The year in books #21: The Silent War

I hadn't planned to read this novel, but discovered it at my in-laws' place and thought it looked interesting. Ben Bova's name is legendary in the sci-fi world, and so far The Kinsman Saga is the only work of his I've read. At least, I thought so - as I got a few chapters into the book, I realized that I had, in fact, read it once before, but had almost entirely forgotten the story.

The Silent War tells a tale of corporate war over the question of who will rule the almost limitless resources of the asteroid belt. It contains all of the elements of an excellent sci-fi thriller: it's action-packed; persons are beaten, exploded, perforated and otherwise caused to become partly or entirely nonfunctional. It is thrilling; there are alliances, betrayals, secret schemes. It is wonderfully paced and an entertaining read. (Related question, am I the only one who finds the term "page turner" silly? All books are page-turners. That's how books work. Saying a book kept you turning pages until the end is like saying a movie kept your eyes open until it was over.) The only part of the book I found uninteresting was the short story that, split in two, serves as opening and closing act for the novel proper. I suspect I'm missing the backstory necessary to get what was going on there; this is the third book in a trilogy, and I haven't read the other two, though that didn't make the rest of the novel any harder to understand.

Throughout my reading of this book, the one thing that bothered me was the same thing that bugged me about The Kinsman Saga: Reading the book is fun, but there's nothing particularly memorable about it. It's absolutely clear that Bova has mastered the craft of writing entertaining novels, but I feel like a novel - especially a science fiction novel - should aspire to more than being simply entertaining. The power and beauty of sci-fi is the practically limitless ideas its conceits allow an author to explore, but there's nothing surprising or particularly thought provoking in The Silent War. The concept of a future in which corporate actors are more powerful and important than state actors - one of the main themes of the book - is about as speculative in a 21st century novel as the concept of a future in which people carry Internet-connected devices in their pockets.

My very strong suspicion is that I'm reading the wrong Ben Bova books. A lot of authors who produce dozens of books over decades of work seem to produce much less truly original thought in their later books, even as their craft improves (see Piers Anthony: Macroscope is packed with brilliant ideas and dissolves into almost unreadable psychobabble about two-thirds through. The Xanth books, in contrast, are totally readable but hadn't produced an original idea in ten volumes or so when I finally gave up on them). I suspect that Bova wouldn't be so well known if all his novels were the sort of popcorn space thriller represented by The Silent War and the Kinsman Saga books.

My final verdict is that this is an excellent book for a sci-fi fan's day at the beach or intercontinental flight. If you're looking for something with psychological or speculative depth, however, you'll find this one lacking. If any of you happen to be familiar with Ben Bova and have a book suggestion for me, please drop by the comments section!