Onslaught

Demontech #1

by David Sherman

The diabolic armies appear invincible–but they haven’t met the Marines.

The Dark Prince’s power to summon demons has made his forces second to none, and ensured his place as one of the invasion’s leaders. Not content to merely seize his father’s throne, the renegade royal dreams of world conquest–and with his army and his black arts, there is little to stop him.

So unexpected, so well planned is the invasion of the free port New Bally that out of hundreds in the city, only two escape capture. Haft and Spinner will need all their courage and cunning to retrieve their weapons from their enemy-held ship, cross the open meadows surrounding the city walls, and escape into the forest beyond–where they hope to regroup and drive back the invaders. Luckily, Haft and Spinner are no ordinary men. They are Marines . . .

Genres: Fantasy, Science Fiction, Military Fiction, Fiction

352 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 2002

About the author

David Sherman was the author or co-author of some three dozen books, most of which are about Marines in combat.
He wrote about US Marines in Vietnam (the Night Fighters series and three other novels), and the DemonTech series about Marines in a fantasy world. The 18th Race trilogy is military science fiction.
Other than military, he wrote a non-conventional vampire novel, The Hunt, and a mystery, Dead Man's Chest. He also released a collection of short fiction and non-fiction from early in his writing career, Sherman's Shorts; the Beginnings.
With Dan Cragg he wrote the popular Starfist series and its spin off series, Starfist: Force Recon—all about Marines in the Twenty-fifth Century.; and a Star Wars novel, Jedi Trial.
His books have been translated into Czech, Polish, German, and Japanese.
David passed away in November 2022.

Reviews

[Halleck · Rating 3 out of 5]

Entertaining, I enjoyed it a lot when I was younger. Adventurous but that's about it, I think the writing is a bit shallow. Creative elements like the Phoenix eggs were pretty cool though.

[Otis Campbell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Now, the story starts off hotter than a copperhead in a dust storm. This slick, no-good feller called the Dark Prince goes and figures out how to call up literal demons to do his dirty work. He takes his army and flattens the free port of New Bally so fast nobody knew which way was up. Just about everybody gets captured—except for two fellers named Haft and Spinner. See, these ain't just two regular boys from the hollow. They’ve been trained up on the high-falutin' art of war by the teachings of an old Earth Marine Gunnery Sergeant who got himself magically plonked into their world. So when the bad guys show up with their fancy black magic, Haft and Spinner basically say, "Hold my moonshine," grab their gear, and head for the woods to reckon up an ass-kickin'. If you like skull-splitting action and boys implementin' solid military discipline against a bunch of ugly monsters, you're gonna have a grand ol' time. Sherman knows his military business, bein' a real-deal Marine veteran himself, and it shows in how the fellers move and shoot.

[Gary · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not as much material regarding Marines as I would have liked.