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Star Force: Phase 1 - The Origin Series #1-4
Star Force: Origin Series Box Set
***The Star Force Universe has over 120 million KU pages read to date.***
Your mission: Build an empire to defend Earth.
Your assets: Alien pyramid battlestation discovered in Antarctica with database of advanced galactic knowledge. Star Force corporate holdings. Earth's current anonymity.
Your team: 100 of the best and brightest recruits Earth can muster.
Allies: None.
Timeframe: Unknown. Earth is currently off the map. Time until rediscovery is impossible to determine.
Background Info: Earth is a lost colony of the dominant empire in the galaxy. Humans are their primary slave race, and should have been evacuated from Earth when it was abandoned. Something went wrong and some were left behind. If our unauthorized existence is discovered, the V'kit'no'sat will return and eradicate us without hesitation. Negotiation is impossible.
Probability of success: Negligible.
Do you wish to proceed? Yes/No
Your mission: Build an empire to defend Earth.
Your assets: Alien pyramid battlestation discovered in Antarctica with database of advanced galactic knowledge. Star Force corporate holdings. Earth's current anonymity.
Your team: 100 of the best and brightest recruits Earth can muster.
Allies: None.
Timeframe: Unknown. Earth is currently off the map. Time until rediscovery is impossible to determine.
Background Info: Earth is a lost colony of the dominant empire in the galaxy. Humans are their primary slave race, and should have been evacuated from Earth when it was abandoned. Something went wrong and some were left behind. If our unauthorized existence is discovered, the V'kit'no'sat will return and eradicate us without hesitation. Negotiation is impossible.
Probability of success: Negligible.
Do you wish to proceed? Yes/No
- GenresScience FictionFiction
312 pages, Kindle Edition
Published March 1, 2021
2724 people are currently reading
383 people want to read
About the author
Aer-ki Jyr
241 books264 followersAer-ki Jyr is one of the top 20 science fiction authors on Amazon due to his extremely long and ongoing space opera epic STAR FORCE, one of the longest military science fiction series ever written.
Check out his website and forum at www.aerkijyr.com
Check out his website and forum at www.aerkijyr.com
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 198 reviews
April 21, 2018
Members of Goodreads and random browsers of book reviews, I come before you today with a confession. I am a literary masochist, I continue to read book series long after any sane person would have moved on to greener pastures. The series that caused me to truly realize this aspect of my reading habits is unoriginally named “Star Force.”
tl;dr – This series is bad, really bad. Do not read it, do not even start it, find something better to read. For more details, read on.
I have been curious about this series for a long time, watching books one through one hundred come out between 2012 and 2016, then watching the series continue into phase two. I finally decided that it was a good idea to check it out. Imagine my surprise when the first “book” was a mere 42 pages on my eReader. I hadn’t realized that this was actually a serial, with each “book” being an episode. So naturally I went to find a combined edition.
That’s when I discovered the omnibus collections, four episodes in one. This brought the page total up to a whopping 216 for the first four episodes, which to me is a short story, not even a novelette. But of course I’m used to series like The Wheel of Time, The Stormlight Chronicles, The Sword of Truth, Dune, and Timothy Zahn’s Thrawn trilogy. These are what I consider “Epic” Science Fiction and Fantasy.
As is my habit, I keep a loose count of grammatical errors that I encounter when I read a series. I give new authors, especially new ebook authors, a bit of a pass on this since often they can’t afford the services of a copy editor. This series started out decently, but actually got worse over the course of the twelve episodes that I managed to get through.
I’m not going to lay out every issue that I saw, but here is a list of a few.
Constant misuse of “Less” and “Fewer”
Using “Thrusted” as the past tense when referring to rocket engines
Using “Haven” when the situation calls for “Heaven”
Misusing “Too” and “To”
“Backwards Engineered” (It’s Reverse Engineered)
The grammar is actually what caused me to give up on the series, over and above the reasons I will detail below. By the time I finished episode twelve, there was at least one misuse of a word on every page, sometimes two. I can take a lot, but as with the “Wandering Engineer” series, I just could not get past the language issue.
Moving on, I can suspend a great deal of disbelief when it comes to a good story, but the concepts introduced in this series stretched me near to the breaking point. If the grammar didn’t get me, the super-tech dinosaurs would have. Here is a short list of things that made me cringe when they appeared.
Super-technological dinosaurs. Yes really, somehow we’re meant to believe that the Triceratops and Apatosaurus somehow advanced to a high technological level and were in competition with Velociraptors, Tyrannosaurus Rex, and all sorts of other reptilian species.
If that’s not bad enough, Humans aren’t actually from Earth, they were brought there as slaves to the dinosaurs. Conveniently ignoring the thousands of skeletons that were unearthed without any trace of high technology laying around. Also, Earth humans circa 2044 are sad and pathetic examples of the species.
The secret to immortality and super-humanity is training, not mere exercise, but focused training. There’s no need to grow old and die, train and you will reverse the aging process. But wait, there’s more, if you take this special wonder-vitamin called Ambrosia (which by the way is the FOOD of the gods, not the NECTAR of the gods. Nectar was the drink of the gods) then you can achieve levels of training that will catapult you to super hero status.
Oh, and as a side note, now there are seven foot tall humans called “Knights” who take special growth enhancing drugs and carry giant stun swords. Because bigger is better apparently.
Somehow it is possible in the physics of the Star Force universe to generate a full 1G of gravity using a disc the size of the U.S.S. Defiant of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine fame (I’ll get to that later). The Coriolis effect of a disc that small spinning fast enough to generate 1G of gravity would be unreal. I’m letting the larger ships go, ignoring the size requirements for generating 1G of spin gravity, but that was just stupid.
Now that I’ve covered the things that stretch credulity to the breaking point, for my final segment I will list the things that are just plain irritating about the episodes that I read.
The author cannot write female characters, period, but to his credit he has decided that females only make cameo appearances with one notable exception. The one female that gets more than a few lines at a time is Morgan, who is a serious badass. I love Morgan, she’s great, but she’s also not a definably female character. Other than the initial description and referring to her in the feminine pronoun, you’d never know. Oh, with the one exception of someone asking her to take off her helmet, then saying that she’s hot. Yes really.
The constant referencing of 20th/21st century television, movies, and video games. There are “Halo” tournaments, they play Mario Kart, there are constant references to Star Wars, Star Trek, Dragonball Z, BattleTech, and a few other “popular” shows and games. If you can’t make your descriptive point without referencing an existing work, you need to work harder.
The battleships of the Star Force fleet are named after video games. Not games that could be reasonably thought of as ship names, but rather the battleship Smash Brothers, and the battleship Mortal Kombat. I just can’t take an author seriously when he does things like that.
In the span of approximately sixty years since the discovery of the super-tech dinosaur ship under the ice of Antarctica, there has not been one single leak of Star Force technology, or even a hint that the ship exists. Star Force employs millions of people, hundreds of thousands of engineers, but somehow they managed to hire only the people who will keep their mouths shut in the face of massive amounts of money offered by rival companies. I don’t think so.
There are countless other things that I could talk about as reasons why I stopped reading this series, but I think my litany of annoyance has gone on long enough. Thank you for reading, and I wish you luck in finding other, better books to read.
tl;dr – This series is bad, really bad. Do not read it, do not even start it, find something better to read. For more details, read on.
I have been curious about this series for a long time, watching books one through one hundred come out between 2012 and 2016, then watching the series continue into phase two. I finally decided that it was a good idea to check it out. Imagine my surprise when the first “book” was a mere 42 pages on my eReader. I hadn’t realized that this was actually a serial, with each “book” being an episode. So naturally I went to find a combined edition.
That’s when I discovered the omnibus collections, four episodes in one. This brought the page total up to a whopping 216 for the first four episodes, which to me is a short story, not even a novelette. But of course I’m used to series like The Wheel of Time, The Stormlight Chronicles, The Sword of Truth, Dune, and Timothy Zahn’s Thrawn trilogy. These are what I consider “Epic” Science Fiction and Fantasy.
As is my habit, I keep a loose count of grammatical errors that I encounter when I read a series. I give new authors, especially new ebook authors, a bit of a pass on this since often they can’t afford the services of a copy editor. This series started out decently, but actually got worse over the course of the twelve episodes that I managed to get through.
I’m not going to lay out every issue that I saw, but here is a list of a few.
Constant misuse of “Less” and “Fewer”
Using “Thrusted” as the past tense when referring to rocket engines
Using “Haven” when the situation calls for “Heaven”
Misusing “Too” and “To”
“Backwards Engineered” (It’s Reverse Engineered)
The grammar is actually what caused me to give up on the series, over and above the reasons I will detail below. By the time I finished episode twelve, there was at least one misuse of a word on every page, sometimes two. I can take a lot, but as with the “Wandering Engineer” series, I just could not get past the language issue.
Moving on, I can suspend a great deal of disbelief when it comes to a good story, but the concepts introduced in this series stretched me near to the breaking point. If the grammar didn’t get me, the super-tech dinosaurs would have. Here is a short list of things that made me cringe when they appeared.
Super-technological dinosaurs. Yes really, somehow we’re meant to believe that the Triceratops and Apatosaurus somehow advanced to a high technological level and were in competition with Velociraptors, Tyrannosaurus Rex, and all sorts of other reptilian species.
If that’s not bad enough, Humans aren’t actually from Earth, they were brought there as slaves to the dinosaurs. Conveniently ignoring the thousands of skeletons that were unearthed without any trace of high technology laying around. Also, Earth humans circa 2044 are sad and pathetic examples of the species.
The secret to immortality and super-humanity is training, not mere exercise, but focused training. There’s no need to grow old and die, train and you will reverse the aging process. But wait, there’s more, if you take this special wonder-vitamin called Ambrosia (which by the way is the FOOD of the gods, not the NECTAR of the gods. Nectar was the drink of the gods) then you can achieve levels of training that will catapult you to super hero status.
Oh, and as a side note, now there are seven foot tall humans called “Knights” who take special growth enhancing drugs and carry giant stun swords. Because bigger is better apparently.
Somehow it is possible in the physics of the Star Force universe to generate a full 1G of gravity using a disc the size of the U.S.S. Defiant of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine fame (I’ll get to that later). The Coriolis effect of a disc that small spinning fast enough to generate 1G of gravity would be unreal. I’m letting the larger ships go, ignoring the size requirements for generating 1G of spin gravity, but that was just stupid.
Now that I’ve covered the things that stretch credulity to the breaking point, for my final segment I will list the things that are just plain irritating about the episodes that I read.
The author cannot write female characters, period, but to his credit he has decided that females only make cameo appearances with one notable exception. The one female that gets more than a few lines at a time is Morgan, who is a serious badass. I love Morgan, she’s great, but she’s also not a definably female character. Other than the initial description and referring to her in the feminine pronoun, you’d never know. Oh, with the one exception of someone asking her to take off her helmet, then saying that she’s hot. Yes really.
The constant referencing of 20th/21st century television, movies, and video games. There are “Halo” tournaments, they play Mario Kart, there are constant references to Star Wars, Star Trek, Dragonball Z, BattleTech, and a few other “popular” shows and games. If you can’t make your descriptive point without referencing an existing work, you need to work harder.
The battleships of the Star Force fleet are named after video games. Not games that could be reasonably thought of as ship names, but rather the battleship Smash Brothers, and the battleship Mortal Kombat. I just can’t take an author seriously when he does things like that.
In the span of approximately sixty years since the discovery of the super-tech dinosaur ship under the ice of Antarctica, there has not been one single leak of Star Force technology, or even a hint that the ship exists. Star Force employs millions of people, hundreds of thousands of engineers, but somehow they managed to hire only the people who will keep their mouths shut in the face of massive amounts of money offered by rival companies. I don’t think so.
There are countless other things that I could talk about as reasons why I stopped reading this series, but I think my litany of annoyance has gone on long enough. Thank you for reading, and I wish you luck in finding other, better books to read.
March 27, 2019
Having spent over 30 years in the Army, from private through Sgt-Maj and having attended a 2-year academic and rather hard basic training I can relate to this series. It was quite well done and the author must have had rather extensive military training or have conducted extensive research to be able to write these books. I have just ordered books 5-8 and hope that there is more actual space warfare involved.
October 24, 2017
Asinine!!
This is suppose to be empire building or world building , not how to train a recruit in 500 pages. I finished this book, but it was a struggle, mostly because nothing of significance happens in it. There is no character development, you know nothing about the aliens, there is no progress .... Its infuriating that I can't get my days back.
This is suppose to be empire building or world building , not how to train a recruit in 500 pages. I finished this book, but it was a struggle, mostly because nothing of significance happens in it. There is no character development, you know nothing about the aliens, there is no progress .... Its infuriating that I can't get my days back.
May 24, 2018
Fell short of expectations.
What started out as an interesting premise (finding a buried pyramid under Antarctica) ended up being a book about new inductee training programs for a new space fleet. While somewhat interesting it turns into a marathon training and testing session. Character development is limited and the story arc suffers. Not sure I will continue this series.
What started out as an interesting premise (finding a buried pyramid under Antarctica) ended up being a book about new inductee training programs for a new space fleet. While somewhat interesting it turns into a marathon training and testing session. Character development is limited and the story arc suffers. Not sure I will continue this series.
July 24, 2019
This is a must read series for anyone who loves science fiction! I’m reviewing the series not just these first 4 books.
This is the start to a series that is around 65 books long as of 7/20/19. The author consistently releases a new book on the 20th of every month. I’ve read many different sci-fi genre books including Old Mans War, Dune, many Star Wars books, Enders Game, etc. I can honestly say none of them are as detailed in the development of the galaxy or have characters that you get to know better than the trailblazers in this series. Yes, people have rated the first few books with bad reviews because the action doesn’t start to pick up from the first chapter. This is to be expected in a series this detailed. The series is walked through finding alien tech and realistically reverse engineering it. Most books would have the tech be immediately useable and come with an operators manual conveniently in English.
This author takes the more realistic approach and you get to feel every breakthrough and see how it plays out against first the other countries as they attempt to take control early in the series, then the first aliens encountered which are an aggressive species that strike off the first real showdown for the star force empire, and star force continues to have new conflicts as it grows to become a massive empire in the far future. This series is not about any specific character, this is the story of a empire from birth to becoming a dominant force in our galaxy.
The books are all pretty short and the different stages of growth can have a unique feel but this will be a series you find hard to put down once you get into it. Don’t miss out on an awesome series because the first few short books don’t have the characters become super powered gods from the beginning. They grow into it, by the time you catch up to the author you will see basically Super Sayian/Jedi levels of power, and awesome in depth tech that you understand because you’ve seen it develop from start to finish.
This is the start to a series that is around 65 books long as of 7/20/19. The author consistently releases a new book on the 20th of every month. I’ve read many different sci-fi genre books including Old Mans War, Dune, many Star Wars books, Enders Game, etc. I can honestly say none of them are as detailed in the development of the galaxy or have characters that you get to know better than the trailblazers in this series. Yes, people have rated the first few books with bad reviews because the action doesn’t start to pick up from the first chapter. This is to be expected in a series this detailed. The series is walked through finding alien tech and realistically reverse engineering it. Most books would have the tech be immediately useable and come with an operators manual conveniently in English.
This author takes the more realistic approach and you get to feel every breakthrough and see how it plays out against first the other countries as they attempt to take control early in the series, then the first aliens encountered which are an aggressive species that strike off the first real showdown for the star force empire, and star force continues to have new conflicts as it grows to become a massive empire in the far future. This series is not about any specific character, this is the story of a empire from birth to becoming a dominant force in our galaxy.
The books are all pretty short and the different stages of growth can have a unique feel but this will be a series you find hard to put down once you get into it. Don’t miss out on an awesome series because the first few short books don’t have the characters become super powered gods from the beginning. They grow into it, by the time you catch up to the author you will see basically Super Sayian/Jedi levels of power, and awesome in depth tech that you understand because you’ve seen it develop from start to finish.
December 5, 2017
Best. Series. Ever.
Being an avid reader of usually the medieval fantasy genre I decided to give a more futuristic sci fi genre. I was not disappointed. This series is huge, 120 books so far, many more to come. I have spent close to a year reading this series and I have genuinely loved every minute of it, even going so far as to talk to people about things in the book (even though they aren't reading them) if you enjoy getting to know characters, and want a book you can genuinely feel a part of (I often refer to stat force as 'us' as it's earthlings) this is the series for you. Try it, you won't be disappointed.
Being an avid reader of usually the medieval fantasy genre I decided to give a more futuristic sci fi genre. I was not disappointed. This series is huge, 120 books so far, many more to come. I have spent close to a year reading this series and I have genuinely loved every minute of it, even going so far as to talk to people about things in the book (even though they aren't reading them) if you enjoy getting to know characters, and want a book you can genuinely feel a part of (I often refer to stat force as 'us' as it's earthlings) this is the series for you. Try it, you won't be disappointed.
August 22, 2018
The science is horrible, the training is incredibly stupid. Don't even get me started on Morgan, I don't care that she is a woman, sadly she is a Mary Sue except when it comes to space warfare tactics her only flaw which I personally think the author just tacked on when he noticed what he was doing. This doesn't even touch on how unrealistic the political situation is, which I'm not even going to attempt to get in to.
March 11, 2019
The premise of the first book was interesting. Unfortunately, the book pivots away from the mystery at hand. I was bored out of my mind a few chapters into the second book. I just don't care about the characters, or their training.
Also, faint and feint are different words with very different meanings. I would chalk it up as a typo, but faint was used in place of feint at least twice (perhaps more, but I'm not willing to read more to find out).
Also, faint and feint are different words with very different meanings. I would chalk it up as a typo, but faint was used in place of feint at least twice (perhaps more, but I'm not willing to read more to find out).
May 22, 2019
One great start
Starts strong and then builds. Characters development is done in stages so we can see their growth. Story development is wonderful. Great read, I highly recommend it.
Starts strong and then builds. Characters development is done in stages so we can see their growth. Story development is wonderful. Great read, I highly recommend it.
February 2, 2020
Don't waste your time with this 'book' it had an interesting if trope-filled premise, that I was willing to overlook. But honestly, as it went on, I realized there was nothing good about it. This writer has zero ideas of science, fiction, or what to write and what NOT to write. If you ever have a character describe a bathroom you certainly do not need them going over every little detail, sadly such a scene presents itself in here. That was the point at which I understood the writer is just padding for a larger word count.
The book is 40 chapters long, divided into four sections that are each exactly 10 chapters long. Each chapter is just shy of 2,000 words. No, you read that right, what is usually four pages(back and front) is a chapter here. I suspect that this formulaic approach was used to churn out this mediocre product.I'd say 95% of the book is describing training nonstop. Its as if the author never heard of training montages.
And don't get me started on the videogame references. It was fun the first two times, after that, it was clearly used a thinly veiled attempt to handwave away the fact that the author can't think of original ideas and just 'borrows' from other authors the names, shapes, function, etc for future ships, strategies, weapons, armor, vehicles, etc.
Do yourself a favor and just read the original halo novels that this book is blatantly trying to pretend it is not ripping off badly.
The book is 40 chapters long, divided into four sections that are each exactly 10 chapters long. Each chapter is just shy of 2,000 words. No, you read that right, what is usually four pages(back and front) is a chapter here. I suspect that this formulaic approach was used to churn out this mediocre product.I'd say 95% of the book is describing training nonstop. Its as if the author never heard of training montages.
And don't get me started on the videogame references. It was fun the first two times, after that, it was clearly used a thinly veiled attempt to handwave away the fact that the author can't think of original ideas and just 'borrows' from other authors the names, shapes, function, etc for future ships, strategies, weapons, armor, vehicles, etc.
Do yourself a favor and just read the original halo novels that this book is blatantly trying to pretend it is not ripping off badly.
April 12, 2020
Wow
I chose 5 stars because this is The most detailed and "practical book I've read about the entry of humans in space. At times I was ready to give the book one star, thinking the detail too exacting. Changed my mind on that.
There were a couple of minor errors I caught with tense, actually two. Couldn't detect a single other error in grammar, and I look. No words misused, no spelling errors, nothing. Truly amazing.
I'm not saying a single word about plot or actual content. I think you'll either like it, or you won't. No gray areas to quibble about, "Well, I sort of liked this but not so much that."
I think there is a natural scare factor involving the discovered fact that humanity is so far behind any other space fairing planet, even reverse engineering is nearly impossible. We have to evolve tactics for space, wet water Navy tactics don't usually work.
This book may make you mad when you see how little of Steven Spielberg's Star Wars is practical, but if you have any actual knowledge of science, tactics, physics and space, you already know that.
Without getting stuck in too many technical details, this is a good, hard science, science fiction novel. Maybe a bit short in length, but a very, Very good read.
I chose 5 stars because this is The most detailed and "practical book I've read about the entry of humans in space. At times I was ready to give the book one star, thinking the detail too exacting. Changed my mind on that.
There were a couple of minor errors I caught with tense, actually two. Couldn't detect a single other error in grammar, and I look. No words misused, no spelling errors, nothing. Truly amazing.
I'm not saying a single word about plot or actual content. I think you'll either like it, or you won't. No gray areas to quibble about, "Well, I sort of liked this but not so much that."
I think there is a natural scare factor involving the discovered fact that humanity is so far behind any other space fairing planet, even reverse engineering is nearly impossible. We have to evolve tactics for space, wet water Navy tactics don't usually work.
This book may make you mad when you see how little of Steven Spielberg's Star Wars is practical, but if you have any actual knowledge of science, tactics, physics and space, you already know that.
Without getting stuck in too many technical details, this is a good, hard science, science fiction novel. Maybe a bit short in length, but a very, Very good read.
December 10, 2019
Avoid reading this author. I wasted to much money and time on him--including this one. All his books together could be a done in 20 books. The books are on average about 100 pages each, and the content is mostly fluff. He really needs an editor. The books read like someone on a mission to spread the latest way to save yourself. It also preaches veganism devoutly. I expect him to become another L. Ron Hubbard who believes his own SciFi. The books read like an episode of Dragon Ball Z with all the posturing and childishness that goes with it. It borrows heavily from pop-culture. He starts with the grain of a great idea, but in the end he ruins it.
May 6, 2017
I enjoyed the whole series. my stars bounce from 4 to 5 cause of the words and the author re explaining but read alot and some people need the extra explaining some get bored and hit the Kindle screen like they are punching a hole through it. but I LOVED the series. many a reader will too.
March 24, 2019
I have not posted in a while. I guess I can make up a lot of excuses. Each of them being just that…excuses. However, one of them is that I have been somewhat hooked on this series, and that is not necessarily a good thing.
This series has been difficult to let go of for me. At the same time, it is not really great. Actually it is, at times, quite bad. Perhaps I should have known from the cover of the first box set with the Star Wars wannabe text font. I guess the reason for me to stick to it would be that the overall story concept is one that appeals greatly to me. I just like these kinds of stories and I guess that I got myself suckered into this one. Once I read the first box set, I really wanted to see where it all was going and was desperately looking for good parts on the way. Make no mistake, there are some but overall there is too much nonsense for this to rate above mediocre.
The overall story is one of humanity taking to the stars, kicking quite a bit of ass on the way and generally achieving greatness. The details of the story, how this is achieved and the actual history of humanity is quite a bit of a twist in this series and overall I like it. The series is a sequence of short stories really. Having read 19 box sets I have really read 76 episodes so far. If it would not have been released as box sets, I would probably never have considered it.
The series has a lot going for it. The writing is not bad at all. The action is quite good. However, there are indeed a fair amount of weak points. I would go as far as to say that there are some parts that are nonsensical and some that are even hugely annoying. Although the latter is of course a personal opinion.
Let’s start with the good parts. As I already mentioned the basic story itself is quite too my liking. I also like that, in the early stages of the story, the Earth governments and their useless politicians get a nice ass whooping. The action is, also as I wrote, quite good although there is actually too much of it. The ground pounding really becomes repetitive and sometimes feels more like a filler than anything else when I, as a reader, would like to overall story to actually advance. At the same time, sometimes, the story just jumps several years in the future making it feel like the author just could not be bothered to fill in the details.
I certainly do like statements like “Democracy asks those who know nothing about the subject matter what to do, and values their massed opinion higher than those that do know” because whether you like it or not it is true. Not that there is any better system right now though.
However, after what I have read so far I am actually wondering it the author is just gathering things to write that he thinks appeals to the social mob. In other episodes he went into crap like it being amoral to eat meat, animals are people and a lot of other vegan nonsense. Quite frankly I really considered dropping the series when I read the animals are people crap.
In another episode he went on a long rambling about the use of performance enhancing drugs and essentially, whether it was intentional or not, advocated that athletes should freely be able to use performance enhancing substances. I consider that not only a f… load of nonsense but also highly amoral.
The series also contains a lot of pseudo-science. Apart from the vegan crap the worst one is, unfortunately, a bit of a foundation for the series. In the series humans achieve a greatly increased lifespan. Theoretically the become immortal. However, this is not because of some really scientific or medical advancement but, according to the author, you can live for ever if you just keep on training a lot. What a load of bullshit!
Then we have the gender debate where he tries to appease the more fanatical part of the feminists but in other episodes, he gives the green movement a slap in the face. The author’s lecturing is really moving all over the place which is why I am wondering if he is not just fishing for cheap social points.
So you are probably wondering why I kept on reading this series. Quite frankly, so am I. I would say that it is because I like the overall story idea and I really want to know where the story goes and the conclusion. I have to say that I did “speed read” some episodes though.
This series has been difficult to let go of for me. At the same time, it is not really great. Actually it is, at times, quite bad. Perhaps I should have known from the cover of the first box set with the Star Wars wannabe text font. I guess the reason for me to stick to it would be that the overall story concept is one that appeals greatly to me. I just like these kinds of stories and I guess that I got myself suckered into this one. Once I read the first box set, I really wanted to see where it all was going and was desperately looking for good parts on the way. Make no mistake, there are some but overall there is too much nonsense for this to rate above mediocre.
The overall story is one of humanity taking to the stars, kicking quite a bit of ass on the way and generally achieving greatness. The details of the story, how this is achieved and the actual history of humanity is quite a bit of a twist in this series and overall I like it. The series is a sequence of short stories really. Having read 19 box sets I have really read 76 episodes so far. If it would not have been released as box sets, I would probably never have considered it.
The series has a lot going for it. The writing is not bad at all. The action is quite good. However, there are indeed a fair amount of weak points. I would go as far as to say that there are some parts that are nonsensical and some that are even hugely annoying. Although the latter is of course a personal opinion.
Let’s start with the good parts. As I already mentioned the basic story itself is quite too my liking. I also like that, in the early stages of the story, the Earth governments and their useless politicians get a nice ass whooping. The action is, also as I wrote, quite good although there is actually too much of it. The ground pounding really becomes repetitive and sometimes feels more like a filler than anything else when I, as a reader, would like to overall story to actually advance. At the same time, sometimes, the story just jumps several years in the future making it feel like the author just could not be bothered to fill in the details.
I certainly do like statements like “Democracy asks those who know nothing about the subject matter what to do, and values their massed opinion higher than those that do know” because whether you like it or not it is true. Not that there is any better system right now though.
However, after what I have read so far I am actually wondering it the author is just gathering things to write that he thinks appeals to the social mob. In other episodes he went into crap like it being amoral to eat meat, animals are people and a lot of other vegan nonsense. Quite frankly I really considered dropping the series when I read the animals are people crap.
In another episode he went on a long rambling about the use of performance enhancing drugs and essentially, whether it was intentional or not, advocated that athletes should freely be able to use performance enhancing substances. I consider that not only a f… load of nonsense but also highly amoral.
The series also contains a lot of pseudo-science. Apart from the vegan crap the worst one is, unfortunately, a bit of a foundation for the series. In the series humans achieve a greatly increased lifespan. Theoretically the become immortal. However, this is not because of some really scientific or medical advancement but, according to the author, you can live for ever if you just keep on training a lot. What a load of bullshit!
Then we have the gender debate where he tries to appease the more fanatical part of the feminists but in other episodes, he gives the green movement a slap in the face. The author’s lecturing is really moving all over the place which is why I am wondering if he is not just fishing for cheap social points.
So you are probably wondering why I kept on reading this series. Quite frankly, so am I. I would say that it is because I like the overall story idea and I really want to know where the story goes and the conclusion. I have to say that I did “speed read” some episodes though.
May 12, 2019
First of all, I read this in audiobook format and that materially affected my enjoyment of this book. I have re-pasted my review of the audiobook from another site below.
I also read a couple of negative reviews of the series and the author's responses, in which he attacks the character of the reviewer, and also makes it clear that the author didn't bother reading the negative review (not even comprehending the critique, let alone taking it well): https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
I'm sorely tempted to go a star lower for that disaster, but I'll refrain as I still found some enjoyable content in this book.
The basic premise is at least one I haven't heard before (space faring dinosaurs colonized earth hundreds of thousands of years ago!) This particular box set (books 1-4, which is really about 1 short novel worth pages) concentrates on (surprise) the origins of "Star Force" which is a corporate owned fighting force trying to figure out space infrastructure and warfare strategies prior to having to actually fight anyone (and before they have earth-based competition).
These books follow a team of the first trainees for Star Force, all of whom are "the best" in terms of adaptability, learning and the like.
Most of the characters are not all that memorable, but that might just be due to the audiobook disaster, so I'll probably give this one another chance (it's short anyway).
Audiobook review (2/5 stars):
"I don't know who this narrator is, but her flat, emotionless and inflectionless voice is really distracting. The voice almost sounds synthetic, except a few times when a hint of an accent comes through. The odd vocal timing is also somewhat distracting. Finally the narrator just can't pronounce words like vehemence..
This story seemed interesting, and I might try to reread it in non audiobook format. I hope the next narrator does a better job."
I also read a couple of negative reviews of the series and the author's responses, in which he attacks the character of the reviewer, and also makes it clear that the author didn't bother reading the negative review (not even comprehending the critique, let alone taking it well): https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
I'm sorely tempted to go a star lower for that disaster, but I'll refrain as I still found some enjoyable content in this book.
The basic premise is at least one I haven't heard before (space faring dinosaurs colonized earth hundreds of thousands of years ago!) This particular box set (books 1-4, which is really about 1 short novel worth pages) concentrates on (surprise) the origins of "Star Force" which is a corporate owned fighting force trying to figure out space infrastructure and warfare strategies prior to having to actually fight anyone (and before they have earth-based competition).
These books follow a team of the first trainees for Star Force, all of whom are "the best" in terms of adaptability, learning and the like.
Most of the characters are not all that memorable, but that might just be due to the audiobook disaster, so I'll probably give this one another chance (it's short anyway).
Audiobook review (2/5 stars):
"I don't know who this narrator is, but her flat, emotionless and inflectionless voice is really distracting. The voice almost sounds synthetic, except a few times when a hint of an accent comes through. The odd vocal timing is also somewhat distracting. Finally the narrator just can't pronounce words like vehemence..
This story seemed interesting, and I might try to reread it in non audiobook format. I hope the next narrator does a better job."
October 15, 2017
Initial slow burn with a high octane finish
Kind of like "Stargate" on steroids.... without the wormholes but with an inimical technologically advanced race to worry about. If you prefer that your sci-fi have a touch of plausibility, this one's for you. I'm off to binge read the next few.
Kind of like "Stargate" on steroids.... without the wormholes but with an inimical technologically advanced race to worry about. If you prefer that your sci-fi have a touch of plausibility, this one's for you. I'm off to binge read the next few.
January 27, 2019
Excellent book, reminds me of my fav parts of Enders Game
Star force is excellent, moves fast with a lighter touch. you feel the clock ticking but are not depressed about the coming hardships. this box set reminds me of my favorite parts of Enders Game. The “BattleRoom”. I wished there had been more battles and that they were longer.
looking forward to reading mor.
Star force is excellent, moves fast with a lighter touch. you feel the clock ticking but are not depressed about the coming hardships. this box set reminds me of my favorite parts of Enders Game. The “BattleRoom”. I wished there had been more battles and that they were longer.
looking forward to reading mor.
April 20, 2018
Getting started
An interesting story what blends military training, advanced tech and the human condition. I’d like to see how the following books deliver the story. What kind of conflicts arise and more of the personal angle. A pretty good read
An interesting story what blends military training, advanced tech and the human condition. I’d like to see how the following books deliver the story. What kind of conflicts arise and more of the personal angle. A pretty good read
October 27, 2018
If only this was our future
I've never heard of Mr. Jyr before but i can tell you I'm hooked. This first book will keep you up all night to finish. Great story and character development. Can't wait to find out how they all come together.
I've never heard of Mr. Jyr before but i can tell you I'm hooked. This first book will keep you up all night to finish. Great story and character development. Can't wait to find out how they all come together.
November 24, 2018
So glad I powered through
The first two books were rough and hard to get through, but I could see the potential and it paid off. The end of this book was fantastic and I can't wait to read more. I wish I had found this series sooner.
The first two books were rough and hard to get through, but I could see the potential and it paid off. The end of this book was fantastic and I can't wait to read more. I wish I had found this series sooner.
November 27, 2018
Outstanding
This novel presents a well thought out road to the future. It incorporates the drive and spirit of Heinlein’s Man who sold the moon, with the modern equivalent of passionate leaders like Musk.
I am eager to see what comes next.
This novel presents a well thought out road to the future. It incorporates the drive and spirit of Heinlein’s Man who sold the moon, with the modern equivalent of passionate leaders like Musk.
I am eager to see what comes next.
December 3, 2018
Leaving out the Science Fiction This is the way we should prepare for space Exploration and Colonization. Very well written, The Character stay within Character and are well written, The Plot is realistic and logical. A very entertaining read.
December 4, 2018
Nothing in the story gets the reader invested.
Bogs down and gets lost in training details. As for the ending. 2 or 3 nations would confiscate all SF resources and game over. Plot doesn’t work.
Bogs down and gets lost in training details. As for the ending. 2 or 3 nations would confiscate all SF resources and game over. Plot doesn’t work.
January 15, 2019
Learning Hard nocks.
Entertainingly good writing and realistic facts on the process of going to and operating in Space. The plan and the cooperation of all members of the Atlantis group made for wonderful reading and looking forward to the rest of the series.
Entertainingly good writing and realistic facts on the process of going to and operating in Space. The plan and the cooperation of all members of the Atlantis group made for wonderful reading and looking forward to the rest of the series.
June 1, 2019
New ideas
A interesting concept saying the dinosaurs were the space travelers and their slaves were the settlers, following wars and mishaps that decimated the original space travelers
A interesting concept saying the dinosaurs were the space travelers and their slaves were the settlers, following wars and mishaps that decimated the original space travelers
July 28, 2019
Just as good the 2nd time through
Just rereading the series and it is equally as enjoyable as before. Many great parts to it. If you like Star Trek, Star Wars or any space story you need to check this one out.
Just rereading the series and it is equally as enjoyable as before. Many great parts to it. If you like Star Trek, Star Wars or any space story you need to check this one out.
November 12, 2020
Build a Space empire
This is one of the best organized stories that I have read. I find the characters to be believable. I believe that anyone who enjoys military space operas will find this interesting and enjoyable. Very interesting and unusual beginning.
This is one of the best organized stories that I have read. I find the characters to be believable. I believe that anyone who enjoys military space operas will find this interesting and enjoyable. Very interesting and unusual beginning.
March 7, 2021
Well written & clean - I'm up to book set #18 now, which is book 72 in the series apparently.
November 27, 2019
This is an interesting read and something I'd give between 3 and 4 stars, if there were a half-star increment for reviews. However, I like that the author has a clear passion for his world and is building toward greater things, so I'll happily round this up to a four.
To start with the good: This is the standard premise of advanced alien technology disrupting human civilization with the added kicker that the aliens are related to dinosaurs and are at some point coming back.
Star Force is a benevolent institution that's set up to get humanity on the right course and to deal with this threat.
And the author really gets into the nitty gritty of the world. How the space ships operate, how they are loaded out, the different bits of technology from the aliens-lots and lots of details.
The real story starts when the main protagonist applies to join Star Force. He has to solve a series of puzzles to show his ingenuity and resolve to pass the hurdles to join Star Force. And once passed, the story moves onto his struggles to pass his training.
So, why isn't this a five or five plus review?
There a little issue with the development of the characters. The author really loves world building and solving puzzles/situations. The preponderance of character development revolves around the actions the characters take to move ahead in the Star Force training.
As a general trope, once someone begins in a schooling environment (whether it be for wizards, demigods, children learning to be leaders by fighting fake battles), there is generally a peer adversary and an administration level adversary. It allows different types of conflict that helps to reveal the inner nature of the characters. In this book, the conflict is only based on solving the next battle in the training. It's not to say there weren't opportunities - in the beginning, we have the protagonist given the choice - you can join Star Force with all the gadgets and adventures, but you have to leave your family, never to see them ever again. This is a perfect dilemna for the protagonist, but the opportunity is lost because the protagonist joins without a second thought. And he's not a loner. Indeed, none of the other student has any issue with abandoning their family. It's also the same with the administrators - they only notice the protagonist because he's doing well and only hard on him because he's doing well. Since there isn't any personalization with the conflict, it's really hard to get to know any of the characters - indeed, probably 50% of the dialog could be said by any of the characters without affecting anyone's personality.
There's also an issue with the aliens, where the evil that they've done to humanity is told in exposition rather than show.
So, those thoughts aside - if adventure and cool worlds are for you, then this book and series is definitely worth checking out.
To start with the good: This is the standard premise of advanced alien technology disrupting human civilization with the added kicker that the aliens are related to dinosaurs and are at some point coming back.
Star Force is a benevolent institution that's set up to get humanity on the right course and to deal with this threat.
And the author really gets into the nitty gritty of the world. How the space ships operate, how they are loaded out, the different bits of technology from the aliens-lots and lots of details.
The real story starts when the main protagonist applies to join Star Force. He has to solve a series of puzzles to show his ingenuity and resolve to pass the hurdles to join Star Force. And once passed, the story moves onto his struggles to pass his training.
So, why isn't this a five or five plus review?
There a little issue with the development of the characters. The author really loves world building and solving puzzles/situations. The preponderance of character development revolves around the actions the characters take to move ahead in the Star Force training.
As a general trope, once someone begins in a schooling environment (whether it be for wizards, demigods, children learning to be leaders by fighting fake battles), there is generally a peer adversary and an administration level adversary. It allows different types of conflict that helps to reveal the inner nature of the characters. In this book, the conflict is only based on solving the next battle in the training. It's not to say there weren't opportunities - in the beginning, we have the protagonist given the choice - you can join Star Force with all the gadgets and adventures, but you have to leave your family, never to see them ever again. This is a perfect dilemna for the protagonist, but the opportunity is lost because the protagonist joins without a second thought. And he's not a loner. Indeed, none of the other student has any issue with abandoning their family. It's also the same with the administrators - they only notice the protagonist because he's doing well and only hard on him because he's doing well. Since there isn't any personalization with the conflict, it's really hard to get to know any of the characters - indeed, probably 50% of the dialog could be said by any of the characters without affecting anyone's personality.
There's also an issue with the aliens, where the evil that they've done to humanity is told in exposition rather than show.
So, those thoughts aside - if adventure and cool worlds are for you, then this book and series is definitely worth checking out.
May 13, 2018
Slow Going
I had a hard time with this book because it was slow going. It started off with the discovery of a huge pyramid discovered under the ice of Antarctica. I got excited as they discovered that an advanced race had built this technical wonder thousands of years before and abandoned it. Afraid that this race might return and be hostile, the discoverer of the pyramid determines to be ready. He gathers 100 of the best and brightest of the young people of earth to train to fight in space. This is where the book slowed to a crawl for me. There were pages and pages of simulated battles based on video games. I found myself skipping whole pages to find anything written about th characters or the aliens or the technology found in the pyramid.
The premise is interesting enough that I will stick with the series long enough to see if the pace picks up.
I had a hard time with this book because it was slow going. It started off with the discovery of a huge pyramid discovered under the ice of Antarctica. I got excited as they discovered that an advanced race had built this technical wonder thousands of years before and abandoned it. Afraid that this race might return and be hostile, the discoverer of the pyramid determines to be ready. He gathers 100 of the best and brightest of the young people of earth to train to fight in space. This is where the book slowed to a crawl for me. There were pages and pages of simulated battles based on video games. I found myself skipping whole pages to find anything written about th characters or the aliens or the technology found in the pyramid.
The premise is interesting enough that I will stick with the series long enough to see if the pace picks up.
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