Valiant

Invasion: Earth Saga #3

by Sean Robins

Kanoor has fallen.

The Xortaags are back, and they’ve conquered the Akakie homeworld. If they have enough time to reverse-engineer all the advanced technology they can find on Kanoor, they’ll be undefeatable, and they won’t stop until they’ll have colonized the rest of the galaxy, starting with Earth.

To make matters worse, an even more sinister threat is looming in the darkness. Unknown to our heroes, a time-travelling alien fleet is on its way to our neck of the galactic woods.

Now it’s up to Jim, Kurt, and Tarq to save not only humanity but also billions of other people living on hundreds of different planets.

You thought the stakes were high in Invincible (with Earth conquered and 700 million humans killed)? You ain’t seen nothing yet! Read Valiant now and get lost in this epic galactic adventure!

Note from the author: This is a dark and gritty reboot of the humorous Crimson Deathbringer series. Please see “From the Author” for more information. If you’ve read and enjoyed the original series, I don’t think you should read this; you’ll probably hate it. On the other hand, if you read The Crimson Deathbringer and liked the story but not the comedy, maybe give this version a chance.

427 pages, Kindle Edition

Published February 29, 2024

About the author

"Who am I? I am Spider-Man."

Well, not really, but this should tell you all you need to know about me and my writing style.

I'm a huge Marvel (plus Game of Thrones, Star Trek AND Star Wars) fan, which shows since my novel is loaded with pop culture references. If you are a sci-fi fan (I assume that you are, otherwise what are you doing here?) you will enjoy them tremendously. I even went full Deadpool in my first draft and broke the fourth wall multiple times, until my editor told it was distracting and kept taking her out of the moment. Shame. Those fourth-wall breaks were hilarious. Still, I can guarantee a few laugh-out-loud moments. Case in point: The "good" aliens in my novel are a race of pranksters, whose main goal in life is pulling other people's legs (They have four legs, hence the slight change in the idiom). My favorite author is Jim Butcher (The Dresden Files), which is probably how I ended up writing in a first-person POV with the same light-hearted, funny tone as he does. The fact that my MC's name is Jim is purely coincidental though.

I am a university/college level English teacher, and including Canada, I have lived and worked in five different countries. I have met people from all around the world. Plus, my parents are from a different background, and so is my wife. As a result, diversity has become a major theme in my novel. My characters look like the bridge crew from Star Trek. One of my female characters even impersonated Uhura once, albeit posthumously.

Reviews

[BJ Richardson · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am still giving this book 3 stars, but the quality of writing has steadily dropped for each book of the series. If you like lackadaisical authors who don't seem to take themselves or their story seriously, then maybe you will like this. He does call himself a Marvel fan and to be fair, the writing is about as bad as the scriptwriting for She Hulk, the Marvel's, or Disney Wars: Acolyte. Just tone down the wokeness and drop down the quality a bit and these could really be his influences. If you like that stuff, have at it. I am seriously doubting I will finish this series, but for now I slog onwards.

[Aaron Eichler · Rating 5 out of 5]

I liked this book better than book 2, Jim was more devil may care than serious. I also liked the alien strategist and his little Deadman switch.