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Glen Cook (The Black Company, The Dread Empire) delivers a masterpiece of galaxy spanning space opera! For four thousand years, the Guardships ruled Canon Space with an iron fist. Immortal ships with an immortal crew roaming the galaxy, dealing swiftly and harshly with any mercantile houses or alien races that threatened the status quo. But now the House Tregesser believes they have an edge; a force from outside Canon Space offers them the resources to throw off Guardship rule. Their initial gambits precipitate an avalanche of unexpected outcomes, the most unpredicted of which is the emergence of Kez Maefele, one of the few remaining generals of the Ku Warrior race -- the only race to ever seriously threaten Guardship hegemony. Kez Maefele and a motley group of mysterious aliens, biological constructs, and scheming aristocrats find themselves at the center of the conflict. Maefele must choose which side he will support; the Guardships, who defeated and destroyed his race, or the unknown forces from outside Canon Space that promise more death and destruction. Skyhorse Publishing, under our Night Shade and Talos imprints, is proud to publish a broad range of titles for readers interested in science fiction (space opera, time travel, hard SF, alien invasion, near-future dystopia), fantasy (grimdark, sword and sorcery, contemporary urban fantasy, steampunk, alternative history), and horror (zombies, vampires, and the occult and supernatural), and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller, a national bestseller, or a Hugo or Nebula award-winner, we are committed to publishing quality books from a diverse group of authors.… (more)
User reviews
Much of the first half of the book left me thinking “poor man’s version of 'The Culture'” (indeed the book
But then, after all that, the climax and denouement all felt like a bit of a let-down. After having been kept guessing about Kez Maefele’s goals and motivations for most of the book, his actions during the climactic scenes of the book felt fairly random to me.
Don’t expect even remotely convincing aliens, or economics, or politics…This is one of those books that is just supposed to entertain and amuse, and for the most part it delivers. The implications of the cloning and regeneration aspects of certain societies in the book were completely ignored. And I missed the dark humor which pervades the Black Company books.
Still, all in all, worth your time.
Story is about conflict taking place in a (very) distant future where Canon space (known space) is controlled by infamous Guardships. Guardships are sort of a "living" ships - they
This book has more twists and turns than any other book I have ever read. It is listed under military sf but it is more, much more. Battles are described in short - few sentences, paragraph or [in some] cases entire [albeit small] chapters. Story is fast paced and very interesting but some parts are chaotic (to say the least) - you are truly left wondering what happened to some characters, are they alive or not (and even you when see/read them in following chapter you still won't be 100% sure what happened to them). I think this is an element that many readers will have problems with, which is a shame because [I will repeat myself] this one is a great story.
Recommended.
I can understand why authors want to write a stand alone novel, but this book should have been at least two or three books. I loved the characters. I loved the premise and the plot, but the action was sometimes too fast and furious and sometimes much slower. If the book(s) had been longer, many of the passages that were rushed over in the first half would have been made much clearer.
This is really the story of the missions of One of the Guardships,
The Story starts off with a focus-- but halfway thru the book and several outrageous plot characters too many and you are just taking the ride through a very colorful universe where ancient superships maintain a Law that No-one remembers who first imposed it, fighting against ancient alien rebels who never die. The Plot just kinda spirals off into dark and there's no point in chasing it. That's the main negative of this book.
And then you hit the part where it seems that the Superships have minds of their own, mixed in with the uploaded consciousnesses of dead commanders-- and the whispered thought that NO LAWS govern them in the end.
A Weird, Strange future that I found entrancing to contemplate. If only the author had been disciplined to stay inside a more cohesive plot structure.