Zoe's Tale

Executive Summary: Easily the weakest in the series so far, but the second half of this book makes up for the slow start. 3.5 Stars rounded up.Audio book: The audio is fine. It makes sense that they switched to a female narrator instead of William Dufris. Tavia Gilbert makes me feel like I'm listening to a teenager. I'm not sure that's a good thing, but it certainly fits the narrative. This is a series that works well in audio, and this one is no different.Full ReviewI've dragged my feet on listening to this one. I liked [b:The Last Colony 88071 The Last Colony (Old Man's War #3) John Scalzi https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1406858062s/88071.jpg 18279847] fine, but not so much that I really wanted to read it again from Zoe's perspective. I was unwilling to skip it though before continuing on with the series, so I finally pulled the trigger.I'm happy to report, that Mr. Scalzi does a good job of writing a companion novel. He goes into detail on things that were minor plot points in the original novel, and leaves major plot points as minor details in this one. If you haven't read Last Colony first, this book wouldn't be nearly as good.As I was never a teen-aged girl, I can't speak to how well Mr. Scalzi captures that voice. I've heard complaints that he doesn't do a very good job. I have no complaints, but your mileage may vary.My major issue was I felt like the first half of the book was slow. Things picked up eventually, but I didn't find it as fun as the first three in the series. Instead of the politics and military stuff, there is a lot more of teenager's problems. Relationships with friends and dating. It's not really my cup of tea.But Mr. Scalzi always writes pretty fast paced stories, and the humor is still pretty good. If you're a completionist like I am, you'll want to read this, and should enjoy it fine. If you're on the fence about reading it, I'd say you can probably skip it without issue. Or so it seems without having read [b:The Human Division 15698479 The Human Division (Old Man's War, #5) John Scalzi https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1341582413s/15698479.jpg 21356077]. It does fill in some much needed details about Zoe's actions at the end of Last Colony, and for that alone I think it's worth reading.