some torture, the doctor told Jane Sagan of a plan between species to eradicate humans

Chapter 2

• They discussed how the human consciousness needs the same brain it developed into work, hence why the cloned genetically modified military bodies still need a replica of the original human brain to transfer consciousness

Chapter 3

• Three emergent technologies that revolutionized the military were the ability to grow these modified bodies quickly, the brain transfer process, and the BrainPal that helped assist the new recruits
  • Also, using elderly citizens from Earth who were willing recruits helped them overcome the resistance and ethical pushback from colonists
• They put the consciousness of the traitor into a new body, but his consciousness didn’t settle yet and was basically a newborn still
  • However, the general thinks he still might be useful in the coming war against the other 3 species

Chapter 4

• Jared was barely an hour old when he was having a conversation with the pilot transporting him to where he was supposed to go
  • The pilot mentioned how special forces people don’t typically have a sense of humor and he suspects it’s because humor takes time to develop, whereas special forces people are born already grown up
• Jared finally got integrated with his squad which was basically a mental sync, then he met Pauline who helped him out and showed him around

Chapter 5

• Their instructor told them that what makes the special forces different isn’t that they’re made to be smarter faster stronger than the real born, but it’s that they were made with a purpose: to keep humans alive in this universe
• It takes Realborn 3 months of training while it takes the special forces 2 weeks to be combat-ready
• During their first 7 days, they all researched and did training to be human and learn human context, culture, and concepts
• Squad 8 won the war games. On the way back he ran into the pilot Cloud after the 2 weeks of training and discussed Frankenstein and jokes
• Jared and Cloud agreed that their philosophy on humans can be summed up in 4 words: I like good people

Chapter 6

• Jane Sagan would be getting Jared a new recruit in her team because he’s a hybrid Special Forces and has the consciousness of a traitor in him
  • And she’s the only one with experience working with someone not like them
• Jared completed his first mission and managed to fight off in Rraey and barely survived
  • But he did so by creatively using the Smart Blood to blow up his enemy’s face

Chapter 7

• After every battle, the 2nd Platoon has a fully integrated team orgy as a celebration
• Their plan was to kidnap the air to the Ala species, and then they negotiated to force them to become allies of the humans again

Part Two

Chapter 8

• Some of Charles Butan started to leak out and then he got transferred over to research to try and unlock more of the trader’s memories 

Chapter 9

• Jared met the special forces that lived in a self-contained dark matter meteor-looking object organic body complete with its own organic brain pal, which had a lot of stealth uses
• After visiting the space station, he was flooded with memories of his daughter and the attack that took her life, and the emotions and events that led to his treason
• They managed to escape alive 

Chapter 10

• Jared went to the grave of Charles, his wife, and their daughter, and mourned his daughter’s death after coming to terms with the fact that he shares Charles’ memory

Chapter 11

• Jane was granted a special top-secret tool that allowed her to read Jared‘s private thoughts without him knowing. This made her realize that Jared was genuinely trying to succeed in their mission and was concerned they were underestimating Charles since he knew how Charles thinks
• During the 2nd Platoon’s parachute drop onto the planet, the Obin had some technology that cut off their BrainPal, so most of the platoon fell to their deaths from the sky, disconnected from each other in horror
• Jared was the only functioning person out of the 4 survivors because he’s experienced being out of integration before

Chapter 12

• Jane and Seaborg were left in the jungle and confined. Jared was brought to Charles
• The Consu were the most advanced species that uplifted the Obin species
• Charles revealed that his daughter Zoe was still alive and with him

Chapter 13

• The Obin don’t have a sense of self, ego, or fear
  • Their morals are hard-coded and Charles thinks they’re a perfect species that works in complete harmony and unison
• Obin means “lacking” in their language
  • They desire consciousness as a collective species and think Charles can give that to them
• Charles’s argument is that the colonial union and humans as a species are very hostile to the vast majority of other species on their horizon and that they are the evil ones, not the rest of the universe
  • Therefore, the CU needs to be destroyed
• The Conclave is a united front of all the intelligent species that will create an agreement for colonialization
  • The humans are not participating and will wipe themselves out because of it
• Charles’s plan was to put his own consciousness into Jared and then sneak a virus into all of the BrainPals from the CU, which would compromise them and open them up to invasion and attack

Chapter 14

• The 2nd Platoon attacked and gave Jared enough time to communicate to Jane Charles’s plan, Jared’s request for her to save Zoe, and to trust Jared to complete the mission
• Jared left his final farewell note to Charles before he executed a smart blood self-destruct mechanism to kill Charles in his body
  • He also sent a farewell note to Jane to tell her what happened
• Jane managed to escape with Zoe and ordered Harvey who decided to stay behind to look for Jared’s consciousness

Chapter 15

• In exchange for silence on all the classified information, the General agreed to release Jane and John, as well as put Zoe in their adoptive care
  • Jane also agreed to help the scientist Kainan commit suicide

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Closing thoughts:

I really liked this book. It was a great continuation of the story, switching from John’s perspective in the first book to Jane’s perspective in this second book. I also like how it gave a look into the Special Forces, which are arguably the most interesting group of characters/species in the story.

I also enjoyed how the ending was happy and everything was wrapped up really well. I think it also did a good job setting up the story for the sequel in the 3rd book.

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Nutshell:

Jane of the Special Forces of the Colonial Defense Forces must oversee Jared, the new Special Forces person who has the consciousness of Charles Butan, a traitor to the human species. They race to figure out what Charles’s plan is before an alliance of alien races starts a war against the humans.

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Similar books:

• Lock In by John Scalzi
• Head On by John Scalzi
• Old Man’s War by John Scalzi
• Agent to the Stars by John Scalzi
• Redshirts by John Scalzi

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Rating:

4/5

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