The Stainless Steel Rat Gets Drafted
Series: Stainless Steel Rat 7
Reviewed date: 2006 Feb 6
Rating: 2
262 pages
Harry Harrison's latest installment in his Stainless Steel Rat series offers little new. The Stainless Steel Rat Gets Drafted continues the adventures of the young Jim diGriz as started in A Stainless Steel Rat is Born. Jim is looking for revenge against Captain Garth, who cruelly sold him into slavery in the previous book.
Jim manages to track down Garth's whereabouts, but the only way to reach him is to join his army--and so the stainless steel rat gets himself drafted. Jim works his way through the army staying one step ahead of those who are hunting him. Unlike in other Rat books, in this adventure Jim makes many mistakes, but Harrison arranges for him to be saved every time.
Before Jim gets a chance to kill Captain Garth, Jim discovers that the army he has infiltrated is on the move: they are staging an invasion. The gimmick is that nobody except the generals know who the target is. The Interplanetary League wishes to stop the invasion but they must know which target to protect. Jim diGriz is drafted again--this time as a secret agent of the League.
The Stainless Steel Rat Gets Drafted has its moments, but mostly it's a dull formulaic rat adventure.