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Fire from Ashes
At war with an old enemy, betrayed by a supposed ally, Fuercon is a system on the brink of disaster. All that stands between it and defeat are its Space Navy and Marines – and the fact the betrayer does not yet know its secret plans have been discovered. But will that be enough to turn the tide of war? Honor and duty. Honor and duty have guided Colonel Ashlyn Shaw’s life for as long as she can remember. Honor kept her sane when she was betrayed by those she had fought beside. Duty gave her reason to trust again once the betrayal came to light and her name, as well as the names of her fellow Devil Dogs, was cleared. Now she and the Marines under her command are once again asked to risk their lives to protect Fuercon from its enemies. Family and the Corps. They are why she fights. She knows what will happen to them should Fuercon fall to the Callusians. Their lives are worth any sacrifice she must make to help keep their homeworld safe. Betrayal. The not-so-secret driving force of Ashlyn’s life. Four years ago, someone betrayed her and her command. That person now works to betray Fuercon. Ashlyn is determined to discover who – and why – and bring them to justice. The storm clouds of war gather and time is running out. Will Ashlyn and the Devil Dogs be able to turn back the enemy and unmask the betrayer before all is lost?
- GenresScience Fiction
271 pages, Kindle Edition
Published July 3, 2018
16 people are currently reading
4 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
October 18, 2018
Left me wanting more!
Intrigue with enough action to keep the story moving at a fast pace. I would like to see a romantic interest for Ash, but this is a great series. I'm anxiously awaiting the next book.
Intrigue with enough action to keep the story moving at a fast pace. I would like to see a romantic interest for Ash, but this is a great series. I'm anxiously awaiting the next book.
December 25, 2018
The bookworm dilemma: "Find out what happens!" versus "Not wanting it to end"
December 9, 2018
Format: Kindle Edition
I obtained this book through the Kindle Unlimited program.
I may as well tell you up front: I got the book MONTHS ago, and it was supposed to be read and reviewed before Dragon Con. However, Those awards took precedence, and then I hit a combination of Reviewers Block and Life Events; thus, the delay in reviewing must fall entirely on my shoulders, and is no fault of the author or her work.
This is the fourth book in the series, which evidently is planned to completed in a fifth book. And thus, the bookworm's dilemma: I really, really want to find out the send of the plot lines, so I want to get to the end, BUT I also am so fascinated by the story, that I don't want it to end. I KNOW it has to end from my own experience. However, we who are bookworms always want MOAR!!~!~!!! Well, not ALWAYS. If I never read another word GRRM writes, it will bother me not at all.
Ashlyn Shaw isn't the first female hero I've followed, but she is the first female hero that had me examining the difference in my literary heroes at age 10 and those of age 65. Is it a simple formula? Do you just take Sergeant Rock, add 55 years, and you get Ashlyn Shaw? Let's face it: there are some amazing resemblances. They both care about the troops under their command. They both are HIGHLY mission oriented. They are both, unequivocally, Good Guys. And say it I must: they are both bad-asses, of cosmic proportions.
At the beginning of this penultimate (perhaps) installment of the series, Ashlyn has risen in the organization from being the commander of a single company at the beginning. More significantly, she has been completely exonerated of the charges and suspicion that she was a traitor to her nation/planet of Fuercon. Those who set her up in an attempt to bring Fuercon down are in prison, where she can't get at them. And the evidence that a professed ally, who put the entire scheme in motion, is mounting.
It's the development of these themes that comprises the bulk of the book.
Not all that has hurt her command and her country has been a result of enemy action. Sometimes it was simple incompetence; other times, nepotism has put people in command of combat units, when they would be better off commanding a messkit-repair depot.
That latter approach, by the way, of putting people in command for reasons other than ability to command, has a mirror image in the career formation of the enemies of Fuercom. In those cases, it appears that terror, in the form of fear of death at the hands of a vexed supervisor, is regarded as the appropriate command strategy. That alone would make them repugnant enough to fight, regardless of their policies toward conquered planets. Fortunately, it's a strategy which does not make for an efficient military in the long-term.
As long as Amazon utilizes a single five-star scale for rating a book, reviews are going to be affected by too many factors to be truly accurate. The characters and the story are of the sort that keep me coming back for more, but there are too many copy-proofing errors for me give the fifth star. Those are easily filtered out by the reader, however, and I knew what the author MEANT to say from the context. My end impression is of a well-told story that needs $25 worth of copy-editing paid to some reasonably competent high school senior, who can also use this for extra credit in Senior English. YMMV
December 9, 2018
Format: Kindle Edition
I obtained this book through the Kindle Unlimited program.
I may as well tell you up front: I got the book MONTHS ago, and it was supposed to be read and reviewed before Dragon Con. However, Those awards took precedence, and then I hit a combination of Reviewers Block and Life Events; thus, the delay in reviewing must fall entirely on my shoulders, and is no fault of the author or her work.
This is the fourth book in the series, which evidently is planned to completed in a fifth book. And thus, the bookworm's dilemma: I really, really want to find out the send of the plot lines, so I want to get to the end, BUT I also am so fascinated by the story, that I don't want it to end. I KNOW it has to end from my own experience. However, we who are bookworms always want MOAR!!~!~!!! Well, not ALWAYS. If I never read another word GRRM writes, it will bother me not at all.
Ashlyn Shaw isn't the first female hero I've followed, but she is the first female hero that had me examining the difference in my literary heroes at age 10 and those of age 65. Is it a simple formula? Do you just take Sergeant Rock, add 55 years, and you get Ashlyn Shaw? Let's face it: there are some amazing resemblances. They both care about the troops under their command. They both are HIGHLY mission oriented. They are both, unequivocally, Good Guys. And say it I must: they are both bad-asses, of cosmic proportions.
At the beginning of this penultimate (perhaps) installment of the series, Ashlyn has risen in the organization from being the commander of a single company at the beginning. More significantly, she has been completely exonerated of the charges and suspicion that she was a traitor to her nation/planet of Fuercon. Those who set her up in an attempt to bring Fuercon down are in prison, where she can't get at them. And the evidence that a professed ally, who put the entire scheme in motion, is mounting.
It's the development of these themes that comprises the bulk of the book.
Not all that has hurt her command and her country has been a result of enemy action. Sometimes it was simple incompetence; other times, nepotism has put people in command of combat units, when they would be better off commanding a messkit-repair depot.
That latter approach, by the way, of putting people in command for reasons other than ability to command, has a mirror image in the career formation of the enemies of Fuercom. In those cases, it appears that terror, in the form of fear of death at the hands of a vexed supervisor, is regarded as the appropriate command strategy. That alone would make them repugnant enough to fight, regardless of their policies toward conquered planets. Fortunately, it's a strategy which does not make for an efficient military in the long-term.
As long as Amazon utilizes a single five-star scale for rating a book, reviews are going to be affected by too many factors to be truly accurate. The characters and the story are of the sort that keep me coming back for more, but there are too many copy-proofing errors for me give the fifth star. Those are easily filtered out by the reader, however, and I knew what the author MEANT to say from the context. My end impression is of a well-told story that needs $25 worth of copy-editing paid to some reasonably competent high school senior, who can also use this for extra credit in Senior English. YMMV
July 17, 2018
Strong military space opera with a few issues
I have really enjoyed this series. Probably it is best described as a somewhat lighter military space opera, as the battle scenes are not gruesome or highly detailed. Character development is high too. The main errors come in two categories: editing and recap/world building.
Editing is the entire series has been problematic. Gender pronouns are misused constantly, homonyms like hole vs whole are incorrect often, and name identifiers are screwed up, especially in this book, with even the main character’s last name wandering from Shaw to Santos and back again and again. It is distracting but not to the level of awful for me. Getting a good editor on all the books and extras could move this series far towards excellence. Especially, if this second issue is addressed also.
The author recaps events and scenes in previous books way too often for my taste. Thus, she also loses the opportunity to grow the world and characters more. A good example of this is when Talbot tells the story of first meeting Ash. Is it a good story yes, but to retell it when it was detailed in earlier works suggests that the author does not trust her readers. This is the fourth book in the series along with 2 stories, if we are reading it we know and like the story so far. Instead, I suggest the author could have told a new story about the relationship about those characters. Grow the world and characters and trust your readers more to come along with you please.
Finally, I do recommend this series if you can stand editing errors. It really is a very nice take on marines in space.
I have really enjoyed this series. Probably it is best described as a somewhat lighter military space opera, as the battle scenes are not gruesome or highly detailed. Character development is high too. The main errors come in two categories: editing and recap/world building.
Editing is the entire series has been problematic. Gender pronouns are misused constantly, homonyms like hole vs whole are incorrect often, and name identifiers are screwed up, especially in this book, with even the main character’s last name wandering from Shaw to Santos and back again and again. It is distracting but not to the level of awful for me. Getting a good editor on all the books and extras could move this series far towards excellence. Especially, if this second issue is addressed also.
The author recaps events and scenes in previous books way too often for my taste. Thus, she also loses the opportunity to grow the world and characters more. A good example of this is when Talbot tells the story of first meeting Ash. Is it a good story yes, but to retell it when it was detailed in earlier works suggests that the author does not trust her readers. This is the fourth book in the series along with 2 stories, if we are reading it we know and like the story so far. Instead, I suggest the author could have told a new story about the relationship about those characters. Grow the world and characters and trust your readers more to come along with you please.
Finally, I do recommend this series if you can stand editing errors. It really is a very nice take on marines in space.
July 9, 2018
I REALLY like this series which is why I am a little bit disappointed with this book. The characters are great but this book had a lot of talk and little action, especially for the main character. It felt almost anti-climactic after all the lead-up and the repeated comments about keeping Shaw from doing anything foolish. That, and the crazy promotions being flung around felt just a bit too fluffy at times. While I get that there are losses in war, I still find it difficult to believe that there aren't enough people to slowly rise through the ranks. In this book one person jumps from Lance Corporal to Lieutenant by the end of the book with only a short time as a Corporal in between. I could still forgive those things but the lack of proofreading brought it down to three stars for me. I'm normally not overly picky about a few mistakes or typos but this book was full of them, right down to accidental mix-up of character names which made it a bit confusing in spots.
I still love this series; the overall story is an enjoyable military sci-fi read and I'll definitely continue on with it. I'm hoping with the next book in line that we finally get to see Colonel Shaw get some revenge, or at least some action as the conspiracies unfold.
I still love this series; the overall story is an enjoyable military sci-fi read and I'll definitely continue on with it. I'm hoping with the next book in line that we finally get to see Colonel Shaw get some revenge, or at least some action as the conspiracies unfold.
July 5, 2018
I really enjoy this series
I have re-read the previous books a couple of times, and I expect to re-read this one, too. The characters are strong and the plots are interesting. The reason for only four stars (and if I didn't enjoy them I would deduct more stars) is the abominable lack of proofreading. With the publication of each new book, I hoped for improvement, but it hasn't happened yet. The frequent missing words, extra words, wrong pronouns, etc., jerk me out of the story. Sometimes the writing is so jumbled that I have to pause and figure out what was meant.
It is last time for Ms. Green to respect her readers and employ a *professional* proofreader.
After this many books, it is last time
I have re-read the previous books a couple of times, and I expect to re-read this one, too. The characters are strong and the plots are interesting. The reason for only four stars (and if I didn't enjoy them I would deduct more stars) is the abominable lack of proofreading. With the publication of each new book, I hoped for improvement, but it hasn't happened yet. The frequent missing words, extra words, wrong pronouns, etc., jerk me out of the story. Sometimes the writing is so jumbled that I have to pause and figure out what was meant.
It is last time for Ms. Green to respect her readers and employ a *professional* proofreader.
After this many books, it is last time
September 9, 2019
A SS./ASG. SYFY. Military Deep Space Action Adventure (FFA) (HADB - 4)
SS/AGS. have penned the fourth novel in the Honor and Duty series, which begins with a general not responding to a request for assistance from a fleet in trouble. The call came six times but was ignored until the President and Col. Shaw prepared a relief group, but arrive three hours late. This is the beginning of retribution for Col. Shaw. This is an excellent read for the genre.....DEHS
SS/AGS. have penned the fourth novel in the Honor and Duty series, which begins with a general not responding to a request for assistance from a fleet in trouble. The call came six times but was ignored until the President and Col. Shaw prepared a relief group, but arrive three hours late. This is the beginning of retribution for Col. Shaw. This is an excellent read for the genre.....DEHS
August 4, 2021
Great series, however
This is a great series, love the storyline. However, way to many editing errors which in turn subtract from the books flow. Very simple errors such as Adamson vs Anderson? Or when the enemies name replaces an allies name, or sentences completely out of placement.
Otherwise I enjoy these books (on my third time reading) and will keep in my library for some time.
This is a great series, love the storyline. However, way to many editing errors which in turn subtract from the books flow. Very simple errors such as Adamson vs Anderson? Or when the enemies name replaces an allies name, or sentences completely out of placement.
Otherwise I enjoy these books (on my third time reading) and will keep in my library for some time.
August 12, 2018
Great Military Science Fiction
Not just shooting, but the price paid, even by the survivors. Plus politics, spying, and fixing lax discipline. All done with characters that fairly leap off of the page. My only concern is that if the main character keeps having such traumatic piles of ashes to triumph over even she may be permanently broken.
Not just shooting, but the price paid, even by the survivors. Plus politics, spying, and fixing lax discipline. All done with characters that fairly leap off of the page. My only concern is that if the main character keeps having such traumatic piles of ashes to triumph over even she may be permanently broken.
September 10, 2018
Enjoyed the continuation of this series, as the main "space opera" arc progressed and more characters had enhanced roles. Too many errors in the proof reading, as one character's name kept switching between Adamson and Anderson. Very distracting!!
December 9, 2019
Excellent plot
Great book with excellent plot. But close to the worst editing I ever read, then again the book is free and I will happily recommend it to everyone. Start at book one and truley enjoy the series.
Great book with excellent plot. But close to the worst editing I ever read, then again the book is free and I will happily recommend it to everyone. Start at book one and truley enjoy the series.
May 30, 2019
Excellent! can't wait for #5, Victory From Ahhes.
December 17, 2020
Good space opera, needs better editing.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews