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Empire Rising #20
Empire's End
The Empire’s most formidable stronghold, Zeta Fort, has fallen, shattering the northern defenses. Chaos has been unleased as enemy raiding fleets surge southward into the Empire. Even worse, with eighty thousand warships under his command, Tanaka-lan and his battlefleet stand poised to strike at the heart of the Empire.
The remnants of the Allied fleet have retreated to New Shanghai, bloodied and battered. Emperor James Somerville knows no reinforcements are coming. The countdown has begun—Tanaka-lan’s forces will soon resume their relentless advance. Should New Shanghai fall, the Sol system will be next, and then Humanity’s Empire will follow.
Desperate and out of options, James and his family must prepare for a final, decisive battle against Tanaka-lan. Everything hangs in the balance.
The remnants of the Allied fleet have retreated to New Shanghai, bloodied and battered. Emperor James Somerville knows no reinforcements are coming. The countdown has begun—Tanaka-lan’s forces will soon resume their relentless advance. Should New Shanghai fall, the Sol system will be next, and then Humanity’s Empire will follow.
Desperate and out of options, James and his family must prepare for a final, decisive battle against Tanaka-lan. Everything hangs in the balance.
- GenresScience Fiction
609 pages, Kindle Edition
Published August 14, 2024
206 people are currently reading
17 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews
August 30, 2024
I loved it
This series, almost from the moment I picked it up, I think 2 or 3 years ago has been my favorite. Every time there is a release, I immediately read it and eagerly await the next.
There have been persistent issues throughout the series, however, like mixing up character names, inconsistent statistics for the military hardware used, etc. And such things are present in this book as well. To be honest though, I don't care that those issues are present. D J Holmes has continually done a spectacular job, giving us such a large and complex overarching story. I regularly use this series as the gold standard for how such a large story should be written.
This book managed to bring tears to my eyes multiple times while I read it. Only a book that has focused a great deal of effort on developing characters and relationships can have such an emotional impact on their reader. We have followed the majority of these characters for 20 books now and over 20 years of in universe time. There are not very many series that allow such attachment to characters the proper time to grow and evolve. I felt like I could feel the emotion straight off the page.
I am devastated to learn that this series will conclude with the 22nd book. There are so many mentions of events to happen after the ending of events in this series. I can only hope that the ending of this series will spark the beginning of another as we hopefully watch the empire evolve into what it is in 3015AD.
DJ, if you do not have plans to continue the story of the empire, I beg you to reconsider. This series will always be my favorite. I can't wait to read the final 2 books.
This series, almost from the moment I picked it up, I think 2 or 3 years ago has been my favorite. Every time there is a release, I immediately read it and eagerly await the next.
There have been persistent issues throughout the series, however, like mixing up character names, inconsistent statistics for the military hardware used, etc. And such things are present in this book as well. To be honest though, I don't care that those issues are present. D J Holmes has continually done a spectacular job, giving us such a large and complex overarching story. I regularly use this series as the gold standard for how such a large story should be written.
This book managed to bring tears to my eyes multiple times while I read it. Only a book that has focused a great deal of effort on developing characters and relationships can have such an emotional impact on their reader. We have followed the majority of these characters for 20 books now and over 20 years of in universe time. There are not very many series that allow such attachment to characters the proper time to grow and evolve. I felt like I could feel the emotion straight off the page.
I am devastated to learn that this series will conclude with the 22nd book. There are so many mentions of events to happen after the ending of events in this series. I can only hope that the ending of this series will spark the beginning of another as we hopefully watch the empire evolve into what it is in 3015AD.
DJ, if you do not have plans to continue the story of the empire, I beg you to reconsider. This series will always be my favorite. I can't wait to read the final 2 books.
August 31, 2024
What a book
What an amazing series this is. Like every other book in this series, this book sucks you in deep into the Karacknid threat, the battles, the sacrifices, and the war. It’s an excellent book and I’m looking forward to the next one. If you’ve read the other 19 books preceding this one, you Will Not be disappointed or dissatisfied. Truly excellent.
What an amazing series this is. Like every other book in this series, this book sucks you in deep into the Karacknid threat, the battles, the sacrifices, and the war. It’s an excellent book and I’m looking forward to the next one. If you’ve read the other 19 books preceding this one, you Will Not be disappointed or dissatisfied. Truly excellent.
July 13, 2025
I have to admit I didn’t really want to read this book since I kind of knew it wasn’t going to end well. I mean the title is kind of foreboding, right? Well, if you’ve read the previous nineteen books, you’ll know that we have a lot of characters that we have met and I don’t really want to see any come to an end. Christine and James Somerville have built quit the empire during the years while also raising an ever growing family. Their kids have now all grown up and now are serving like their father in the Imperial Fleet. Jonathan, the eldest, is a proven military leader having raised to the rank of Rear Admiral. Georgia has also proven herself as a fierce and capable starfighter pilot and even better yet as a diplomat to the Eaglaton Protectorate. And youngest of the children is Rachel, now a Marine Medic, which should see her station away from the front lines treating patients.
Then there’s Edward who is serving as a fleet intelligence agent doing some very secret work. The entire first part of this book is about just exactly what he is doing. He’s on the trail of the Silizzarus. These are tiny worm/snake-like aliens that have been causing untold trouble for thousands of years intruding in the very culture and development of growing civilizations. They have managed to infiltrate themselves into civilizations that are near their home system leading them to become very pacific to the point most of these civilizations can’t even defend themselves. Edwards’ mission is to find the homeworld of the Silizzarus to see what they are up to and determine if the Human Empire can defeat this threat before it becomes worse.
Edward has some lead from a previously captured Silizzarus starship. But, we know that the Silizzarus have received information that humans might just know where their homeworld is located so they are beginning to build shipbuilding docks to build a fleet capable of destroying any civilization that threatens them. We know from previous engagements with even one Silizzarus starship that they are much more advanced that anything humans have built so even small Silizzarus fleet could destroy Earth! Edwards must find their homeworld and then get that information back to the Empire so they can strike first!
Yet the Empire is in another huge war with the Karacknids. This is the same enemy that Emperor/Admiral James Somerville once defeated some thirty-five years ago. Yet, now they are back again after having fought a deadly internal civil war to name a new Imperator. The Human Empire had watched this civil war hoping that this would result in the Karacknids never having the strength to unite behind one individual who would threaten them again. Yet, that didn’t happen. Now Imperator Tanaka-Ian has gathered a tremendous fleet of something like eighty-thousand warships and is coming for the Human Empire. He wants to specifically kill James Somerville and destroy Earth. After that he plans to conquer and destroy every civilization that has ever supported the humans, especially those that had aided the humans when they won the First Karacknid War!
I am at a loss as to why the Human Empire along with it Varanni Alliance have not built enough warships in the last thirty-five years that would far exceed anything the Karacknids could field after their civil war almost destroyed their ship building capabilities. Yet, here we are with Admiral James Somerville only able to put together a fleet of about twelve thousand warships to stand against the eighty thousand the Karacknids have delayed. Yet, the humans did have other battles to fight, but those didn’t seem to last long and certainly didn’t take all of the Human Empires resources. Even then, with a few exceptions, the humans don’t seem to have developed anything kind of advanced weaponry, super weapons and even much, much improved engineering skills. With a few exceptions, these ships of the Human Empire seem to be the same ships James Somerville fought with thirty five years ago.
So, you have to storylines, Edward has to find the Silizzarus homeworld and then has to find something to attack it with while his Father, James Somerville will try to defend Earth with only a fraction of the ships compared to what the Karacknids will be fighting with. James suffers an early defeat at Zeta Fort so now having fallen back to New Shanghai he awaits Imperator Tanaka-Ian and the possibility that after this next battle, Earth will be completely undefended and his Empire will have fallen.
This book, as the other nineteen have been, was well written. While there is some confusion during every battle, the author manages to keep things pretty straight. The author also doesn’t kill the read with numbers every time something happens, but there are a lot of counting of missiles and ships that any bean-counter would love. And this isn’t the end of the series. Oh no, we’ve got a least two more books. Book 21, “Inheritance of War” and book 22, “Empire Divided” seem to be the last two books in the series. I plan on reading both.
==[Note: As of 12/03/2023, this will not be published on Amazon since I have been banned from posting reviews for some unknown reason. Once the ban is lifted, assuming it does get lifted, I’ll go back and post this to Amazon.]==
Then there’s Edward who is serving as a fleet intelligence agent doing some very secret work. The entire first part of this book is about just exactly what he is doing. He’s on the trail of the Silizzarus. These are tiny worm/snake-like aliens that have been causing untold trouble for thousands of years intruding in the very culture and development of growing civilizations. They have managed to infiltrate themselves into civilizations that are near their home system leading them to become very pacific to the point most of these civilizations can’t even defend themselves. Edwards’ mission is to find the homeworld of the Silizzarus to see what they are up to and determine if the Human Empire can defeat this threat before it becomes worse.
Edward has some lead from a previously captured Silizzarus starship. But, we know that the Silizzarus have received information that humans might just know where their homeworld is located so they are beginning to build shipbuilding docks to build a fleet capable of destroying any civilization that threatens them. We know from previous engagements with even one Silizzarus starship that they are much more advanced that anything humans have built so even small Silizzarus fleet could destroy Earth! Edwards must find their homeworld and then get that information back to the Empire so they can strike first!
Yet the Empire is in another huge war with the Karacknids. This is the same enemy that Emperor/Admiral James Somerville once defeated some thirty-five years ago. Yet, now they are back again after having fought a deadly internal civil war to name a new Imperator. The Human Empire had watched this civil war hoping that this would result in the Karacknids never having the strength to unite behind one individual who would threaten them again. Yet, that didn’t happen. Now Imperator Tanaka-Ian has gathered a tremendous fleet of something like eighty-thousand warships and is coming for the Human Empire. He wants to specifically kill James Somerville and destroy Earth. After that he plans to conquer and destroy every civilization that has ever supported the humans, especially those that had aided the humans when they won the First Karacknid War!
I am at a loss as to why the Human Empire along with it Varanni Alliance have not built enough warships in the last thirty-five years that would far exceed anything the Karacknids could field after their civil war almost destroyed their ship building capabilities. Yet, here we are with Admiral James Somerville only able to put together a fleet of about twelve thousand warships to stand against the eighty thousand the Karacknids have delayed. Yet, the humans did have other battles to fight, but those didn’t seem to last long and certainly didn’t take all of the Human Empires resources. Even then, with a few exceptions, the humans don’t seem to have developed anything kind of advanced weaponry, super weapons and even much, much improved engineering skills. With a few exceptions, these ships of the Human Empire seem to be the same ships James Somerville fought with thirty five years ago.
So, you have to storylines, Edward has to find the Silizzarus homeworld and then has to find something to attack it with while his Father, James Somerville will try to defend Earth with only a fraction of the ships compared to what the Karacknids will be fighting with. James suffers an early defeat at Zeta Fort so now having fallen back to New Shanghai he awaits Imperator Tanaka-Ian and the possibility that after this next battle, Earth will be completely undefended and his Empire will have fallen.
This book, as the other nineteen have been, was well written. While there is some confusion during every battle, the author manages to keep things pretty straight. The author also doesn’t kill the read with numbers every time something happens, but there are a lot of counting of missiles and ships that any bean-counter would love. And this isn’t the end of the series. Oh no, we’ve got a least two more books. Book 21, “Inheritance of War” and book 22, “Empire Divided” seem to be the last two books in the series. I plan on reading both.
==[Note: As of 12/03/2023, this will not be published on Amazon since I have been banned from posting reviews for some unknown reason. Once the ban is lifted, assuming it does get lifted, I’ll go back and post this to Amazon.]==
November 20, 2025
Darn Good Yarn
If I got through the entire series it has to be a darn good yarn. Great series from all angles. A Space Opera that hits every note. Characters well developed - for both the bad and good entities. Emotionally evocative characters. Only minor thing is the anthropomorphizing of the alien cultures, but not a deal breaker. Still gets a solid 5. Very descriptive battle scenes. I wonder if the author has ever tallied the numbers killed in the Empire series. lol. Looking forward to more stories from this universe!
If I got through the entire series it has to be a darn good yarn. Great series from all angles. A Space Opera that hits every note. Characters well developed - for both the bad and good entities. Emotionally evocative characters. Only minor thing is the anthropomorphizing of the alien cultures, but not a deal breaker. Still gets a solid 5. Very descriptive battle scenes. I wonder if the author has ever tallied the numbers killed in the Empire series. lol. Looking forward to more stories from this universe!
August 24, 2024
A Tearjerker
If you are reading this series in order this novel will break your heart. Holmes' character development has been excellent throughout and now it haunts. If you are not reading the series in order I would encouragement you to start at the beginning as it is an excellent series.
If you are reading this series in order this novel will break your heart. Holmes' character development has been excellent throughout and now it haunts. If you are not reading the series in order I would encouragement you to start at the beginning as it is an excellent series.
September 30, 2024
Once again I was intrigued and hooked
This book had me on the edge of my seat from
The very beginning. The whole series has been enthralling and addictive. The story of James Somerville and the rise of the Earth Empire has been a compelling series that I have had the impatience of waiting for each new book.
This book had me on the edge of my seat from
The very beginning. The whole series has been enthralling and addictive. The story of James Somerville and the rise of the Earth Empire has been a compelling series that I have had the impatience of waiting for each new book.
October 24, 2024
wow!wow!wow!
AWESOME! Once again, another great book. Very surprising end if you’ve read the series from the beginning. I can hardly wait for the next entry in one of the best series I’ve read. I am also very sad to read that there are only two episodes left. Do not read this if you haven’t read the other 19 first.
AWESOME! Once again, another great book. Very surprising end if you’ve read the series from the beginning. I can hardly wait for the next entry in one of the best series I’ve read. I am also very sad to read that there are only two episodes left. Do not read this if you haven’t read the other 19 first.
November 24, 2025
How did he do this?
I can't begin to imagine the creativity and skill required to develop the events and characters involved in this huge story.
Nevermind the different species, the tech, and the military strategy knowledge required.
This is a wonderful work, and I'm nearing the end. I can't wait to see how he wraps this all up!
I can't begin to imagine the creativity and skill required to develop the events and characters involved in this huge story.
Nevermind the different species, the tech, and the military strategy knowledge required.
This is a wonderful work, and I'm nearing the end. I can't wait to see how he wraps this all up!
August 19, 2024
Continuing a great series.
This book continues the saga and sends it in new directions with new adventures. It's still an exciting read. I'm looking forward to the next in the series.
This book continues the saga and sends it in new directions with new adventures. It's still an exciting read. I'm looking forward to the next in the series.
August 19, 2024
Fantastic entry
One of the best in the series, not since Haven have I been this captivated by the story. Really a great series, looking forward to the future series that will come soon
One of the best in the series, not since Haven have I been this captivated by the story. Really a great series, looking forward to the future series that will come soon
August 24, 2024
required reading
Great story , if you are a fan of this genre don’t pass by on your search for the next read. This story was entertaining form beginning to end and has left me wishing the next chapter was already done.
Great story , if you are a fan of this genre don’t pass by on your search for the next read. This story was entertaining form beginning to end and has left me wishing the next chapter was already done.
October 2, 2024
Cracking read.
Fast pace ,plenty of action and even if you think you know the story by now you'll still find a good measure of suspense and thrills ,gonna miss this series when it's done.
Fast pace ,plenty of action and even if you think you know the story by now you'll still find a good measure of suspense and thrills ,gonna miss this series when it's done.
August 12, 2025
Good read.
This book had plenty of action in it in bot space and plant battles. The space action was huge and you never knew what was going to happen next . Lots of new weapons and new strategies to top it off .
This book had plenty of action in it in bot space and plant battles. The space action was huge and you never knew what was going to happen next . Lots of new weapons and new strategies to top it off .
August 18, 2024
Recommended
Have thoroughly enjoyed every one of the books in this series,pleased two more to go,look forward to reading them
Epic battles
Have thoroughly enjoyed every one of the books in this series,pleased two more to go,look forward to reading them
Epic battles
August 26, 2024
Always delivers
Great fun to read. Continues the story with new twists. Looking forward to book 21 and 22.
Hope there will be another series about the empires future.
Great fun to read. Continues the story with new twists. Looking forward to book 21 and 22.
Hope there will be another series about the empires future.
September 5, 2024
Outstanding
Mr Holmes, I enjoy a good science fiction drama as well.as.anyone but this work is EPIC. I look forward to the next installments.
Mr Holmes, I enjoy a good science fiction drama as well.as.anyone but this work is EPIC. I look forward to the next installments.
October 11, 2024
Another find book
Really nice book I like the whole series I've been reading them for months now and I highly recommend them.
Really nice book I like the whole series I've been reading them for months now and I highly recommend them.
November 22, 2024
Just read all (so far) 20 back to back. Someone needs to turn this series into a TV franchise, it'd blow all the others out of the water. Immense!
January 25, 2025
Thanks for the ride
20 books in & still really enjoying them, its a shame it’s coming to an end, but thank you Mr Holmes its been a blast.
20 books in & still really enjoying them, its a shame it’s coming to an end, but thank you Mr Holmes its been a blast.
March 3, 2025
Great series!
I love this series! I'm rereading it and the conclusion books, evil.aliens, good aliens, the author put a lot of thought in creating his aliens!
I love this series! I'm rereading it and the conclusion books, evil.aliens, good aliens, the author put a lot of thought in creating his aliens!
June 11, 2025
Amazing as always
One of the best books in the series. I couldn't stop reading it. DJ keeps getting better and better! Must Read!!
One of the best books in the series. I couldn't stop reading it. DJ keeps getting better and better! Must Read!!
December 29, 2025
hooked
Have been loving the series & look forward to the next instalment.
Be sad when the series is finished. ☹️
Have been loving the series & look forward to the next instalment.
Be sad when the series is finished. ☹️
April 5, 2025
This was absolutely my cup of tea. Lots of space battles with capital ships slugging it out. Tactics, strategy, heroes and everything you would expect from a great military sci-fi novel.
My only gripe would be that the author went a bit R.R. Martin with the casualties.
This book concludes the story arc with the Karacknids, for now and, not surprisingly, starts another arc with another main enemy. No rest for the wicked.
My only gripe would be that the author went a bit R.R. Martin with the casualties.
This book concludes the story arc with the Karacknids, for now and, not surprisingly, starts another arc with another main enemy. No rest for the wicked.
Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews