Review: Redshirts by John Scalzi

I don't normally write reviews of books. Most of my blogging experience consisted of reviewing bars, bartenders and the occasional stripper. Perhaps I'll post a link to that blog someday. Statistically speaking, someone, somewhere actually really, really enjoys this sort of thing (given that plenty of people also enjoy cutting themselves, getting pissed on and watching Jersey Shore, this is not particularly exciting to me). But I digress (the handiest three words if you like to avoid having to write smooth transitions).

John Scalzi's latest novel, Redshirts, is a work of what one (or at least I) might call metametafiction and you should immediately go read it. (Seriously, stop reading this shit right now and go buy a copy). For those of you who are unfamiliar with Star Trek, I must first applaud you for reading a blog that's got a picture of a toy dinosaur (a dimetrodon, to be precise) wearing an aluminum foil hat in front of a field of stars (I don't know how you got here, but thanks for coming). Second, "red shirt" is the term used to describe the extras in Star Trek. They're the guys who go on away missions with main characters and usually die horrible deaths. The term has come to mean any secondary (or perhaps even tertiary) character whose only real function in the story is to die.

While Scalzi does a phenomenal job of lampooning many of the silly tropes and scientific impossibilites found in Star Trek and similar shows, there is much more to Redshirts. It tells the story of a group of these minor doomed characters (red shirts) as they become aware of their status as sacrifices upon the altar of drama (and not particularly good drama). This awareness leads them to take action to save themselves from the extra-dimensional force that controls their fate: The Narrative. This mission for survival leads them through the interior fourth wall (this story has two of them) via a black hole (they are fully aware of how badly this violates physics). Later on they even take a shot at the outer fourth wall, too.

I don't want to give away much, but rest assured it's an awesome read. If all you want is a good parody of TV science fiction, Redshirts has got it. If you want an honest and revealing examination of the nature of fiction, it's got that too. While I do recommend this book to everyone, I think that science fiction fans, as well as fiction writers will especially enjoy it (I'm a science fiction writer, so yeah, it rocked).

I actually listened to the audio version of this book (I do that a lot on cross country drives). I find it extra amusing that the reader is none other than Wil Wheaton, who is known for his role as Wesley Crusher on Star Trek: The Next Generation, and has been in other science fiction shows (Eureka, most recently). Not only is Wil a great reader, but his presence lends the audio book an extra bit of irony (I fucking love irony).