This series is interesting, but kind of boring. It seems like all the main characters do is think about what they are going to do next and not really doing much of anything. That might not be totally correct, but as I read this book I was definitely getting bored! Oh, well, I did finish this book and i’m glad I read it. You make your own call.
As you’ll recall, Earth has been devastated by the Veldon. I mean Earth has been pretty much destroyed. The single remaining fleet commanded by Admiral Thomas Gaston has sent scouts to Earth and their reports are not very encouraging. It’s total destruction even for remote sites in the Antarctic were struck by the Veldon and totally obliterated. Veldon still had troops on the ground systematically going about destroying any human survivors of this vicious attack. There wasn’t much hope coming from the video records brought back by the scouts. Admiral Gaston ruled that these scouting reports would not be released to the crew, only the officers who were present at this Intel back brief were aware of the situation on Earth. Everyone else had been told that it was bad, but no specifics could be given.
Of course that wasn’t the only thing the fleet was doing. They had dispatched an EDF cruiser to find out what was going on with Earth’s colonies. He had reports that the Veldon were attacking these colonies and wiping them out. Nothing was available to stop these attacks and Admiral Gaston wasn’t ready to commit the only fleet humanity had towards a potentially fatal encounter. The cruiser Patton, under command of Captain Stewart Carmine, was not finding anything of promise. The few colonies they had approached were actively being bombarded or occupied by the Veldon. The Patton couldn’t stop these attacks by themselves, so the only thing they could do was to proceed on hoping to find a colony that could begin evacuation procedures before the Veldon arrived. The next colony was Calidorn. It appeared to be unaware of the Veldon’s or if they were they hadn’t done much to organize an evacuation. So, Captain Stewart made them aware of the need for urgency. The Veldon were coming and soon.
Meanwhile, a team lead by Lieutenant Franklin Hale was just disengaging with the Zitha or a faction of the Zitha that had broken away from the main Zitha body due to their distaste for the normal bad habits of the Zitha. Again, the Zitha were mainly a bunch of pirates that preyed on unsuspecting shipping no matter where they came from. This group, though, were scientist who were trying to establish advanced terra-forming processes on a suitable planet. So, although these Zitha agreed to join with the EDF Fleet, it’s questionable as to what they can provide. But, Lieutenant Hale was told by Ambassador Alfred Chance that they needed to head towards Likari space. This was an unknown alien civilization that no one had actually ever seen. Still, they knew that anyone who previously crossed into their territory were violently destroyed. So, these aliens might have some kind of advanced weaponry which could be of use to the EDF, provided they could survive the encounter.
And for the other story-line, we have Commander Gareth Weston and his crew of mismatched people were also headed for Calidorn. They had knowledge of a Korla scientist whose rescue might get the Korla’s interested in coming in to the war against the Veldon as human allies. So far, they had seemed reluctant to do anything even though they had once had mutual support agreements which should have already activated the Korlas. But, so far they were doing nothing.
So, there are several different threads to follow in this book. Most are pretty easy to understand when you finally figure out which group is doing what. There are also a lot of interpersonal conflicts going on that, quite frankly, get pretty tiring. The impostor Ambassador Chance is always fighting with Ethyl who is about as negative a person as you can be. She needs to be eliminated! Then there’s Lyra Vahst and her continued fear of being arrested by Chelsea Gaston! I think they are beyond that, but it’s always brought up and the fact that Lyra doesn’t like the military life-style. All of these are long, long parts of the story and are just boring in my opinion. Additionally, the fact that humanity is almost destroyed, I don’t see a way that this situation can change. Admiral Gaston is already having challenges to his command and he might not last much longer.
So, I’m not really sold on going forward with this series. Oh, I might, read book 5, “Turning Point”, since it’s on my reading list, but I’m in no hurry to do so right now.