55 pages 1 hour read

Old Man's War

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2005

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Background

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of death.

Authorial Context: John Scalzi

John Scalzi (born May 10, 1969) is the author of dozens of novels, short stories, novellas, and nonfiction works, including The Kaiju Preservation Society (2022), Starter Villain (2023), and When the Moon Hits Your Eye (2025). He has written six books set in the same universe as Old Man’s War, with a seventh—The Shattering Peace—forthcoming. The books do not all follow John, instead examining different characters and plotlines in the same world as Old Man’s War. While The Ghost Brigades follows Jane and the other special forces operatives, The Last Colony is the only other novel that follows John, now living with Jane in a colony after his military service. The series has received critical acclaim, with three of its texts being nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Novel. Scalzi himself has won the Hugo Award for Best Fan Writer, the Ohio Governor’s Award for the Arts, the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer, and the Robert A. Heinlein Award.


Scalzi is primarily a science fiction author, exploring real-world problems through works set in the future or alternate universes. For example, When the Moon Hits Your Eye explores a fictional world where the moon suddenly turns into a block of cheese.

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