{"id":1137,"date":"2015-07-27T20:17:16","date_gmt":"2015-07-28T01:17:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/?p=1137"},"modified":"2015-07-27T20:17:16","modified_gmt":"2015-07-28T01:17:16","slug":"tom-kratmans-big-boys-dont-cry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/tom-kratmans-big-boys-dont-cry\/","title":{"rendered":"Tom Kratman’s Big Boys Don’t Cry<\/em>"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Big<\/a>Big Boys Don’t Cry<\/em><\/a>
\nTom Kratman<\/a>
\nCastallia House
\nebook $2.99<\/p>\n

This is another novella that’s on the final ballot for the Hugo Awards this year.\u00a0 I reviewed<\/a> one of its competitors recently.<\/p>\n

There’s some pretty good competition here.\u00a0 If you like military science fiction, you”ll like this one.<\/p>\n

Maggie is a tank, and she’s been damaged beyond repair.\u00a0 Her brain is still functional as the technicians are beginning to take her apart for scrap.\u00a0 Big Boys Don’t Cry<\/em> gives some of the highlights from her illustrious career, a career that spans centuries if I read the book correctly.\u00a0 (The memories aren’t in chronological order.)<\/p>\n

But something in Maggie’s memory is damaged.\u00a0 There are certain memories that are partitioned off, memories she isn’t supposed to access.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

This is where the story gets interesting.\u00a0 Maggie has been highly decorated for bravery and valor during battle.\u00a0 And not just once, but multiple times.\u00a0\u00a0 Through her memories and other sources Kratman includes, we get to see her in action.<\/p>\n

But as her forbidden memories return, we see other things she’s done.\u00a0 Things that could be considered war crimes.\u00a0 Things that could be considered atrocities.\u00a0 These aren’t acts that Maggie wanted to do.\u00a0 She often argued against them.\u00a0 But she’s a machine, which means she’s programmed, which means she can be forced to to things against her will.<\/p>\n

But she’s also a self-aware intelligence.\u00a0 She can take initiative if it doesn’t conflict with direct orders.\u00a0 And in the end she does.<\/p>\n

I was liking and enjoying the story until I got to the end.\u00a0 Then I loved it.\u00a0 In less than a page, Kratman provides a satisfying conclusion to a very dark situation.\u00a0 There’s been a lot controversy over the Hugo nominations this year.\u00a0 I’m not getting into that.\u00a0 I’ll just say that Big Boys Don’t Cry<\/em> is worthy of its nomination.<\/p>\n

This is the first work of Col. Kratman’s that I’ve read.\u00a0 I’ll be reading more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Big Boys Don’t Cry Tom Kratman Castallia House ebook $2.99 This is another novella that’s on the final ballot for the Hugo Awards this year.\u00a0 I reviewed one of its competitors recently. There’s some pretty good competition here.\u00a0 If you like military science fiction, you”ll like this one. Maggie is a tank, and she’s been […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[30,750],"tags":[710,752,716,751],"class_list":["post-1137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hugo-awards","category-military-science-fiction","tag-castalia-house","tag-hugo-awards","tag-military-science-fiction","tag-tom-kratman"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3P5pJ-il","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1137"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1137\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1140,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1137\/revisions\/1140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}