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BattleTech Universe #30
Hearts of Chaos
Sent to the planet Towne to prevent an invasion by the secret Black Dragon Society, Cassie Suthorn and Camacho's Caballeros find a world that has descended into faction-ridden turmoil, with a hostile population that rejects all outside intervention. Original.
413 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1996
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166 people want to read
About the author
Victor Milán
75 books289 followersVictor Woodward Milán was an American writer known for libertarian science fiction and an interest in cybernetics. In 1986 he won the Prometheus Award for Cybernetic Samurai. He has also written several shared universe works for the Forgotten Realms, Star Trek, and Wild Cards Universes. He has also written books under the pseudonyms Keith Jarrod, Richard Austin (Jove Books The Guardians series), Robert Baron (Jove Books Stormrider series), and S. L. Hunter (Steele series with Simon Hawke, who used the pen name J. D. Masters). He also wrote at least 9 novels under the "house name" of James Axler for the Harlequin Press/Gold Eagle Books Deathlands series & Outlanders series.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
February 16, 2024
Individuals who are unfamiliar with how women relate to each other shouldn’t write stories trying to relate women! Also, this was agonizingly slow with very little to show for all the set up. Blech!
November 22, 2024
Take a drink for every
bishōnen
; double if the word is used correctly.
Our favorite bunch of weirdo mechwarriors, Camacho's Caballeros...er, second favorite (sorry Cranston) are sent to Towne in the Chaos March by Kurita to defend against...Kurita. But upon arrival, the reception is as cold as the weather.
It is a bad book. Not interesting-bad, but disappointing-bad. Not a hate read, to the point that it almost makes it to 2 stars. But there are many problems. Summed up, the adage is 'write what you know,' which is distinct from 'write what you are interested in.' I will address the good first.
I like the setting & the set-up. The Chaos March is full of opportunity for good stories, and this one is reflective of the confused sectarianism of it. Characters are, refreshingly, without plot armor, and death or injury is fairly common. This creates the right sort of tension that is missing from so many of the other novels with Big Names in them. The scene with the is great, a fun subversion of expectations that also works to provide some refreshing expository detail.
My highest praise is for the limited-term POV character, where we dip into focus temporarily to a character on the periphery of the narrative, sometimes never to come back. It is not a new trick, but it works particularly well in war stories. These are all human beings.
The antagonists...stick a pin in that, but there is some great scenery chewing, for some of them, in the grand tradition of Battletech villainy. Too much sexual assault for my taste, perhaps, but the 90s, am I right?
The glaring problem in the book is that the author has a bad case of men writing women. That I have to read about how smokin' each female character is bad. Worse is the romance subplot. It is in Strangled by the Red String territory. The author is disinterested in it to the point that it becomes unrealistic, yet somehow also telegraphed. I can see how it would work well on an outline, but it is implemented without joy.
The situation with the antagonists is similar. Outside of the fun one from Central Casting, the premise seems to be to show off two different kinds of Kuritian i.e. Japanese (culturally if not ethnically) traditionalists. Neither is a wrong choice, but neither then fit with the plot. Both are racist, but this is a different sort of racism than in, say, early Stackpole. This is more weeb-y. The book always stops to explain why something is weird and cool and alien and strange.
This is not a singular moment, as the book is ripe with 'and let me tell you about my special interest.' I realized this when I found myself trying to reconcile why I did not like all the characterization in the Caballeros. No character is introduced without some tidbit about them or their backstory. This is what I want in a book in general. In practice, it saps any motion out of the plot.
Paradoxically, it renders all the characters the same. Even if all the Caballeros are wacky individuals, they are all similarly wacky. It is the schtick, cf. the Zionist, that they have different backgrounds but come to the same sort of ideology and skill-set.
And so much time is spent covering everyone that the reader resonates with no one. Most notably, are are weightless, having exactly one scene before with them, both of which provide a subtlety-free explanation of what is about to happen to them later on. There would not be reason to include them otherwise.
And oh, the politics.
A Libertarian streak in military science fiction is no surprise, nor is soapboxing about it. But like so much of the material in the book, it does not matter. There are blunt analogies, but having set up a straw man, the author is content to walk away without tilting at it. It is expressly mid-90s, again, in its sort of Vietnam War amnesia, having a very American notion of the relevance of insurgency in the face of authority, but zero effort in understanding what that looks like. So we have this allegedly guerrilla war that looks entirely conventional. The talk and the action are at complete odds.
I circle back to that scene with . The scene introduces two deus ex machina. Neither of matter. They barely re-enter the story. When one ( does appear for a page, it supports a total misunderstanding of what a rebellion is. This is emblematic. There is a functional narrative here, but the author spends so much time faffing about around it, talking about early air combat or whatever, that every page is a downbeat of momentum. There are good ideas here; they are all in the wrong book.
Our favorite bunch of weirdo mechwarriors, Camacho's Caballeros...er, second favorite (sorry Cranston) are sent to Towne in the Chaos March by Kurita to defend against...Kurita. But upon arrival, the reception is as cold as the weather.
It is a bad book. Not interesting-bad, but disappointing-bad. Not a hate read, to the point that it almost makes it to 2 stars. But there are many problems. Summed up, the adage is 'write what you know,' which is distinct from 'write what you are interested in.' I will address the good first.
I like the setting & the set-up. The Chaos March is full of opportunity for good stories, and this one is reflective of the confused sectarianism of it. Characters are, refreshingly, without plot armor, and death or injury is fairly common. This creates the right sort of tension that is missing from so many of the other novels with Big Names in them. The scene with the is great, a fun subversion of expectations that also works to provide some refreshing expository detail.
My highest praise is for the limited-term POV character, where we dip into focus temporarily to a character on the periphery of the narrative, sometimes never to come back. It is not a new trick, but it works particularly well in war stories. These are all human beings.
The antagonists...stick a pin in that, but there is some great scenery chewing, for some of them, in the grand tradition of Battletech villainy. Too much sexual assault for my taste, perhaps, but the 90s, am I right?
The glaring problem in the book is that the author has a bad case of men writing women. That I have to read about how smokin' each female character is bad. Worse is the romance subplot. It is in Strangled by the Red String territory. The author is disinterested in it to the point that it becomes unrealistic, yet somehow also telegraphed. I can see how it would work well on an outline, but it is implemented without joy.
The situation with the antagonists is similar. Outside of the fun one from Central Casting, the premise seems to be to show off two different kinds of Kuritian i.e. Japanese (culturally if not ethnically) traditionalists. Neither is a wrong choice, but neither then fit with the plot. Both are racist, but this is a different sort of racism than in, say, early Stackpole. This is more weeb-y. The book always stops to explain why something is weird and cool and alien and strange.
This is not a singular moment, as the book is ripe with 'and let me tell you about my special interest.' I realized this when I found myself trying to reconcile why I did not like all the characterization in the Caballeros. No character is introduced without some tidbit about them or their backstory. This is what I want in a book in general. In practice, it saps any motion out of the plot.
Paradoxically, it renders all the characters the same. Even if all the Caballeros are wacky individuals, they are all similarly wacky. It is the schtick, cf. the Zionist, that they have different backgrounds but come to the same sort of ideology and skill-set.
And so much time is spent covering everyone that the reader resonates with no one. Most notably, are are weightless, having exactly one scene before with them, both of which provide a subtlety-free explanation of what is about to happen to them later on. There would not be reason to include them otherwise.
And oh, the politics.
A Libertarian streak in military science fiction is no surprise, nor is soapboxing about it. But like so much of the material in the book, it does not matter. There are blunt analogies, but having set up a straw man, the author is content to walk away without tilting at it. It is expressly mid-90s, again, in its sort of Vietnam War amnesia, having a very American notion of the relevance of insurgency in the face of authority, but zero effort in understanding what that looks like. So we have this allegedly guerrilla war that looks entirely conventional. The talk and the action are at complete odds.
I circle back to that scene with . The scene introduces two deus ex machina. Neither of matter. They barely re-enter the story. When one ( does appear for a page, it supports a total misunderstanding of what a rebellion is. This is emblematic. There is a functional narrative here, but the author spends so much time faffing about around it, talking about early air combat or whatever, that every page is a downbeat of momentum. There are good ideas here; they are all in the wrong book.
August 4, 2017
Camacho's Caballeros get sent to look after various resources of their employer following rumours they will be attacked by rogue DCMS units.
Not a lot of mech action in this one, the majority of the book is discussions within the Caballeros and with the natives who don't think they should be there.
Not a lot of mech action in this one, the majority of the book is discussions within the Caballeros and with the natives who don't think they should be there.
April 16, 2024
Hearts of Chaos is the second book about Camacho's Caballeros and I'm still not a fan of them. In short, the Caballero's are a southwestern US/Hispanic themed mercenary company. Seeing that the book was written in the 90's the machismo and racial stereotypes are pretty heavy handed in this one. So just keep that in mind. The story sees the Caballeros sent to a FedCom planet named Towne, where word has it that the Draconis Combine is about to invade. The natives are not happy about the Caballeros being there and so things really go down hill when the Dracs invade. I was hoping for more mech combat but most of this story was development of the Caballeros main character Cassie Suthorn. Honestly, the relationships between all of characters were a bit unbelievable and the fighting between Cassie and Wolf Girl (one of the main antagonist) was ripped straight from a John Woo movie (Hard Boiled I think). One of the weaker BT novels but not horrible, like say Far Country. Milan did one more BT novel I think with Camacho's Caballeros, so hopefully the last will end of a better note.
April 8, 2020
A re read of number 2 in this trilogy for me. Still love it - it may not be literature of the highest order beloved by critics, but it's fun, it uses it's setting (shared Universe) to the fullest, and the lovingly recreated Hong Kong style action scenes are fab.
July 20, 2021
BattleTech Book 31. Camacho's Caballero's are sent to Towne to protect Uncle Chandy's interests and an expected renegade DCMS attack.
August 20, 2023
A unique and off-the-wall bonkers Battletech story weakened by over-the-top action sequences and one-dimensionally evil antagonists.
October 3, 2009
This book is one of the single best Battetech stories I have ever read. It is second only to Illusions of Victory. The tense entrenchment suffered by the Eridani Light Horse is lain out in a intriguing and gripping story. Pick this one up if you’re hooked on the series. But make sure you read the Blood of Kerensky and Exodus Road series’ first, as this one does not make much sense if you’re stuck in the earlier storyline.
March 10, 2009
Ich meine "Auge um Auge" wäre wesentlich spannender gewesen...
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews