So, look. Typically in my reviews I go the very remedial route of talking about broad themes from the book, how well the characters and/or worldbuilding were developed, and I comment on the pacing and overall competence of the plot. If I am very lucky, something will stand out that either makes me want to rant, or go on a gushing squeefest, and I can write a better than milquetoast review. When you get to the sixth book in a consistently excellent series, there isn’t […]
Naval Battles in Spaaaaaace!
While I am a big science fiction guy, and a history guy, military science fiction is a new genre to me. David Weber’s Honorverse series grabbed my attention because a very short version of this book was recently featured in 2015’s Free Comic Book Day. I liked the story, so I downloaded the first book of the series for free on Kindle. Weber’s Honorverse series chronicles the exploits of Honor Harington, a naval officer in the future, in space. Honor is a natural leader – […]
Scalzi strikes again.
I love this series! This one wasn’t my favorite, but it does a great job finishing off the arc started way back in The Last Colony and escalated in The Human Division. Whenever Scalzi comes back to this series, he’ll have a brand new universe to play around in. Also, it’s chock full of Scalzi’s smart, irreverent voice. So this is the sixth book in Scalzi’s Old Man’s War series. The first three books are a trilogy, #4 is a weird re-telling of #3, and then Human […]
Military Sci-Fi with Side Dishes of Geopolitics and Theology
I did not expect to appreciate this book as much as I did. As you can see from the cover, the book looks very much like Halo. The cover led me to believe I was in for the novelization of a space marine-type video game. What I got instead was a nuanced military sci-fi story with an interesting and diverse cast of characters, realistic geopolitics, and real-world tactics. Knox’s Irregulars is the story of Randal Knox, the son of a national leader of New Geneva. […]