Another very good book in an overall great series. We’re back again with Captain Jason Burke, commanding the Phoenix gunship and the Omega Force. Well, he does command the Phoenix, but not so much the Omega Force. Yeah, they all do what he tells them, but they are a little disrespectful while doing it and do complain a lot. Jason, for his part, lets them get away with it, but I don’t really know what he can do about it. Especially that the team has just gotten back together. This book does show different parts of Jason Burke as a human, a very enhanced human and how he’s changed from what he once was. Some of that change is good, very good, but other times, his change seems be leading towards his ultimate doom. Luckily he’s got one huge best friend in Lucky, the huge battlebot.
It seems that Earth has been busy and not necessarily in a good way. They have managed to colonize another planet which happens to be the domain of another intelligent species who could on a whim wipe out the humans without much trouble. instead, they make a contract with the humans to help them along with their technology in exchange for the parts from the original downed starship that Jason destroyed in his first return to Earth. Unfortunately, the administrator of this new Earth colony, named Terranovus is a full fledged megalomaniac and has diverted this new tech into building her own personal starship armada. She plans to rule the Earth at some point, but first she has a vendetta against Jason Burke. She wants him dead.
A mercenary team of ex-military special forces types is hired and sent out into the void to find Jason and end him. Little do they realize how unprepared and incapable humans are against the vast unknown galaxy. Jason has to find these guys and try to educate them on how things really are in the rest of the galaxy and while doing so, attempt to make sure they don’t get hurt! Then there is also the problem with the aliens that have contracted with Terranovus hiring their own bounty hunter who is very, very capable of ending Jason Burke.
So, as you can read, there are going to be all sorts of fun and games in this book. It might not turn out so well for Earth since the aliens who are involved are highly intelligent if not the bravest of aliens and they want Earth for themselves. Jason has also been branded a bad guy since his last visit to Earth since everyone blames him for the aliens coming there in the first place and tearing the place up trying to chase him down. This is a very interesting book in that the author made an attempt to show Jason Burke through the point of view of other characters. Sometimes he comes off as slightly bizarre, definitely dangerous and extremely violent for little reason.
Jason has to find someone willing to help defend the Earth or he might not have a home to ever return to. And, that gets him to wondering if Earth is still his home or does he even have one? Now that the Omega Force is permanently based a S’Tora, does he really need to be involved in Earth’s affairs? What if he just leaves them to their own defense? That’s probably not going to turn out too well for humans at their current minimal level of technology.
There will be more books in the series and I look forward to that very much. This is a really good space quasi-military science fiction series. Just what I like. The next book, “Omega Force: Revolution” should be out soon, I hope!