This is a fairly long book. There is ample reason for it to be this long since Admiral Tyler Barron has a lot to accomplish and not very much time. The Confederation is in chaos caused by operatives from the Union messing with several members of the Confederation Senate. While all the members of that body were corrupted to some extent, the Union operatives were influencing several key members with almost total success. After the successful arrest and imprisonment of Admiral Barron and the Confederation Chief of Intel, Gary Holsten, things were looking up for the Union spies. That is until friends of the two broke them out of their imprisonment.
Admiral Barron has fled to Archellia and is trying to rally those Confederation space forces to his cause. He doesn’t want to start a civil war, but he must get back to Megara and find out what is causing all the unrest with the Senate. He also knows he must do this quickly in order to organize any kind of defense against the Hegemony invasion. That invasion is already underway at Dannith with Admiral Clint Winters fighting a losing battle against the overwhelming forces of the Hegemony.
In the last book, Andi Lafarge was captured by Richard Lille and suffered considerably under his control. While outwardly she appears to have recovered from the ordeal, she is internally festering a deep hatred and a growing desire to go back to Megara and kill Lille. Since Gary Holsten has to go back to Megara also, Andi volunteers take him back to the Pegasus. She knows that Tyler Barron would never let her go if he knew the vengeance that Andi was after. Neither would Gary Holsten or at least he would insist on helping her kill Lille. So, Andi says nothing of her plans to track down and kill Richard Lille. It’s either her last act or his.
Gary Holsten also has the task of finding Admiral Van Striker who again, was captured by Richard Lille. He doesn’t know what kind of condition he’ll find the Admiral, but it’s been awhile since he’s been heard from. There is no guarantee that Lille hasn’t already killed Admiral Striker. Of course, if Andi kills Lille prior to Gary finding where he’s holding Striker, they may never find him and certainly not alive.
So, there’s a lot going on in this book. We read about the preparations on Dannith since everyone knows the fleet won’t be able to stay around and defend the planet. A former Marine Captain, now promoted to Colonel is in charge of the planetary defenses. He has about two divisions of Marines and local militia. Now this is something I can never get my head around. How can any one man defend an entire planet. Additionally, a division of about 15,000 soldiers and another 8,000 support troops can’t cover an entire planet. Even two divisions won’t provide the necessary strength. Planet Earth has over a million service men and women in just the United State military and we’re only defending one nation! So, I think the authors are really stretching things when he thinks one Colonel and a few thousand other military personnel can protect an entire planet. But, this author isn’t the only one doing this kind of trick. Everybody else writes the same way. It just doesn’t make sense.
Ok, so this isn’t the end, even if the Hegemony seems capable of just running through the entire Confederation. Well find out just how far they get in the next book entitled, “Nightfall”, I hope coming soon.