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The Last Hunter #15
Shell Game
If you can't hide the game, conceal the pieces.
Admiral Jack Romanoff and his people have located the system the Tardans are using as their command post for the invasion of the Confederation. Only they can't simply attack militarily because of the stellar terrain, so they need to improvise.
When the stakes are high, leave no option unexplored.
With direct action off the table, they must infiltrate the system and get the information they need to defeat the Tardans and their Locust minions. For something this important, it's an all-hands-on-deck exercise, and everyone must pitch in. With everything at stake, they need to throw a few jokers into the deck for the enemy and hope for some wildcards of their own.
Second place means death, so they must win at all costs.
Admiral Jack Romanoff and his people have located the system the Tardans are using as their command post for the invasion of the Confederation. Only they can't simply attack militarily because of the stellar terrain, so they need to improvise.
When the stakes are high, leave no option unexplored.
With direct action off the table, they must infiltrate the system and get the information they need to defeat the Tardans and their Locust minions. For something this important, it's an all-hands-on-deck exercise, and everyone must pitch in. With everything at stake, they need to throw a few jokers into the deck for the enemy and hope for some wildcards of their own.
Second place means death, so they must win at all costs.
331 pages, Kindle Edition
Published August 11, 2024
648 people are currently reading
50 people want to read
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J.N. Chaney
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Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews
November 15, 2024
☆☆☆☆☆
A SCI-FI BOOK AND SERIES THAT HAS IT ALL FOR THOSE WHO TRULY ENJOY A GREAT SCI-FI STORY
Shell Game (The Last Hunter Book 15) by
J.N. Chaney and Terry Mixon has it all for those who truly love a great science fiction series. It has aliens, robotic drones, space and ground battles, spies, hackers, terrorist and traders, government coup, suspense, and mind-blowing action. You will find yourself glued to the pages from the chapter in the first book to the final page in the 16th book.
J.N. Chaney and Terry Mixon have written the characters so well that you will find yourself routing for the good guys and hating the bad guys. The storyline, along with all the characters within, will hold your interest throughout.
This book and series is definitely one that I would recommend to all.
A SCI-FI BOOK AND SERIES THAT HAS IT ALL FOR THOSE WHO TRULY ENJOY A GREAT SCI-FI STORY
Shell Game (The Last Hunter Book 15) by
J.N. Chaney and Terry Mixon has it all for those who truly love a great science fiction series. It has aliens, robotic drones, space and ground battles, spies, hackers, terrorist and traders, government coup, suspense, and mind-blowing action. You will find yourself glued to the pages from the chapter in the first book to the final page in the 16th book.
J.N. Chaney and Terry Mixon have written the characters so well that you will find yourself routing for the good guys and hating the bad guys. The storyline, along with all the characters within, will hold your interest throughout.
This book and series is definitely one that I would recommend to all.
August 21, 2024
The Last Hunter crew is working now against a half-dozen factions simultaneously. The Kindgom, The Poseidon Group, The Tardans, and even more aliens are all at their throats. Can our heroes beat them? Probably. But its entertaining to watch them do so.
October 2, 2024
Admiral Jack Romanoff and his ships, the *Hunter* and *Aries* have headed for the DuPont system to see how deeply the Tardans have taken it over and also to see what the Poseidon Group is doing to the planetary governments. Unfortunately, this particular system has a problem in that there are no planets. It consists of a vast drifiting belt of asteriods around a very bright and dangeours sun. There is so much radiation and heat coming from this sun that it’s almost impossible for anyone to operate inside the system without substantial shielding.
Not able to build enough effective shielding for two battleships, Admiral Romanoff has to concentrate on equipping the spy ship, *Specter* commanded by Lisa Gain. They have a look around the system in stealth mode since the spy ship is quite capable of doing that and find that the Tardans are surprisingly not as active as expected. They do have a huge amount of Locusts in the system and since they aren’t manned, they aren’t effected by the immense radiation. Still, they do pose a problem to Jack and his people if they actually see the *Spector*.
As they cruise around the system attempting to find out just where the Tardans have concentrated their forces, the do find a huge space station which is probably the focal point of the system government, trading and commerce. They also find another smaller space station, but they don’t know exactly what it is being used for. This system is predominately used for mining activities since the asteroids are rich in exotic minerals. That mining activity hasn’t stopped even with the arrival of the Tardans which is kind of surprising.
Anyway, Jack sees two things they must do. One is to find out how the population has accepted the Posiedon Groups takeover and the second is to eliminate the Tardans and their Locusts so they can’t maintain a grip on this system or send reinforcements to the eventual attack of the Solar System and Earth. This is going to be very complicated since they can’t actually engage the Tardans within this system with the Confederation battleships due to their lack of shielding. They have to devise a plan to bring the Locusts out to the system edge, but not in too large a force or even his battleship could be overwhelmed.
As more intell gathering, Jack and a contingent of his people to include Lisa Gain, go aboard the large space station. There that find none other than Patrick Gibbs, the Kingdom of Kastelara spy, who has taken a liking to Lisa. Lisa is still on the fence about her relationship with Patrick but has decided to work with him as their goals are the same. Jack eventually leaves them on the station while he goes back to the *Specter* who is now ran by the Professor and Tina Chen. They take him back to the *Hunter* so he can command the overall activities within the system.
There is a lot going on, but one thing these characters do is have meetings to plan out what they are going to do. It seems like everyone has a perfect plan, eventually, to obtain a goal and those plans seem to work out a little too perfectly. Additionally, I’m getting a little tired of Lisa and her internal “soul searching” about her feelings for Patrick. Patrick is a spy but also a very good assassin, but Lisa doesn’t want to go down that road although she’s already killed people when it was necessary.
I think this series is coming to an end some where soon. They now head to Earth to defend it from the Tardans and see if the Posiedon Group has made any headway there. Once this is all done, they still need to get back to their original part of the galaxy and then get ready for the Kingdom of Kastelara to invade. That should/could be a whole new series.
More will come in book 16, “Operation Endgame”, available for pre-order and availabe for purchase o/a 10 November 2024.
Not able to build enough effective shielding for two battleships, Admiral Romanoff has to concentrate on equipping the spy ship, *Specter* commanded by Lisa Gain. They have a look around the system in stealth mode since the spy ship is quite capable of doing that and find that the Tardans are surprisingly not as active as expected. They do have a huge amount of Locusts in the system and since they aren’t manned, they aren’t effected by the immense radiation. Still, they do pose a problem to Jack and his people if they actually see the *Spector*.
As they cruise around the system attempting to find out just where the Tardans have concentrated their forces, the do find a huge space station which is probably the focal point of the system government, trading and commerce. They also find another smaller space station, but they don’t know exactly what it is being used for. This system is predominately used for mining activities since the asteroids are rich in exotic minerals. That mining activity hasn’t stopped even with the arrival of the Tardans which is kind of surprising.
Anyway, Jack sees two things they must do. One is to find out how the population has accepted the Posiedon Groups takeover and the second is to eliminate the Tardans and their Locusts so they can’t maintain a grip on this system or send reinforcements to the eventual attack of the Solar System and Earth. This is going to be very complicated since they can’t actually engage the Tardans within this system with the Confederation battleships due to their lack of shielding. They have to devise a plan to bring the Locusts out to the system edge, but not in too large a force or even his battleship could be overwhelmed.
As more intell gathering, Jack and a contingent of his people to include Lisa Gain, go aboard the large space station. There that find none other than Patrick Gibbs, the Kingdom of Kastelara spy, who has taken a liking to Lisa. Lisa is still on the fence about her relationship with Patrick but has decided to work with him as their goals are the same. Jack eventually leaves them on the station while he goes back to the *Specter* who is now ran by the Professor and Tina Chen. They take him back to the *Hunter* so he can command the overall activities within the system.
There is a lot going on, but one thing these characters do is have meetings to plan out what they are going to do. It seems like everyone has a perfect plan, eventually, to obtain a goal and those plans seem to work out a little too perfectly. Additionally, I’m getting a little tired of Lisa and her internal “soul searching” about her feelings for Patrick. Patrick is a spy but also a very good assassin, but Lisa doesn’t want to go down that road although she’s already killed people when it was necessary.
I think this series is coming to an end some where soon. They now head to Earth to defend it from the Tardans and see if the Posiedon Group has made any headway there. Once this is all done, they still need to get back to their original part of the galaxy and then get ready for the Kingdom of Kastelara to invade. That should/could be a whole new series.
More will come in book 16, “Operation Endgame”, available for pre-order and availabe for purchase o/a 10 November 2024.
August 21, 2024
I hate to say it because I've been a big fan of this series, but I didn't really care for this one. As far as the writing style I think maybe after 15 books the little nitpicky things have added up until they really bug me. Like how all the characters sound exactly the same.
You could switch any piece of dialogue between any character and not tell the difference. They all use the same idioms, talk with the same levels of knowledge and experience, etc. Thankfully this book only had one instance of "make the magic happen" (though it was on page 1! almost like it was done on purpose), and no instances of someone "knowing where the bodies are buried", but this time "You're not wrong" was on every other page being spoken by every character at least once.
Maybe stuff like that didn't bother me as much before because there was plenty of other good stuff going on to drown it out. Like action and cool sci fi stuff like bootstrapping their technology and knowledge up to a new higher level. But this book didn't have any of that.
More specific gripes, with spoilers:
I don't want it to sound like I'm dumping on this series. I liked the prior books a lot, this one just hit me differently.
You could switch any piece of dialogue between any character and not tell the difference. They all use the same idioms, talk with the same levels of knowledge and experience, etc. Thankfully this book only had one instance of "make the magic happen" (though it was on page 1! almost like it was done on purpose), and no instances of someone "knowing where the bodies are buried", but this time "You're not wrong" was on every other page being spoken by every character at least once.
Maybe stuff like that didn't bother me as much before because there was plenty of other good stuff going on to drown it out. Like action and cool sci fi stuff like bootstrapping their technology and knowledge up to a new higher level. But this book didn't have any of that.
More specific gripes, with spoilers:
I don't want it to sound like I'm dumping on this series. I liked the prior books a lot, this one just hit me differently.
August 24, 2024
The fight for Du Pont begins....
This tale is a bit of a slow burn, with much setting up and only a sprinkling of real action. However, that is not to say it is a boring book as despite there being only one real battle, there is much manoeuvring as they split into two groups - one to tackle The Poseidon Group and one to take on the Tardans. The former are tackled by Patrick and Lisa, making it more if an espionage tale than an action packed thriller, though there are moments of suspense as well as discussions about their relationship and possible future partnership... Both groups spend much of their time information gathering as they try and work out what each faction is up to and how best to defeat or at least undermine them...
This novel sets things in motion as we head towards the grand finale and the battle for Earth.
An entertaining read that while it is low on actual fighting, still has much happening, making it a worthwhile read.
This tale is a bit of a slow burn, with much setting up and only a sprinkling of real action. However, that is not to say it is a boring book as despite there being only one real battle, there is much manoeuvring as they split into two groups - one to tackle The Poseidon Group and one to take on the Tardans. The former are tackled by Patrick and Lisa, making it more if an espionage tale than an action packed thriller, though there are moments of suspense as well as discussions about their relationship and possible future partnership... Both groups spend much of their time information gathering as they try and work out what each faction is up to and how best to defeat or at least undermine them...
This novel sets things in motion as we head towards the grand finale and the battle for Earth.
An entertaining read that while it is low on actual fighting, still has much happening, making it a worthwhile read.
October 4, 2024
Major changes
It’s rather difficult to think about how this story began with a single ship captain, an obsolete museum relic and a few brave people barely beyond being boys and girls playing a video game!
Now those kids have become competent, dedicated officers. Having seen the poor examples from the corrupt & nepotistic behavior from the Confederation navy they are highly motivated to emulate the examples shown by Admiral Romanoff by working at the best level of every possible task which has the side benefit of instilling a considerably higher sense of esprit de corps in their ranks.
They are determined to protect Earth 🌍
They make a stop at a space station where their nonhuman enemies have taken over the area yet they don’t interact with the humans. As they delve deeper into the situation it becomes clear that The Kingdom is either involved or at least studying the situation. Now they have to try to hide their actions from the hidden Kingdom ships.
It’s rather difficult to think about how this story began with a single ship captain, an obsolete museum relic and a few brave people barely beyond being boys and girls playing a video game!
Now those kids have become competent, dedicated officers. Having seen the poor examples from the corrupt & nepotistic behavior from the Confederation navy they are highly motivated to emulate the examples shown by Admiral Romanoff by working at the best level of every possible task which has the side benefit of instilling a considerably higher sense of esprit de corps in their ranks.
They are determined to protect Earth 🌍
They make a stop at a space station where their nonhuman enemies have taken over the area yet they don’t interact with the humans. As they delve deeper into the situation it becomes clear that The Kingdom is either involved or at least studying the situation. Now they have to try to hide their actions from the hidden Kingdom ships.
October 14, 2024
Series has become stale...
It had already become repetitive, several volumes earlier, each only barely reaching three star level; but this volume dipped below that. Half of the story is simply filler, not even character building, and now so repetitive that it's become drudgery. I was holding out hope that Chaney and Mixon would finally figure out how to craft better prose, but I don't think I'll be continuing any further; there's just too much better writing out there to read than this. These authors have wasted so much potential.
It had already become repetitive, several volumes earlier, each only barely reaching three star level; but this volume dipped below that. Half of the story is simply filler, not even character building, and now so repetitive that it's become drudgery. I was holding out hope that Chaney and Mixon would finally figure out how to craft better prose, but I don't think I'll be continuing any further; there's just too much better writing out there to read than this. These authors have wasted so much potential.
August 23, 2024
great addition to the storyline,
great addition to stroryline, They’re almost to Earth; @planning to retake her for the Confederation. and kick the Poseidon group yo the curb. Can’t wait! Then it’ll be the Kingdome and that’ fight will be a huge undertaking. Hopefully Patrick will be worth his weight in gold in information, as well as tricks and insight to beat them & make sure they get the idea that they need to stay in their own region and quit trying to bully everyone
great addition to stroryline, They’re almost to Earth; @planning to retake her for the Confederation. and kick the Poseidon group yo the curb. Can’t wait! Then it’ll be the Kingdome and that’ fight will be a huge undertaking. Hopefully Patrick will be worth his weight in gold in information, as well as tricks and insight to beat them & make sure they get the idea that they need to stay in their own region and quit trying to bully everyone
August 26, 2024
Excellent
Jack is placed in a precarious position. The fight is in a system where there are no planets and only asteroids with a star that just wants to burn everything up. They embark on an intelligence mission, which after a they are surprised by an unlikely ally, the mission changes. This book has some great character development and story telling. This is a great additions to the Hunter story.
Jack is placed in a precarious position. The fight is in a system where there are no planets and only asteroids with a star that just wants to burn everything up. They embark on an intelligence mission, which after a they are surprised by an unlikely ally, the mission changes. This book has some great character development and story telling. This is a great additions to the Hunter story.
May 22, 2025
The end of the series, but like all nowadays, potential for another.
if you read the series, you will know this meaning.
the end got me a 'really' and a little bit out of character for the main leads. I won't spoil it, but again,it's the launch for other adventures.
enjoyable series, good end to it, in bigger picture. Suppose with all the supporting characters, their fates are for our imagination presently, or till next week meet....
if you read the series, you will know this meaning.
the end got me a 'really' and a little bit out of character for the main leads. I won't spoil it, but again,it's the launch for other adventures.
enjoyable series, good end to it, in bigger picture. Suppose with all the supporting characters, their fates are for our imagination presently, or till next week meet....
August 17, 2024
Allies and new friends
The war against tyranny moves forward. All the talents the displaced Confederation Navy has accumulated are beginning to function as a cohesive force. The liberation of DuPont has been achieved. From both the Tarden and Poseiden Group. Stealth, cunning and firepower win the day.
The war against tyranny moves forward. All the talents the displaced Confederation Navy has accumulated are beginning to function as a cohesive force. The liberation of DuPont has been achieved. From both the Tarden and Poseiden Group. Stealth, cunning and firepower win the day.
August 21, 2024
Great read
Another well written book in the series. One more obstacle in the path to restore the Confederation from the internal Poseidon Group overthrow of the government and the neutralizing of two alien forces in one of the Confederation’s systems has now paved the path to try to free Earth’s system from all intruders. Tall order with limited resources!
Another well written book in the series. One more obstacle in the path to restore the Confederation from the internal Poseidon Group overthrow of the government and the neutralizing of two alien forces in one of the Confederation’s systems has now paved the path to try to free Earth’s system from all intruders. Tall order with limited resources!
September 7, 2024
I have enjoyed the 15 book series so far but felt there has been too much dialogue on speculation i.e. there were 12 very good books trying to get out. Nevertheless, I look forward to book 16 but just hope there is no more repetition of the word 'behoove' and the phrase 'quantity has a quality all of its own'.
I know: everyone's a critic!!
Pioneer Pete.
I know: everyone's a critic!!
Pioneer Pete.
September 8, 2024
Great Strategy & Action
This book brings Confederation Intelligence and Navy forces to coordinate actions to face a new challenge. Tarden ships, Locust forces, and other challenges must be overcome. The action involves significant risk for individuals and small teams, as well as the battleship hammer. The next step in the line towards the major contests at Earth. Fun read!
This book brings Confederation Intelligence and Navy forces to coordinate actions to face a new challenge. Tarden ships, Locust forces, and other challenges must be overcome. The action involves significant risk for individuals and small teams, as well as the battleship hammer. The next step in the line towards the major contests at Earth. Fun read!
September 19, 2024
Long winded
Took for ever to get going, the storyline is long winded with lots conversation that isn't really needed and to top it all so many people in a conversation it's difficult to know who is saying what
After 15 books I'm hanging in there hoping it's concluding soon, if it drags on to much more I may accept I can't get.to the end
Took for ever to get going, the storyline is long winded with lots conversation that isn't really needed and to top it all so many people in a conversation it's difficult to know who is saying what
After 15 books I'm hanging in there hoping it's concluding soon, if it drags on to much more I may accept I can't get.to the end
August 29, 2024
Although this book was OK it was one of the poorer reads in the series. The storyline was flat and two dimensional with little action or development of the storyline. You could easily have not read this book and not missed anything in the overall narrative of the series.
September 1, 2024
The action, characters, and story continue to take us a step closer to the finale.
Pacing is really good. Characters continue to grow. Problems are solved in reasonable steps. A book that is a joy ride. Can't wait for the finale.😇
Pacing is really good. Characters continue to grow. Problems are solved in reasonable steps. A book that is a joy ride. Can't wait for the finale.😇
August 21, 2024
Great Book can't wait to see what happens in the last book even though i feel there could do another 2 or 3 book because they still have to attack the other kingdom
February 17, 2025
Absolutely brilliant
A thrilling addition to the series.
Great characters with realistic situations and lots of action.
I look forward to the next one.
A thrilling addition to the series.
Great characters with realistic situations and lots of action.
I look forward to the next one.
April 5, 2025
This was an okay book but not more than okay. In general this series has been a bit uneven for me. Never really bad but alternating between three and four stars. This is a three star one.
There’s nothing wrong with the characters nor the writing. It is just that it is a bit too much mucking around with ground ground infiltration, undercover crap etc… and not enough actual military action, especially in space, for my taste.
Given the name of the next instalment, Operation Endgame, I hope the next book will be a four star one or more though. I think it is about time that the authors wrap up this story arc. The next book is book 16 after all.
There’s nothing wrong with the characters nor the writing. It is just that it is a bit too much mucking around with ground ground infiltration, undercover crap etc… and not enough actual military action, especially in space, for my taste.
Given the name of the next instalment, Operation Endgame, I hope the next book will be a four star one or more though. I think it is about time that the authors wrap up this story arc. The next book is book 16 after all.
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews