Only You Can Save Mankind

by Terry Pratchett

Paperback, 2006

Status

Available

Call number

823.914

Publication

HarperCollins (2006), Paperback, 224 pages

Description

Twelve-year-old Johnny endures tensions between his parents, watches television coverage of the Gulf War, and plays a computer game called Only You Can Save Mankind, in which he is increasingly drawn into the reality of the alien ScreeWee.

User reviews

LibraryThing member mybookshelf

What would you do, if the aliens in your computer game started talking to you? Talking to you, personally; visiting your dreams, introducing you to their children, eating your food? This is the dilemma Johnny Maxwell faces, when he discovers that his favourite pastime of blowing up alien ships is

systematically destroying a real alien race. Funnily enough, the ScreeWee don’t want to become extinct, so they surrender. To Johnny, whose task it becomes to see them safely home.

This book is all about computers, and adolescents, and the games they play. But it’s also about war, and how easily young people manage not to think about its effects. Perhaps it even manages to make people think about the effects that continual on-screen violence have on the young.

The book is also hilarious, filled with ridiculous conversations between Johnny and his friends, and even sometimes between Johnny and his enemies. In fact a huge portion of the text is dialogue, the meaningful interspersed with the inane.

In the background of all the action, Johnny’s parents appear to be splitting up (he refers to it as “a bit of a Trying Time”), so there is some dispute as to whether Johnny’s problems are real or psychological. This is part of the amusement for the reader, who must sympathise with the hero, but can’t help wondering whether he really might be mental, as his friends keep trying to oh-so-tactfully suggest.

I learned a lot about human teenage male stereotypes from reading this book, (also what really goes on in those computer game shops which I’m always too scared to enter because I think of them as “boy-spaces”) but there’s also a human female character, not-so-typical, who teaches Johnny a few things about sexism along the way.

The ScreeWee aliens are the unexpected characters in this story, because they’re not expected to be characters at all, in fact, as Johnny initially puts it, “I shoot at you and you shoto (sic) at me. That is the game”. However, it turns out that the captain is real, and has feelings and ambitions; and so is Gunnery Officer, notable for his tendency to disagree with his Captain, and likewise to distrust Johnny. As the story unfolds, human and ScreeWee cultures discover that they have a great deal to learn from each other.

There are two other books featuring Johnny by the same author, but I have yet to actually track them down and read them.

I would recommend this book to anyone from the age of 10 upwards, who’s ever felt addicted to a computer game, or wondered about the difference between games, TV, and “real life”.

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23 more

LibraryThing member debnance

Johnny Maxwell is shocked to find that the aliens in his computer game are talking back to him. They are conceding defeat. What can he do? What must he do?

Though this book has apparently been updated (in 2004) from the original story (published in 1992), it probably needs to be updated again. Lots

of computer talk and popular lingo that has changed dramatically in the past few years and would leave a modern child feeling a bit clueless.

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LibraryThing member Fledgist

A boy discovers that his video game is for real.

LibraryThing member iayork

Enjoyable and different: This is a terrific story, with many classic bits and a very realistic portrayal of kids in primary school. Johnny's best friends include Wobbler (a computer hacker), Yo-less (named because he never says Yo), and Bigmac (who lives in the rough part of town).Johnny Maxwell,

while his parents are going through "trying times" and the Gulf War is getting going on the tele, was playing a shoot-em-up computer game when he found that the Mighty ScreeWee(tm) Empire had no interest in fighting back, and wanted to surrender. This becomes quite complicated.
There are deeper meanings, etc, but don't let them frighten you off a book that is also very entertaining for adult Pratchett fans. :)

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LibraryThing member jbdavis

The Johnny Maxwell books are not Terry Pratchett's usual Discworld books. They are set in a very ordinary run down town in England, centering around Johnny Maxwell and his three friends. Johnny, whose parents are going through Trying Times, is playing his favorite video game when the aliens

suddenly surrender to him instead of fighting back. He and his friends suspect a computer virus but things get even stranger when Johnny finds himself in incredibly lifelike dreams piloting a starfighter, leading the alien fleet home where they will be safe from mankind, and communicating with a girl who also is dreaming of the alien fleet. Pratchett adds those extra touches that regular readers love such as when they go by the ruined hulks of Space Invader ships tumbling in space that the aliens use to show each other what happens when you take a stand. His special genius, to my way of thinking, comes in how he treats the conversations and thinking of the kids, along with those little unexpected twists.

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LibraryThing member kings7

It makes you want to read on

LibraryThing member readermom

It was written back in the early 90s. I think the most interesting part of the book was the forward explaining the few changes the author made when it was reissued. "If you were away from home you had to use a phone attached by a wire to the wall. It was terrible." It is funny to watch old movies,

or not even that old movies and see how things have changed in just the last five or ten years. Watching someone talk on a cell phone the size of a brick and feel cool about it is pretty funny.
This is a lot like the movie the Last Starfighter. Same basic premise. Or so my husband told me, I haven't actually seen that movie. It was alright, but nothing wonderful. Pratchett has definitely gotten better as a writer over the last fifteen years.

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LibraryThing member tundranocaps

A young adult book, and rated as such. Good for a light and interesting read, raises some thoughts about "Us" versus "Them".I wish more adults had such thoughts running through their head.

LibraryThing member ironicqueery

There's no familiar Discworld in this Terry Pratchett book, but the thought-provoking way of looking at the world still remains. Surprisingly enough, this book, geared towards young adults, proves to be one of Pratchett's most political and moralistic work yet. There is discussion about divorce,

socio-economic conditions, race, class, and finally war. War seems the main focus, with the message of the book being quite anti-war, even in video games. Based around the Gulf War (the first one), there' s a strong message aimed at kids to remember that war isn't a game, despite all the new technology and media that makes it seem like one.
Regardless of the books morals and messages, it still retains Terry Pratchett's humor. While not one of his funniest, it still manages to keep his messages wrapped in pleasant packaging. Overall, this is a surprisingly different book, but a very nice display of Pratchett's writing range.

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LibraryThing member caro488

Pratchet, Terry -Only you Can Save Mankind- Johnny gets sucked into a space invaders game when they surrender. How can he protect the aliens from mankind? He meets someone to work with -characterization is great- Yoless who makes ironic anti-racist jokes, Johnny the kid no one notices

I have always

loved Terry Pratchett's sense of humor, tho in some of his books, you have to limit exposure - but this series is just perfect

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LibraryThing member shavienda

I had trouble connecting with the characters, but theme itself was pretty interesting. The hero (non-hero type) was rather charming as well.

LibraryThing member APMum

This was the 1st of the Johnny books and is about a young lad who;s parents are having problems. the effect it has on Johnny causes him to enter a different world revolving around a computer game called "Only you can save mankind". It is witty, very readable both for children and adults alike and

thought provoking

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LibraryThing member shavienda

I had trouble connecting with the characters, but theme itself was pretty interesting. The hero (non-hero type) was rather charming as well.

LibraryThing member lilibrarian

Johnny Maxwell is your average British teen - not too keen on school and playing video games whenever he can. His current favorite, Only You Can Save Mankind, is the usual shoot the alien spaceship kind of thing until Johnny recieves a message and realizes that the aliens are real, and are fighting

for their very survival. Can he help them? Can this even be real?

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LibraryThing member JulianJohannesen

An enjoyable, short read. There was a bit more contemplation of the psychological ramifications of televised warfare and video games than I would have expected from a Terry Pratchett novel for young adults, but, hey, I'll take it.

Quick synopsis: Johnny is 12 year old boy who passes the time he's

not in school watching coverage of the first Gulf War and playing video games. Shortly after a friend gives him a pirated copy of "Only You Can Save Mankind" he begins experiencing vivid dreams that take place in the game world. In his dreams, the enemy he's meant to kill has surrendered to him and anointed him the "Chosen One," meant to lead them out of unending conflict with humans and home to a planet none of them has ever seen. As he struggles with this role, he notices that his actions in the dream world are affecting the waking world, causing him to question his own sanity. I'll stop there, so as not to spoil it, but it's a good yarn with a satisfying conclusion.

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LibraryThing member kusine

A fun introduction to science fiction for pre-teens. Some very amusing and cute moments.

LibraryThing member DeweyEver

Only you can save Mankind is a book I would highly recommend for boys who love video games. While the book goes along with the more classical games ( it takes place during the Cold War); I think the readers would be excited of the idea to be transported into a game world. The book also highlights

the ideas of what the word " mankind" means, and the possible dangers of computer gaming too much.

This is the first in the Maxwell Trilogy, and Johnny is a very interesting and developed character. Even younger girls will enjoy some of the characters described in the book. People who have read " Ender's Game" by Card, may also enjoy the gaming/ war concepts of this book.

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LibraryThing member martensgirl

Not Pratchett's finest work, but I guess he had to tone down his usual sense of humour for the younger audience. It is a cute book that would appeal to anyone who grew up in the 1980s.

LibraryThing member Lukerik

This is ostensibly about a boy who finds that his computer game has become real but what it's really about is the stupidity of war and what drives us to it. It's not the greatest novel ever written; it's essentially ham-strung by the central conceit, but the cleverness with which it delivers its

message (and a few good jokes) make up for this.

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LibraryThing member Cheryl_in_CC_NV

Clever.

Read it back when I working really hard to appreciate the love my friends have for Pratchett, don't remember it now.

LibraryThing member PhoenixTerran

It has been years since I've read anything by Terry Pratchett, which is somewhat surprising as I really enjoy his work. Like most people, I am most familiar with his Discworld novels and the adaptations thereof. As a result of a conversation with a coworkers that I don't' even remember what it was

about, I found a copy of Only You Can Save Mankind pressed into my hands. Now, I thought I recognized most of Pratchett's books, but I had never even heard of Only You Can Save Mankind, one of his young adult novels. The book sat on the to be read mountain for some time before I actually got around to reading it, but I am very, very glad that I did.

Johnny Maxwell is your fairly typical, slightly nerdy twelve-year-old kid living your fairly typical, slightly nerdy twelve-year-old life. His parents aren't around all that much, and when they are they're fighting, so Johnny ends up looking after himself much of the time. He occupies himself by hanging with his blokes and playing video games. Most recently, he's been trying to beat a bootleg copy of Only You Can Save Mankind, a space warfare game known for its realism. Everything is going fine until he receives a message from the alien capital ship, "We wish to talk." They surrender to him, but they're not supposed to do that. In fact, the manual doesn't say anything about direct messages at all. But now Johnny finds himself escorting the ScreeWee to their home, even in his dreams. He might be going crazy, but those dreams seem awfully real.

Most of the story takes place in this marvelous mix of dreamspace, gamespace, and realspace. They're constantly shifting and it's often difficult to separate one from another, but that's really not the point. Or maybe it is. There were little details that Pratchett included that just thrilled me to no end. Johnny's typing skills, for example, are simply atrocious. The various gaming and movie references, some more obvious than others, were great. Granted, I'm not sure that the younger generations are all that familiar with Space Invaders anymore (so sad!), or will realize that Alabama Smith is just another way to say Indiana Jones, or why the screen name Sigourney is so amusing, but they should still be able to get most of the jokes at least on the surface level. Surprisingly enough, except for some of the references, Only You Can Save Mankind isn't too terribly dated--an impressive feat, especially seeing as technology and gaming systems play a pretty significant role in the plot.

Only You Can Save Mankind was an unexpected delight; I had forgotten just how much I liked Terry Pratchett. I found myself grinning for pretty much the entire book and certainly more than one giggle escaped. The novel is short, under two hundred pages, but seeing as the book is intended for younger readers, this makes a fair bit of sense. And just because Only You Can Save Mankind was written for a young audience doesn't mean adult readers won't enjoy it as well; I know that I certainly did. It may have been a very quick read, but it was also very enjoyable, entertaining, and a lot of fun to boot. It even has a moral to the story which thankfully didn't end up being too heavy handed which it easily could have been. Even though the book might be a little dated, it was still a worthwhile read and a great pick-me-up. I really want to go read some more Terry Pratchett now. Only You Can Save Mankind is actually the first book in the Johnny Maxwell trilogy, something that I only discovered as I was writing this review. The next book in the series is Johnny and the Dead.

Experiments in Reading

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LibraryThing member amanda4242

Young Johnny Maxwell is happily shooting alien hoards in his new video game when suddenly the screen flashes a message saying the aliens surrender and are begging him to stop slaughtering them.

I was a little confused as to what Pratchett was getting at here when it dawned on me that it was written

around the time of the Gulf War, when the nightly news was full of images of missile lighting up the night sky like a video game. Having a game become a horrifying war actually works pretty well as a way of exploring desensitization to violence.

Fans of Good Omens will pick up more than a whiff of The Them in Johnny and his friends, which is no bad thing. I especially liked Kirsty, who is smart and talented and has the emotional intelligence of a box of rocks; it's surprisingly refreshing to read a female character who *isn't* the empathetic one.

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LibraryThing member JacksonArthur

Good book and an enjoyable read, but not Pratchette's best. I suppose I will remain a Discworld fan.

LibraryThing member TheStarTrekkie

A good book with classic adventure InTo ThE vIdEo GaMe!

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