First Contact

In Her Name: The Last War #1

by Michael R. Hicks

Young Midshipman Ichiro Sato joined the Terran Navy to escape a tyrannical father and find freedom among the stars. He had no idea when he boarded the survey starship Aurora for his first assignment that he and his crew would make humanity’s first contact with a sentient alien species. Little did he know that this fateful encounter would trigger a catastrophic galactic war...

Genres: Science Fiction, Fantasy, Fiction, Space Opera, Ebooks, Science Fiction Fantasy, Amazon

392 pages, Kindle Edition

First published August 29, 2009

About the author

Born in 1963, Michael Hicks grew up in the age of the Apollo program and spent his youth glued to the television watching the original Star Trek series and other science fiction movies, which continues to be a source of entertainment and inspiration. Having spent the majority of his life as a voracious reader, he has been heavily influenced by writers ranging from Robert Heinlein to David Weber, and many in between. Having finally retired from government service, Michael and his lovely wife, along with their Siberan cat, Nina, are enjoying life as expats in France.

Reviews

[The TBR Pile *Book review site* · Rating 3 out of 5]

**book review and giveaway**

TBR Reviewer: B.H (Brutally honest)

I love science fiction and the cover instantly grabbed my attention. I really had high hopes for this book, the plot sounded full of adventure and as I said I love Sci Fi.

The beginning is primarily introductions and it is slow moving. Mr. Hicks would have been better off cutting it short or getting right into the action of the ‘first contact’ which turns out to be a slaughter. The fight is constantly interrupted by flashbacks about certain crewmembers. Paragraphs about their lives, small tidbits about them all while the aliens are boarding and creating chaos on this ship, it slows down the pace considerably. When the aliens finally capture the survivors, it does get better. The story moves faster but not enough to be a good pace. It’s still very sluggish and I often found myself wanting to X out the PDF and go do something else. There was a lot of head hoping that proved to hinder the story. It also needs more editing; I noticed a few things that knocked me out of the space voyage and back to my cluttered desk.

I hate when the author reveals something about the future ahead of time. Such as Mr. Hicks writing, ‘They had no way of knowing that all but one of them would be dead in a few short hours.’ That ruins the spontaneity, the surprise. When the attack comes, I don’t want to know the ending before the first blow is struck. Readers should live in the moment as the characters do. This happens a few times throughout the book.

The plot was good, had a bit of a Stargate feel to it (A favorite of mine.) but I quickly found myself not wanting to continue because the issues mentioned above. The story was there and I am slightly interested in the next novel. Perhaps that would be more engaging and faster paced.

Enter the contest here: http://thetbrpile.weebly.com/1/post/2...

[Cameluta · Rating 4 out of 5]

As the title of the book suggests, the action of "First Contact" is centered on the first encounter between humans and kreelans. And so, it is expected to have more battle scenes than the original series, and also to focus on the humans rather on the kreelans. This doesn't mean the kreelans are ignored ... we get more inside of their culture, "social organization", as well as their level of development. Also, we get to know better Tesh-Dar, the high priestess, to understand her powers and, by extension, Reza's powers from the original trilogy.

One thing that didn't feel quite right were the countless references to our present history. The action of the book takes place several centuries from now when, as expected, the actual boundaries, culture and political organization of the Earth will be different from what we know today. And still, all over the book everything is explained by referring to our present time. (If I talk to somebody about Austria or Hungary I simply say the country name and I do not state "which was part of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire two centuries ago"). Also, the book has a US centric view. However, for an international reader this can be annoying since the reader cannot connect with places and Terran army and president are from US. The same thing happened also in the fifth book "Legend of the Sword", and because of it I didn't enjoy the books as much as I wanted. Michael Hicks has a great writing stile, and I hope he will find a way to fix this "bug" in the last book of the trilogy "Dead Soul".

[tiffany · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a prequel to the series In Her Name: Empire. While it set the tone and background for the human and Kreelan war in the Empire trilogy, most of it was very technical and I found myself skipping through the pages of techo-babble because it was beyond my interest and ability to understand. I found myself reading on though to try to understand the Kreelans but I seem to feel a bitter aftertaste for them when I was done with First Contact. I felt as if the Kreelans are a very self-centered race, wanting everyone around the universe to fit into their mould, their Empire and sing their bloodsong. It's as if they cannot account for any cultural difference? I just can't relate to that. Additionally, what sort of Empress wants her people to die by the scores just to glorify her Name? How is battle, and a senseless selfish one at that, glorifying?

I finished the Empire trilogy empathising with Reza and Esah-Zhurah, and the entire Kreelan race - seeing in them virtues that are hard to find among mankind, even in reality. However, I finished First Contact, never wanting anything more to do with Kreelans.

[Anissa · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the first installment in the In Her Name Trilogy & wider space saga. I came into this one knowing nothing but the summary description about the story. I've jumped into another lengthy scifi saga & will have to add this one to my series rotation. I liked it but I found there were a few problems in the beginning. First, early on, it's a but repetitive in some ways. There would be a paragraph given about the Kreelan from their POV & then following would be the same information as the humans speculated or surmised it. Also, by the book summary, we know that there's only one survivor of the Aurora & pretty much who it is before we even get into depths of the story. For this reason, when I began reading, I was thinking that we would get to the survivor returning home to tell the story of what happened on the fateful meeting far sooner. Because that is not how the story plays out, I spent most of my time anticipating that actuality instead of being deeply riveted to what was unfolding in the moment. The summary information really takes away a lot of what could be great suspense in the battles because you know the humans aren't going to be victorious. The majority of the human characters were fairly pale in comparison to the Kreelan. As they were being dispatched at a pretty good clip, I didn't really get too attached to them. About 25% in, we're through all that & the story picks up & soars.

I'm a sucker for all the political drama you have to have in wide sweeping interstellar space stories, so I quite enjoyed all of that. I found it believable & was simply impressed with the number of characters that were juggled. Even though I didn't feel terribly deeply for any individual in particular (except Patty Coyle, she was my favorite character) I did feel for humanity as they embarked on this struggle. As main characters go, Ichiro Sato & Steph were not terribly interesting or at least not in any way that they overshadowed others. There are long enough stretches where they don't appear & when they popped back up it sometimes felt a bit abrupt. Also, one of them had some Mary Sue luck & when they wondered how & why they survived it, I wondered as well because it really made no sense other than the way the story ends needed them to survive. There was also some awkward moment after the main of the battle, where a soldier recognizes Steph but not because she's the famed reporter who framed Ichiro's story, no. Because Steph & Ichiro had been dating before the battle. This didn't make sense to me as it is clearly established earlier in the story that though they had been close for months leading up to the battle, they were "just friends" hence the tentativeness when the kiss lead to the hook up mere days before the battle began. That's not "dating" & I don't think Steph broadcast that via news feed & Ichiro isn't the sort to be chatty, so I don't know where that bit came from at all. By Steph's own words, she didn't know what she & Ichiro were or would be or what she even wanted in the relationship department as she was heading to cover the battle!

The Kreelans were very interesting & something to get used to. The lens through which they view life & the universe is most explained through Tesh-Dar. She's a supreme warrior priestess & sister to the sainted Empress, for whom all this warring & Bloodsong seeking goes on. The Kreelans were glorious, vicious & arrogant. I'm still not sure how I feel about them. I need to know more.

The one thing that I simply did not like at all was that the whole story is about fighting the Kreelans to protect Keran & in the end, the battle is done, the military pulls out & leaves abandoning the planet & the remaining survivors to the Kreelans to basically hunt & slaughter. WTH?! I wasn't expecting that & admit to having some hard feelings toward the rest of humanity for that one. I want some sort of retribution for that. I'll read the next in the series because I'm interested to know where this is going.

[Donna · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read the In Her Name trilogy last year and considered it one of my top reads for 2010. I have been looking forward to reading this prequel but have been a little hesitant, fearful that it wouldn't be of the same caliber as In Her Name. I am thrilled to say that I had nothing to fear.

This is a top-notch first contact story. The reactions of the humans and the politics involved in humanity's first contact with the Kreelans felt very real. The battle scenes were gripping and it had that well-plotted but nerve wracking quality of every character being at risk.

I am looking forward to In Her Name: Legend of the Sword. I'm not planning on waiting a year this time to get around to it. Also, these books are some of the best value for your money out there. Highly recommended.

[Dave · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book. I downloaded it for free. The reviews both in Goodreads and Amazon are quite favorable. But I found the entire story shopworn, illogical, and too convoluted to be interesting. And the author's writing style is way too wordy and simplistic. I managed to finish the book, but my feelings upon doing so were relief, not satisfaction.
The story line revolves around human contact with a far superior race of aliens. The aliens are a violent matriarchal society who seem to get their only enjoyment through physical combat. They have confusing and powerful telepathic powers, can communicate and travel over vast distances, are far superior to humans, yet are unable to communicate with or understand humans - I don't get it.
The story follows initial contact and annihilation of an exploratory human crew (except for one messenger). The messenger then gains a sacredness with the aliens which makes him safe from further harm. The messenger brings warning back to humans. There is some preparation for battle, then a war on one of the human planets. The aliens 'dumb-down' their fighting capabilities to even the odds and then proceed with a very bloody war with heavy casualties on both sides. Of course the key half-dozen humans being followed in the story miraculously (heavy on the miracles) manage to survive.
Author Michael Hicks spends a good portion of the book repeatedly explaining each character's emotions, rather than writing a good, tight story and letting the reader figure that out. There is a rather silly love story interwoven into the story. As other reviewers have noted, Mr. Hicks likes to use asides extensively, which slow the story to a crawl. The dialog is just silly at times and unnecessarily heavy on expletives. And there's just too many things wrong or illogical to make this book good science fiction. Can't recommend this one.

[Matt · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5/5

I thought I loved all sci-fi. I was wrong.

This author does a lot right, but just as much wrong. I can't stand more telling than showing. A ton of time is spent with dozens and DOZENS of characters, setting up little backgrounds, which is great, ha-ha, my life is this, and here's a little cute backstory about my family or my hobbies, meh meh meh, but it never comes back around to mean anything and they often die anyway. It's dreadfully, dreadfully over written, although the writing is clear and mechanically sound and vivid, it just didn't keep my attention.

This novel is going to be perfect for space-opera lovers who care about well-written detail just for the sake of it; invading alien race history and their culture; human political response (globally and by country -- the best part, IMHO); and action for action lovers. Man, oh, man. Do you get pages and pages of action. I just don't care for it my books. I suppose I'm spoiled on TV and movies, becasue I'd rather watch it than read it. It just goes on forever, even though it's rollicking and thrums with urgency, it just, ahhh!, DRONES ON for chapters and chapters and chapters.

I just prefer character stories in my sci-fi -- and world-building. This novel had tons of narrative summaries. As in: author tells you about a character's past in an info-dump style when two characters first meet, to show that the author knew their backstory. great job. you thought about your characters. whoopee, now execute this in an engaging way and show us, don't tell us. A little telling is fine. For a f***in' movie, as a screenplay, this could be a great film -- but still -- reading this was a chore. I'm gonna say I'm not the right reader for this sub-genre or style.

I'll take speculative science-fiction rooted in reality over fantasy space alien operas, I guess.

[Cyc · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the first book i read in the series, and now i cannot wait to grab the other 2 books and then the Redemption trilogy as well. It was hard to put it down. I had to force myself away from it so i could eat and sleep haha. The story moves along at a good pace. I did not find any parts of it to be dull, which a lot of books suffer from. It does a great job of continuously switching between the human side of the story and the alien side, so you get both perspectives equally. The end of the free Kindle edition also includes the first chapter of the 2nd book, which i chose to skip since i plan to read the whole series.

[Ron · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well done. I love first contact books, and this one took a different approach: an alien specie technologically far advanced over humans and not especially benign in their regard for lesser species.

Well organized and written, but the plot--especially saving the cast she wants to advance--is a but too obvious and too dependent on favorable coincidences. The word "miraculously" is over used, but indicative of this problem.

Sets up a series, this volume nonetheless manages to end neatly.

[Jay Dee Archer · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a pleasant surprise. Plenty of action, good character development, and enough deaths to make me wonder who will survive. Read my full review here: https://ireadencyclopedias.wordpress....

[Lalo Martins · Rating 1 out of 5]

A richly developed alien culture and the interesting (if not novel) concept of contact with a much more advanced species with values so different we can't communicate. Good prose and characters that resonate. All this wasted is a book that is 90% fight scenes. After a while the battle antics just blurred into one another and bored me into skipping entire chapters.

[Pavel Lishin · Rating 2 out of 5]

"The Bloodsong. It was an ethereal thing, unmeasurable by any instrument or technology"

If you want to write fantasy, just write fantasy. The Black Gate was also very handwavy, but this is just elves and wizards on a spaceship.

[Missy LaRae · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5* for me.

This is the first book in the sweeping science fiction saga by Michael R. Hicks. Like Star Wars the story was originally written with books 4-5-6 written first and then books 1-2-3 being written. I read this one first because I like chronological stories, but then I mucked it all up by reading #4, Empire, right after this one.

Okay so a few weeks ago I picked up Mr. Hicks alien scifi story because he kindly had it up for free and I figured why not check it out right?? I was IMMEDIATELY in love with the story. Being former army I am all about stories with some real action as well as some crazy alien bitches as they're called time and time again.

The opening sequence starts out with a human vessel exploring the stars suddenly jumping into alien air space and being greeted by four bad ass alien war ships. Their craft is boarded and they're slaughtered until there are only 22 survivors (23?) left on the ship, and those are the ones who fought back. We're introduced to the brave human warriors one by one and Mr. Hicks does a good job of making them seem very real and relatable early on. Some of his descriptions were a little vague about the aliens but that just set the story up for the battle between the humans and the alien bitches in some sort of gladiator contest for honor In Her Name.

There is chosen a messenger to go back to the human world and tell them of the invasion of the Kreelan Empire, and Mr. Ichiro does just that.

The pace never lets up in this book and that's what I loved about it. It was ALL action, ALL the time. The author got me loving one character and then ya know what, sorry pal you gotta die. Bam! One of my favorite characters in the book towards the end was a tank commander who was bad ass. However, instead of a glorious death in battle or even letting her live, no, she gets shredded my shrapnel.

The biggest pet peeve of mine and the only reason that I took 1/2 a star away was the use of - dashes - as pauses in the story line. There are cleaner ways to write and I thought they were unnecessary. Also there were sentences that were missing a word here, a word there, as if the editing was done, but it wasn't fully read out loud. Those technical mistakes were minuscule, but were the only reason for the star being taken away.

The book was fantastic. Awesome setting, great story telling, and you know what? I downloaded the rest in the series, and then I read #4,5,6 yesterday and today. SO GOOD.

[Cathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

"A prequel to In Her Name: Empire, the events of First Contact take place a century earlier:

Led by Commander Owen McClaren, the TNS Aurora has embarked on an extended survey mission, searching for new worlds that could support human life. Drawn to an uncharted star system that appears to have not just one, but two potentially habitable planets, the crew of the Aurora discovers something even more unexpected: the planets are already inhabited, but not by humans. Approached by gigantic alien starships, the human crew prepares for humanity’s very first contact with another sentient race."

And it goes downhill from there for humanity. Great space opera with epic battles, I enjoyed this book very much! Great pacing, a lot of suspense, very graphic, believable, hard to put down.

A little confusing at times: The multitude of characters. Sometimes I had to go back a page or so to remind myself from whose perspective the story is being told. But eventually, as I got deeper into the plot, it stopped being an issue.

The characters are well drawn and believable. They are also interesting and not one-dimensional at all. I wouldn't mind meeting some of them in real life. Even the aliens aren't just the big, evil monsters, but actual personalities.

Excellent book! And I might use the author's offer to download the first book of the trilogy from his website. It is already stashed away on my Kindle.

[Josh]

This whole series focuses on the conflict between aliens and humans. What I liked was both viewpoints of the conflict. Also the aliens acted for logical reasons just not human logic. It's hard to write aliens as alien and not just "dressed up" humans and I think he succeeded. Story and plot were good with some memorable characters. Also different characters had different points of view on things that were never really resolved...just like real life.
What I didn't like was the books felt a little "twightlightish" to me as far as the romance goes between human and alien. Aspects of the relationship were really improbable to me within the context the author set up. Another problem is some points got repeated over and over again. Not in a preachy way but sometimes I felt like "Okay I get it". This review is for the series as a whole and not this individual book.

[Ann · Rating 5 out of 5]

All I can say is WOW, just WOW! It has been a long time since I read sci-fi this wonderful and I wish I hadn't started reading it so late because I couldn't stop until I was finished, just before dawn. It was worth it. I loved the characters, both human and Kreelan, enough to feel sad when so many of both fell in battle. And what battles they were. The last series I started that made me so anxious to tear through to the last book was Outlander. Although of a completely different genre, I am ready to inhabit this future universe to the end. I came to the book at not quite the end of Outlander sounding like a Scot. I am not sure what this series will leave me with, but I am excited to find out. Thank you Mr. Hicks.

[Christina (Mystic) · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's been a while since I've read a great Sci-Fi book and Michael R. Hicks' In Her Name First Contact was, indeed, great.

The characters were well written and had great depth to them. You know a book is well written when, even though the antagonists are terrifying, you still feel for them and want to learn more about why they do what they do. I had a hard time hating the Kreelans, especially Tesh-Dar and Li'ara-Zhurah as they were just such well written antagonists that I really grew to know them. I love it when a book leaves me feeling conflicted over whether or not the "bad guys" or in this case girls, really are that bad after all.

I can't wait to read the next book!

[Cian Goggin · Rating 5 out of 5]

An amazing novel!! Even thought it was only 373 pages it felt like it was a book of over 1000 pages it was that good, with so much detail and a great plot and brilliant characters, this is a book that I would recommend to anybody who love science fiction books or to anyone else I loved its that much. Really want to download the next book on my kindle, but shouldn't because I have major exams in two weeks, but will probable end up downloading it. I gave it 5 stars and really feel that It is worth the 5.

[Richard Valle · Rating 3 out of 5]

At first I didn't like this one so much as it started out too much like David Weber & Steve White's Starfire series except with samurai tigers instead of people eating giant spiders. As the book went on it was interesting to see how the aliens developed and it became a 4 (really liked it). But, I seriously dislike the viewpoint of 'they are not like us so it's ok to kill every man, woman and child because they are not really people'.

There are hints that might change in later books. I'll read more to see where the story goes.

[Lee Guo · Rating 5 out of 5]

God dam good

God dam good everything damn it. I love. Damn good characterization. A little too much worthiness. Damn good situation all sequences. Just God damn good ending. Lots of surprises

[Carl Bronson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great read

Had a hard time putting this one down. Great writing, showing both sides of the conflict. Fast paced & descriptive space and ground conflict.

[Jaime K · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the foreward, Hicks said that he felt that the entire "In Her Name" series was akin to Star Wars with the middle written first and the prequels as books 1/2/3 written second.
I also equate this to the entire Enderverse, where books on the first Formic war were written after Ender, but showed that first contact with the buggers. So too does "The Last War" show the first contact with the Kreelans.

I have not read any other books by Hicks, so didn't know what to expect. What I got was a wild sci-fi tale of destruction and hope. Was it unique, like Hicks hoped for? I would say so.
That said, I felt like parts of it were like Enderverse, where the Kreelans had a hive mind spirit similar to the Formics, though because of the spiritual vs mind connection, they are still individuals who think and act for themselves. They just feel and know the same things. Going back to the Star Wars universe, they are kind of like the Yuuzhan Vong who hate electronic-based technology, though are not technophobes: Kreelans just think using certain technology in battle is dishonorable regarding how they glorify their Empress. But they do believe in honor and do their best to ensure they honor their Empress, doing everything in Her name. They don't embrace pain the way the Vong do, and they don't think it dishonorable to run in battle if they realize it's a loss, but they fight to work through the pain. Kreelans, like the YV, are humanoid and have technological advances that heal any aches and ailments.
However, seeing those links made me appreciate the differences Hicks gave to give his own "first contact" story. Because even the similarities were not one-to-one. The Kreelans could see the sub-cellular makeup of humans and their ships. They could travel quickly. They could project 3D images in real time. They terraform in a way slightly different than the Vong. They respect those who fight back as worthy opponents.
They are FAIR. When there is a battle, the Kreelans do their best to ensure they are on the same playing level with the humans, even regressing some technology for fairness. In a melee, even when the humans were "winning," those matched against survivors stepped back to better even the odds. I don't like them, but (especially seeing their POVs), I respect what they think they're doing, even if I think it's all asinine.

I really like the way the book is written. Before the humans meet the Kreelans, the alien POVs were in italics; after, the names are given. I found myself liking people even knowing they would die, including McClaren, Kumar, Sato--who had to grow on me, though became more intriguing when Tesh-Dar sees a brightness in him--Steph, President Natalie McKenna, Sabourin, Coyle, and even Tesh-Dar to an extent (not all die, just tossing out the myriad of names).
The culling fight is done really well, giving enough of one POV to get the gist of that part of the fight before swapping to another. The first main battle at Keran was done phenomenally.

The worldbuilding (versebuilding?) was great. I absolutely loved learning about the potential castes of the Kreelans by garb/color (another thing like the YV), and liked the internal acknowledgement that humans do this too! We just don't always have different colros. BUT we do have experts in many areas.
The information on the Human Sphere Defense Agreement and then the ways in which the alien artifacts were anlayzed, including with their DNA sequencing, was all fantastic. There was just enough information to capitvate me but not so much that I lost interest in the political aspect of the book.
Learning why males aren't present in the Kreelan troops, and having a mating-based curse (which I struggle to fully comprehend, but that's me) were pretty interesting.
Sato’s instructor reminded me of Mazer in Ender’s Game.

The book is repetitive at times. For example, I didn't need to be told more than once that McClaren doesn't like cursing.
I also thought that the Sato + Steph relationship didn't need to go where it went, especially after he realizes he has too much survivor's guilt for her to understand. And then a year later, she's 30 when he's 20.

[Lora Shouse · Rating 4 out of 5]

First Contact is the first book in what appears to be a collection of sub-series about a war between the group of worlds settled by people from Earth and the first alien civilization they encounter. It is a good basic military science fiction novel, so if you are fond of military science fiction, you will probably like it.

There are a lot of characters involved in the various aspects of this war – from the Terran President to the various admirals and generals to the engineers and tank commanders and infantrymen. They are all well described, and most of them are honorable people (except for one incompetent ship captain). Many of them die in the battle, and most of the rest are seriously wounded. The fighting is described in realistic detail (given what the aliens are said to be like). The humans technically lose the war, and the Kreelans take over the planet they are fighting for. But there are a handful of human survivors who make it back to their home planets, and they seem to count this as some sort of a win, even though they know there will be another round of battles in the war.

I enjoyed the book but have decided that I don’t really care that much about the details of the subsequent steps in the war. I have one of the books from the next subseries, and will probably read that, but probably won’t seek out the rest of them. However, if military science fiction is your thing, you might want to read the whole series.

This book begins with the exploratory starship, the Aurora emerging from hyperspace after a jump near an unexplored planet. A planet that is as yet unexplored by people from Earth or any of its colonies, that is. The Aurora’s crew is aware of potential danger, but on the whole, they are excited to be part of the first contact with an alien intelligent species.

There is a large number of alien ships already surrounding the Aurora, and they don’t look friendly. Rarely for a science fiction novel, these aliens don’t seem to have telepathic abilities or any kind of universal translator that allows them to communicate with the humans, and they are not interested in learning the language or teaching the humans theirs. The first thing they do is burn holes in the Aurora’s hull through which they board the ship, knocking out all power. They then proceed to start killing people, mostly with swords.

I initially thought they would kill the entire crew within the first five minutes, but, curiously, they spare the people who fight back. They take them back to their own highly advanced ship and heal them so they can engage them in ritualized hand-to-hand combat in what looks for all the world like an ancient gladiatorial arena. Five of the twenty-three people selected for this combat survive the fight – barely. All but one of these is then ritually executed. The lone survivor, the youngest and almost lowest ranking of the crew, Ichiro Sato, is then returned to the repaired and somewhat upgraded Aurora and sent back to Earth with a little globe resembling one of the outlying planets to warn them of what is coming.

[Tristan · Rating 1 out of 5]

Well, this author can line up one word after another well enough, but I don’t think I have ever read anything so cheesy. There’s more overacting by the stereotypically perfect crew members in this novel than in the worst toothpaste commercials on television. The descriptions are as wooden and wobbly as the cheapest backdrops of a bargain bucket TV series.

There’s more “telling” than “showing” here than I have ever seen before, even though I tend to scoff at the old “show, don’t tell” chestnut. But this is more than a textbook example. It reads as spoof text deliberately devised to illustrate that notion. It is stilted beyond tropes and cliches.

However, the author is earnest to a fault, like a child putting on a stage production in the parents’ living room for grandma. Such is his urge to state the very bleeding obvious, again and again, that this verbal diarrhoea does nothing but betray a complete lack of logic or imagination. The naivety of every action or utterance beggars belief rather than suspends it. This naivety and the young adult or middle grade level of relationships between the sexes do not sit well with the profanity thrown around in an attempt to fake some grittiness.

Irrelevant, inopportune, impudently interrupting infodumps placed every other paragraph, smack in the middle of everything, utterly ruin any buildup of tension or any narrative pace. Trying to give every character, however minor, a detailed backstory is unnecessary when that backstory is irrelevant to the plot. It also exposes some laughable cultural and gender stereotypes.

It’s a shame, as there’s a decent concept here (albeit not that original): human explorers stumbling across a civilisation so advanced it cannot be detected and which exists only for war, being blatted like bugs, and then having to find a way to survive. There’s a nice touch in that the aliens deliberately downgrade their technology to that of the humans when they attack, as their aim is not victory, but the honour of fair combat.

Despite this glimmer of interest, the novel is just awful. It’s skimmable only because it is so awful, like rubbernecking at a car crash. Forget the rest of the series.

[Samantha Tanner · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was more enjoyable than I anticipated. If I were to summarize what it is about... Star Trek meets the political aspects of The Expanse meets the battles of Starship Troopers meets the incredibly technologically advanced women of Amazonia.

A few things I really liked about this writing:

1. as with Gaiman, he was able to include "big" words without sounding pompous or common words in creative way. Here's a sampling: rapacious, abattoir, phalanx, brevet, chandelle.

2. A large portion of the book is a battle which could have gotten very boring very quickly, but Hicks (as throughout the whole book) jumped around to the perspective of many different characters. For the battle in particular this really helped keep the pace and narrative going as each person's perspective was unique and it covered pretty much every position/ location in the battle including that of the enemy. Some of these characters died. Not much was sacred. Unlike other books I've read where there have been many perspectives, Hicks gave just enough background information to uniquely identify the characters and their perspective without it bogging down the pace. I also found it impressive how many characters he could include while still all being so different. Excellent diversity between male/female, races, skills, etc.

3. I really enjoyed his descriptions of the alien technology. I thought it was inventive. And I liked how although they were/are hell-bent on unrestricted mayhem, they "would not show leniency, but would show fairness" and they intentionally would even the odds in order to have an "honorable fight". I found it reminiscent of fighting styles found which center heavily on honor and fair fighting or that of kamikazes in addition to gladiators which was mentioned in the book.

The only thing in particular I didn't like was that the perspective of the enemy was a bit redundant (particularly the use of the phrase "that no human could ever know" when describing the speed at which the enemy could move), but I think the purpose was to really hammer home their central ideology and how single-minded they were about it.

[Grace Ison · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a new author for me, and I love a good book that a long-running series. So far. This one is a 19-book series. I would call this a Military SiFi series, and suspect Hicks has read Adrian Tchaikovsky’s Black & Gold Series as well as C.J. Cherryh’s Downbelow Station. Something are immediately clear, such as, when Hicks writes about “jump space” and “gravity wells.” I thoroughly enjoyed the book.
The story begins on a spaceship seeking planets that can be inhabited by humans. Upon finding a solar system that has potentials, the ship is about to investigate when several very large, small planet-sized ships suddenly appear and are traveling toward them at an impossible speed. Obviously much more advanced, and it will make contact in 3 hours.
Should they stay and follow the First Contact protocol? Or get the hell out of there? They choose to stay. Most unfortunately, this species of blue females, far more technologically advanced, are stronger, aggressive, and armed with razor-sharp claws, is not friendly.
Their is ship boarded, many of the crew is killed and the survivors are expected to fight in an arena before they, too, are killed.
Only one person is left alive, whom the blue aliens dub The Messenger, and he is put back on his empty ship to return to Earth with a message which basically says,
“We are coming to kill you.”
It’s a fast-paced book and hard to put down. I had to pick up the next book in the series immediately.

[Yoshinobu Yamakawa · Rating 4 out of 5]

First contact science fiction about contact with aliens. While on a mission to find a planet that could be colonized, a human exploration ship encountered a highly civilized alien race called Cleera. Cleera regards battle as supreme value and regards humans as new prey. Humans struggle to resist their overwhelming power.

This setting alone was enough to keep me excited, but the story took an unexpected turn and drew me into the story.

I was particularly impressed by the heated battle scenes. Aside from the scale of space warfare, I was most impressed by the hand-to-hand combat on the ground. The physical combat with swords and fists is depicted as somewhat human in a sci-fi setting.

Over the course of the story, Cleera's culture and social structure gradually become apparent. They have built a society in which only women are the bearers of civilization, which gives the story its own color. Contact with beings with different values is not just war, but also an attempt to seek deeper understanding. There are many moments when people reconsider their own culture through contact with alien species.

Personally, I strongly felt the importance of cross-cultural understanding from this work. Conflicts and conflicts arising from encounters with aliens have been a recurring theme in science fiction. I realized that the impact of contact with aliens is not just the result of war, but also the importance of embracing new values and ways of thinking.

[TJ · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a weird plot, I must say.
I'm a hardcore sci-fi fanatic, but never have I come across such a plot. Its quite interesting though.
I mean, till now we have read or seen sci-fi shows or books on alien lifeform either friendly or hostile, but never have I heard of or can imagine of a sentient life form with a sole purpose of annihilating other worthy sentient life forms. I mean, they kill because the other life forms are worthy of their respect. Wow...

Super twisted plot. Though the alien characters show more respect worthy qualities in them than us humans. They live for honor. They die for respect. They are portrayed more honorable than humans.
They are portrayed as super advanced yet, their nature is more primitive than humans. They see a worthy enemy and equal their playfield, just to have an honorable fight.

I have revealed enough spoilers, but had to. This story is twisted but its very enchanting. Once you start, you won't be able to stop until the book is over. This story has an intriguing plot. I'm already on to the next one, cause a lot is not clear to me and I hope the next book will clear my concepts.

[Tim Seabrook · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thoroughly enjoyed this book from the opening and all the way through. Mankind is reaching out to the stars, it has been to many places but this is the first time that it has met another race of aliens and they are completely different to what we expect.

Their technology is beyond ours in so many ways and so are the lives they live. Yet, in some of they are more honourable than you could possibly expect.

The crew of the Aurora have the unprecedented role of meeting aliens but even though it is first contact and they have a procedure in place, it can only be based on how we would hope another race would treat us, which they don't.

And even though humans have colonised many planets, their prejudices and traits are still part of who they are. Planets have different governments, all acting in their own self interest, not willing for the most part to help others or believe when something extraordinary happens, until of course, it is too late for anything to be done to help them or others.

[chris baxter · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 stars is being generous. It's just not entertaining to watch a civilization light-years ahead of another in technology and all things War go up against a pathetically weak and technologically backwards culture (the humans) and then spend several hundred pages hoping David miraculously finds a way to, if not beat Goliath, at least get on an even par with the brutes. But no. The aliens are light-years ahead of the humans in all things war and everything else and, surprise! the aliens always win. Sure, the humans get in a few very minor, and ultimately meaningless, "wins" here and there, but that's only because the aliens feel the need to keep at least one hand tied behind their backs or keep one eye closed or whatever it takes to make the battle at least somewhat slightly more interesting for them. They have to go way out of their way to dumb down all their capabilities to make the war more entertaining. So even those rare "wins" aren't actually wins. The aliens can wipe out the humans any time they want. There is no big surprise, no secret human weapon or tactic that ever comes up. Nothing. The aliens are worlds ahead of them in power. Period. I guess if you enjoy seeing people proudly and fervently fighting til the end despite the futileness of it all, then this will be a great read. But personally, I don't find watching Goliath continually slaughter every David that comes up against him entertaining no matter how gallantly or honorably the David dies. They still all get slaughtered. Maybe the next books give a glimmer of hope for the human race, but I don't think I want to spend another several hundred pages of such a one-sided war/slaughter to find out.