2017 space-navy SF, fifth of its series. An ally of the Federation
calls for help against pirates; they can't spare many ships, but they
can send Captain Roberts, a hero with a reputation for winning against
the odds.
A lot of people have written series in which spaceships go boom.
That, it would appear, is relatively easy. What I like about this
series from Stewart, and why I stick with it, is that he manages to
have interesting characters and plots too, and I can't help comparing
this with Jay Allan's unfortunate Call to Arms: where that was a
straightforward fight of Good Navy against Evil Navy, here the sides
are a bit more complex, and there are hard choices to be made. After
all, nobody's particularly surprised that the enemy Commonwealth is
supporting the pirates, even if the Commonwealth commander isn't happy
about what he's enabling. But the pirates turn out to be a great deal
more capable than anyone expected…
Mostly, though, Roberts gets to be a task force commander in a way he
didn't in the last book. It's a small force, but he's still
marshalling more resources than his individual ship, and having to
trust his subordinates to get on with their jobs. Sometimes things go
right; sometimes they go wrong and more people die.
People who get annoyed by "political correctness" (i.e. anything other
than straight white men in the military) will be annoyed by this book,
which is an extra bonus for me.
Of course sometimes there are just bits that haven't been read
through.
Unlike his men's perfectly functional rifles, he wore a scimitar on
his left hip and a modern-looking pistol on the left.
It's not at all original to say "good soldiers on side A and good
soldiers on side B may find they have more in common with each other
than with their respective paymasters". Sure. But it's well-handled,
with considerations of what happens after the joining of forces to
deal with an immediate threat; and the echoes of the previous book,
which had some of the same pieces in a slightly different arrangement,
aren't forgotten here. And there are even some good civilians here,
almost unheard-of in milsf.
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