Customer Reviews

The Holy Land

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Where else can you get witty satire, political attacks, brilliant symbolism, and futuristic aliens all in one place? Reading this book, you will laugh, you will cry, you will want to read it again. Well, maybe not cry, but definitely say "Ouch," as Zubrin points out a not-so-flattering view of our own society. Regardless of your political standpoint, however, you are likely to be both insulted and laugh your behind off, as Zubrin makes fun of everyone. The book is also chock full of symbolism beyond the obvious, things that do not seem amusing to the characters, but are brilliantly amusing to the reader -- "Inside jokes" of our own society. The most brilliant thing of all is that he exaggerates moderately little, but enables us to laugh at the ridiculousness of our own society as it is. The cover says it best -- "A world crazy enough to be our own." Cleverly conceived and sharply hilarious, The Holy Land has a little something for everyone who enjoys a good satire.

A willing suspension of disbelief, the pre-requisite for reading fiction, quickly gives way to amazement and delight as Robert Zubrin leads us through a really fun look at terrorism in the parallel universe of "The Holy Land." Rallying behind the high-flown credo "For Reason, Love and Justice - Everywhere and Forever" the Western Galactic Empire is forced to literally come "down to earth" to deal with the pesky Earthlings who threaten their vital energy supplies. The flash-point for conflict is a colony of stubbornly monotheistic Minervans, rescued from extermination and resettled by the WGE in their ancient homeland, which just happens to be in the territory of a reluctant, but opportunistic, host... the United States of America!

This is no-holds-barred satire, wherein no sacred cow escapes un-gored, trillions are slaughtered for no good reason and an earthling meets a priestess... and takes her home to meet his folks. Amid theological disputes fueled by pride and greed and fought with sci-fi weaponry, we catch a tragi-comic glimpse of ourselves in all our naked (and smelly) humanity. A real treat!

What George Orwell did for (or to?) the Russian Revolution in Animal Farm Robert Zubrin does to the Palestinian/Israeli conflict in this very clever satire. When the Western Galactic Empire relocates the unpopular race of Minervans to their original homeland in Kennewick, WA, the Americans take it poorly. The corrupt Christian fundamentalist administration in Washington, DC first tries to expel them using force, but when that fails they decide to make a play for galactic sympathy, so people are herded into "refugee" camps around the new Minervan land, to live in ostentatious misery. From these camps they launch suicidal terrorist assaults on the Minervans. Later, when the vital energy source helicity is discovered in America, the administration uses its wealth to set up training camps in far flung locales in order to have plausible deniability when it launches a spectacular 9-11-style attack on the Western Galactic Empire itself.

All of the elements of the conflict in our own Holy Lands are present here and there's great pleasure to be had in seeing how Mr. Zubrin draws the parallels. Likewise, the absurdity of these tactics is even clearer in a fictional setting than it is in real life. The Americans have no chance against the Minervans, who are decent folk and just want to live peacefully in the land that is rightfully theirs. The American political leaders cynically manipulate their own people and the galactic press and they engage in truly criminal behavior. But, something seemingly unintended does happen--even with the deck so stacked--this reader, at least, found his sympathies ultimately did lie with the Americans as against the Minervans. Sure, one would wish the leadership less corrupt and their means less vile, but tribalism/nativism is a powerful force and, in the end, it seems only natural to prefer Christian Americans who are rather similar to us, even if flawed, to the quite different Minervans. And, realistically, imagine that the Native Americans, who have a not un-Minervan claim to American soil, set up a state for themselves--how do you think we'd all react, no matter the abstract justice of their case?

As I say, I'd assume this reaction is not what Mr. Zubrin intended, but in a way it makes the book even more powerful. Once you recognize that you can abhor your own leaders methods but still find their cause somewhat compelling, you gain a genuine insight into the insanity that has infected the Palestinians. This insight can in no way justify terrorism but does suggest why more moderate and ordinary people are reluctant to disavow the extremists in their midst.

I bought Holy Land because Robert earned my utmost respect by his vision, scientific expertise and practical attitude displayed by writing "The Case for Mars", "Entering Space: Creating a Spacefaring Civilization" and most importantly by founding the Mars Society at http://www.marssociety.org/. (which I believe has the most visionary Founding Decleration / Mission that I have ever encountered)

I did not realise that he could be incredibly funny too!

However, it is not terribly funny when children blow themselves up with the idea of harming as many others as they possibly can.

Robert's view of the causes and the political machinations keeping the Israeli/Arab conflict going is enough to drive you to rage and tears. And, sadly enough, there is probably more truth in this than one would like to know.

I recommend this book to anyone who would like to read a page-turner, have a laugh, get really angry, read a love story and understand a bit more about morals and the world we live in. (If I left anyone out, please include yourself!). I have recommended this book to all my friends

After reading several reviews of this book (including one published in The National Review), I ran to get it. As a fan of science fiction and political satire, and strongly pro-Israel, I expected this book to be a refreshing and witty presentation of the insanity that we call the Israeli-Arab "peace" process.

If you are looking for a great science fiction novel - there are better ones out there. If you are looking for a great political satire novel - there are better ones out there. However, the concept of using science fiction to portray the Israel-Arab "conflict" in terms that the average Western reader can appreciate is highly admirable.

Most Westerners cannot understand the incredible illogic that rules the Israeli-Arab conflict as it relates to the UN, the European Union and, in part, the United States. Zubrin "de-mystifies" the matter by "reframing" the Israeli-Arab conflict in a setting that Western readers can clearly identify with.

I am glad that I read the book. It was a mildly entertaining and thought provoking use of my time. It did not, however, completely meet my (high) expectations of a sharp and witty look at the Israeli-Arab situation. And, there are a few misspellings in the book that detracted from the overall professionalism of the book.

The Holy Land

Do you think you have a clear understanding of the situation in the Middle East? Do you think you have the Arab/Palestinian/Israeli conflict finally understood? Perhaps you need to test your assumptions b y reading Robert Zubrins new book, "The Holy Land."

Writing a social satire within the Science Fiction genre seems a tall order, but Robert Zubrin pulls it off. Zubrin uses Science Fiction with satire to make his points about the insanity that is our current Middle East reality. Space aliens have been resettled to Earth by a powerful Galactic empire and are the centerpiece of this novel. The Minervans are the relocated alien, and their home is Kennewick, Washington, USA their ancestral home and "holy land."

Opposed to this resettlement is a U.S. government that is presented as a Christian theocracy. Fundamentalist but totalitarian, this twist in the novel is jarring, but makes Zubrin's satire work. The U.S. President is presented effectively, and often comically, as a man who has hijacked a faith for personal power and control.

The Western Galactic Empire is backing the Minervans, and it is through the WGE that Zubrin takes on our Western societies attitudes toward the Middle East. The WGE is motivated primarily by the desire to keep the Helicity (read Oil) flowing, and that desire fuels the reaction to the Minervan-Kennewickian conflict.

All of this sounds familiar?

There is much in "The Holy Land" that will seem familiar, yet don't think for one second that you will find your familiar good guy in this. Zubrin is exceedingly even-handed in skewering all sides for their failings.

In the end "The Holy Land" provides at least one answer that may serve us all well in looking beyond the satire to the reality of the Middle East. Basically we need to reevaluate our assumptions about that region. And there is nothing better then a hard hitting and amusing satire to bring a far away and little understood conflict close to home.

This is a novel well worth the read.

In one real world, a country's President, full of bravado, arrives via fighter jet on the deck of an aircraft carrier. He presents the face of a plainspoken man - a Christian man - a man with a penchant for the transmogrification of his native language. He is here on this occasion to proclaim an end to major hostilities in the country's latest war. At one point during his address to the ship's compliment (and to the camera's beaming his speech around the globe), he looks up to the ship's observation deck and holds up both arms to the roar of hundreds of sailors who had crowded the area. Hanging from the ship's superstructure behind the President is a sign stating boldly for the world to read: "Mission Accomplished." These scenes are masterfully choreographed to drive home a message of strength and success. Six months and too many deaths, maimings, and amputations later this man disavows any connection with the ship's war message.

In another, not so real world, a President learns that a section of his country has been invaded and settled by an outside force - Minervan refugees from oppression in the central galaxy who claim Kennewick, Washington as their ancient homeland. Upon learning these invaders worship a different god, the President turns to his Secretary of Defense telling him to "Mobilize the armed forces, I want those pagans exterminated by Sunday." Forty-thousand deaths later, the President is warned that the invader's overwhelming military superiority is decimating his military - it is time to look toward settling this war. The President exclaims indignantly that " . . . total victory is practically within our grasp, and you want to stop fighting?"

Science Fiction, when done well, can be an amazing tool by which the writer can share his or her view of the world. All of our contradictions, absurdities, and outright foolishness can be reflected back at us in a distorted mirror of parody and just plain fun. Within this genre, the whole spectrum of substantial societal issues can, and often are, discussed. Perhaps because of my age, Star Trek and Isaac Asimov are the most salient sci-fi icons in my mind - these sparks set an entire generation's imagination free. Into this fertile field of giants steps Robert Zubrin, well known aerospace engineer and President of the International Mars Society.

Zubrin's most recent offering is titled The Holy Land. In the author's words, "this is a satire on the Middle East crisis and the War on Terrorism. Throughout the work, Zubrin pokes fun at and even mocks many of our deeply held folkways and mores placing them squarely under the spotlight for all to examine. What ends up happening is that the astute reader is given the opportunity to read at least three good books bundled in one.

First, there was a good sci-fi tale that pits protagonist against antagonist in the midst of some rather murky, multi layered, social conflict. I enjoyed reading that book because the humorous tone and measured pace were a joy to partake of at the end of a long day after the family had gone to bed. Then there was the story that Zubrin told me he meant to write. This story creates a set of circumstances allowing the author to parody the Middle East conflict in madcap style with different factions playing the Israelis, the Palestinians, the Anglo-Americans, the Saudis, the Europeans, the UN, and so forth.s The milieu of violence and mistrust that has surrounded that unending conflict for so many years is explosive and can not help but lend itself to a satirical eye. The third story is one formed in my own mind as I read through Zubrin's words. It is always the case with literature that the author's intent is transubstantiated from the thing it was meant to be to the thing the reader wants it to be. This is the case here too. While one can easily see the parallels Zubrin draws between the conflicted Americans and Minervans, it is also easy to disregard the parties in this conflict in favor of bigger issues. What role should government play in the everyday lives of people? Should the government exercise hegemony over the individual in its attempt to maintain continuing stability for the collective? How much information should the people be provided access to?

In The Holy Land, Robert Zubrin creates a time and place where governments and the people who control power, work in shady gray areas. People are kept alive on a steady diet of bread and circus while power brokers advance themselves on the backs of an unknowing populace. No matter what book you end up reading here, you will enjoy yourself. This book is well worth the read.

--- Reviewed by
Timothy E. McMahon, M.S.
Executive Editor
tim_mcmahon@northeastbookreviews.com

Science fiction pioneer Arthur C. Clarke has suggested that religion is a "disease of infancy": a temporary malady that, at best, keeps the human race shackled to geocentric biases and, at worst, dooms us to premature extinction. "The Holy Land," by Mars Society founder Robert Zubrin, is a scathing diagnosis of our collective predicament as seen through the lens of the modern Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Zubrin's most famous work is the nonfiction treatise "The Case for Mars," which convincingly demonstrates how travel to our neighbor planet could catalyze a new era of planetary discovery. The science and philosophy behind "The Case for Mars" were duly incorporated into his subsequent novel "First Landing": a shaky but ultimately enjoyable hard-SF adventure. "The Holy Land" is something entirely different. Any pretext of realism is swept aside to make way for a slapstick geopolitical farce in which alien "Minervans" attempt to reclaim their ancestral homeland in the continental United States. Loathed by militant U.S. Christian Fundamentalists, the Minervans' conflict escalates into a galactic political melee.

This novel doesn't pretend to be subtle. References to Mid-East suicide bombings, bungled attempts at negotiation between Israel and Palestine and the September 11 attacks are glaringly obvious. Herein lies "The Holy Land's" central weakness: If the action and dialogue read as convincingly as a shoot-'em-up comic book, how seriously are we to take Zubrin's barbs? From a comedic standpoint, Zubrin demands that we actively participate in his farce. While this is a good technique for drawing readers into the book's plot, it's simultaneously alienating.

Not that Zubrin's barbs aren't good ones. Though far from misanthropic, Zubrin views our species as a squabbling, violent and largely ineffectual lot. The central conflict between the crooked U.S. government and the quasi-Zionist Minervans is presented as a microcosm of the human spectacle. Through the eyes of his civilized galactic visitors, Earthlings are little more than oafish, smelly cattle possessed by disgusting habits and backfired ideologies. Ironically, the star-crossed romance that comes into its own in the novel's second half is orders of magnitude more substantial -- and culturally indicting -- than "The Holy Land's" various political intrigues.

"The Holy Land" may ultimately lack the staying power of "The Case for Mars." But for those of us who feel as if the world is in the throes of apocalyptic insanity, Zubrin's book provides welcome reassurance that we're not alone.

Robert Zubrin's new book, "The Holy Land", satirizes the conflict in the Middle East, specifically the troubles between Israel and the Palestinians.

How, one would think, can a person make fun of this particularly sensitive subject? Zubrin succeeds by turning it into a darkly humorous science fiction tale of an alien race who settle in the town of Kennewick, Washington, stating that this is their promised land and theirs by right because it is written in their holy scriptures.

The US administration is understandably perturbed by these events, and led by a crusading fanatical Christian President, go to extraordinary lengths to have the plight of the displaced Kennewickian residents brought to the attention of the Galactic media, while also plotting their own gains from the situation.

Zubrin has created a story which can switch from amusement to disbelief to shock and back again in a single page. He parallels the methods and events which have so defined the Israeli/Palestinian conflict to degrees which even in the satirical world could be considered disturbing, but somehow manages to keep the reader at a safe distance, mirroring the sanitization of such horrors as suicide bombings which today's media have learned to do so well.

This distancing of the reader to the events is achieved in Zubrin's style of writing. I am, in this respect, reminded particularly of The Crystal World by J.G. Ballard, a story which was so fantastic, and yet written with a childlike simplicity which made the abnormal seem normal and didn't allow the reader to pause and think enough to stop believing in it. Zubrin gets the same results - his Ballard-like storytelling sets the pace and "The Holy Land" plays out like a well oiled machine.

I am also reminded of a satirical television mini-series from the U.K back in the early 80's, called "Whoops! Apocalypse". The storyline was ridiculous, the acting was over the top, but somehow you could imagine that things could really be that way - the insanity of crazed politicians and an over zealous military steaming full ahead with utter righteous conviction towards annihilation.

"The Holy Land" takes satire to a new extreme, giving the reader the opportunity to be both amused and horrified, turning the tables on a far away conflict and bringing it close to home, not just physically, but socially and psychologically as well, at times begging the question "is this really how things are?". The story is sufficiently different to be fiction, sufficiently the same to hit home.

Congratulations Mr. Zubrin, you stepped over the line in the sand and drew another one for everyone else to try and cross.

Robert Zubrin's The Holy Land is a dramatic science-fiction saga of a relatively tolerant, galaxy-spanning empire and the brutally resistant segments of fundamentalist Earth who find their "pagan" presence intolerable. Violence rears its ugly head, yet Earth is hopelessly outmatched should it attempt to go to war with the empire - attempting to protect "the holy land" could result utter destruction and devastation for all humanity. The Holy Land is a tense and original story of the collective dark side of human nature.