BOOK REVIEW

Camouflage by Joe Haldeman. Nebula Award

(Brought to you by kat impatientreader.com)  The Changeling comes from a hostile place: the Messier 22 star-cluster where planets are frozen rocks or gaseous flame-bags. Its species evolves as the dominant form of life:  shape-changers so tough they are almost immortal who can adjust their own body mass to mimic anything organic or inorganic. 

Eventually this species ventures into space in their strange vessels.  The Changeling itself splashes down to the Pacific Ocean millions of years before humans evolve to populate Earth.  Its vessel gets buried under the sea floor. It emerges, leaving much of its essence behind in the vessel, and spends the next few millennia as a shark, swimming around and eating.  Gradually it notices humans.  One day it wades ashore in the shape of a human, following its instinct to be at the top of the food chain.

All this -- the Changeling's back-story -- gets dashed off in a 2.5-page prologue with not a single wasted word.  Chapter 1 opens in the year 2019 as biologist Russell (a guy in his fifties) meets admiral Jack who needs his help. The Navy has discovered a strange artifact lodged in a deep sea trench.  (You guessed it:  the artifact, long-forgotten by the Changeling, is the creature's space vessel.) Jack wants Russell to help him bring it up for study.

Russell and Jack do so, centering their base of operations in Samoa. Jack resigns his commission so that the U.S. Government can no longer control him.  He and Russell gather top scientists to help them study the artifact, which is already seems alarmingly extraterrestrial:  its mysterious substance resists all drill-bits and explosives.

Meanwhile the Changeling's story unfolds in alternating chapters.  It's 1931 when it wades ashore in California.  It bases its humanoid form on people seen at a distance when it was a shark. But it hasn't gotten the look quite right. A lone surfer wanders over to gawk at it, and it judges by his reaction that it looks strange. So it kills him, absorbs his mass, and takes on his identity. It returns to the surfer's rich parents who tearfully attribute its emotionless, ignorant demeanor to a head injury.

At this point, the Changeling is a something close to a sociopath. It lacks empathy.  It doesn't try to cause harm, but it will hurt or kill people in the pursuit of knowledge.  It goes to college, then enlists in the service.  Soon, lo and behold, it ends up with the Fourth Marine Regiment on Bataan Peninsula in the Philippines in December 1941.  It's about to get a crash-course in human suffering from the Japanese.

Of course Russell and Jack are still in the year 2019, trying to analyze the artifact while fending off the advances of the various world governments who want to know about it, too. They leave off the drilling, and start trying to communicate with it. 

Then a new character shows up on page 65:  another alien known as the Chameleon. His witty and succinct back-story shows him murdering his way through history. Like the Changeling, he is almost immortal. He can pull his mass back together after any hideous "death." Unlike the Changeling, he cannot shape-change to mimic any substance, and is always a human male. Also, he is evil.  The Changeling seeks knowledge, but the Chameleon just wants sensation. His biggest drive is to seek out the others of his kind he suspects must exist, and annihilate them (so he can end up the top dog). 

When the Chameleon hears about the resurrection of Christ, he thinks (on page 66), "... killed in public and then resurrected, he [Christ] was evidently a relative. He would keep an eye out for him."  Much later on, he finds a soul-mate to hang out with during the Second World War:  Nazi doctor Josef Mengele.

The novel races on as the past catches up with the year 2019.  The scientists teeter on the brink of communicating with the artifact.  (Especially interesting are the scenes where they use chemistry and physics to recreate certain atmospheres within the artifact's holding cell that mimic the gaseous or frozen planets they think the artifact might be from.)  The Chameleon shows up to destroy another of his kind.  The Changeling, who has developed empathy and compassion, confronts the artifact, the key to the riddle of its existence. 

The novel wraps up its inevitable clash of destinies with ferocious speed in the last 12 pages, ending on a high point of action. Its strengths are its lean, thriller-type construction; crisp writing; and the evolution of the Changeling's thinking. You can find Camouflage on Amazon.com through this link:

Camouflage (Ace Science Fiction)

Noteworthy Links:   Wonderquest - Science Q/A! The Connection - Tech blog! Author site - John the Eunuch Historical Mystery series, Cozy Mystery List for all your cozy mystery needs, Obsidian Bookshelf - reviews of gay-themed fiction.
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