(Found) Short story using "planned" war as plot device

[trdconsult]

This would have been from a pulp magazine from the 80's, as I think I would remember it better if it were a stand-alone novel. It has come back to mind after reading "Hunger Games". I was thinking that "Hunger Games" was rather derivative of this earlier short story.

The premise was this: war had been conquered, but the bloodlust for war had not. In order to quench this bloodlust, armies trained to fight in arena. I forget the size, but it was a nice round number - 100, 1000, something like that. Fight to the end in an artificial arena, the last army with members alive wins.

In the story, we follow our hero as he prepares and then fights in the conflict. Eventually he's the only one left from his side, and even he is taken for dead by his opponents. He then manages to kill them and become the hero. Society adored him. Laws no longer applied to him. He could do whatever he wanted and no one would stop him, and so he took advantage of it.

Does this ring any bells to someone?

 

[chrispenycate]

We had a thread – I know because I made an incorrect suggestion - ah, yes, at http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/forum/48439-looking-for-short-story-title-or-author.html which might just be the same book.

 

[trdconsult]

DING DING DING DING DING! We have a winner. I see someone else was looking for the story for the same reason I was; the similarities between it and "Hunger Games". I think if you took that short story, mashed it with Heinlein's "Tunnel in the Sky", and then told yourself "I want this to be appealing to teen girls", you would have to come up with "Hunger Games."

Thank you so much for the help!

 

[Danny McG]

We had a thread – I know because I made an incorrect suggestion - ah, yes, at http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/forum/48439-looking-for-short-story-title-or-author.html which might just be the same book.

Dead link!
Please always name the title and author as well as providing a link.

 

[Dave]

Dead link!
Please always name the title and author as well as providing a link.

It was Mack Reynolds "Frigid Fracas" series that CrisP posted as an incorrect suggestion.
The actual book was Survivor, by Walter F. Moudy.

(The thread number is still correct, the forum software just quotes threads in a different format.) So, I'll mark this as another (Found).