I finally got back to one of my favorite authors and one of his best series. This series has kind of splintered off into about three different story lines if I can remember them correctly. We had the original story of the Slaver Wars which started everything. We learned about the “Special Five” which was a bunch of kids from the original book who decided to go into cryo-sleep and wake up just before the humans began a war with the Hocklyns, an alien race bent on conquering and enslaving the galaxy. These kids sleep for about 300 to 500 years, I can’t remember exactly and so did a group of other humans who understood that a war was coming and Earth would need all the experience it could get.
So, that war took place with Jeremy Strong, the son of one of the original astronauts that found the first alien ship on the moon, now promoted to Admiral and put in charge of his own fleet. Don’t even think about him not having a lick of experience. He went to sleep as a Lieutenant and some how came out of that with a huge promotion. The other “Special Four” didn’t appear so “Special” since none of them were promoted any where near as far and as fast as Jeremy. Oh, he does alright since this is only a story, otherwise, it would have been a sad day for the humans if he was actually in charge of anything. Still, when the humans won the Hocklyn war and then defeated the AIs who were the actual evil of the Milky Way galaxy, Jeremy and a number of ships were blasted into another galaxy. Thus became the “Lost Fleet” with Jeremy Strong in charge of everything in the new galaxy.
So now we have two stories about humans and their allies in the Triangulum Galaxy and the Milky Way. Both are fighting desperate enemies and both seem to be winning. The AIs are coming back in the Milky Way and while the original bad guys, the Simulins, in the Triangulum Galaxy have largely been defeated, the new enemy is the Anti-lifers. These people are the original “Originators” who have determined that they and only they should rule everything. So, of course, Jeremy and his band have started a war with the Anti-lifers and we’re off on another adventure.
The story is pretty good although some of the stuff dealing with Admiral Strong and his group are just to perfect to be believable. For example, they need to find an Originator ship that will help them gain new technology and better prepare them for the next war. Well, surprise, that happens fairly quickly. They just happened to be in the right galaxy at the right time to come across the Dominator, a huge and powerful battle ship ran by a very old AI. Of course, they had to make peace with this AI and figure out that he wasn’t all that mean if treated correctly. So, the humans got the technological boost they needed right in time.
Back in the Milky, they Earth humans found a Dyson sphere similar to those in the Triangulum Galaxy and it appeared to be somewhat friendly. Little did they know that it had the capability to link into the Triangulum Galaxy and while none of Jeremy’s people came home permanently, they did secretly come back and convince a large part of one particular group to go back to the Triangulum Galaxy with them. They also left significant Originator technology which they felt the humans in the Milky Way would need. They put it to good use.
These stories are very interesting and it’s nice to see the humans standing up and kicking butt once in a while. The cover for these books have changed so I wasn’t sure if it was loading on my iPads like it should until I discovered that change. It’s kind of a minor annoyance since I like to see various series all grouped together with common front covers. Doesn’t distract from the story although the author does tend to repeat himself in numerous paragraphs which is distracting. I’ll be looking for more books in this series and other books by Raymond L. Weil.