The Silent War : The Asteroid Wars III

The Grand Tour: Asteroid Wars #3

by Ben Bova

The story of the men and women who risk everything to mine the riches of the asteroids began in "The Precipice" and continued in "The Rock Rats". It comes to its climax in "The Silent War". Martin Humphries, wealthy, ruthless and obsessed, has exiled his rival Lars Fuchs to the depths of space and taken Fuchs' wife, Amanda Cunningham, for his own. Now he rules space exploration almost unchallenged. But for Humphries, nothing short of total domination will ever be enough. He wants a son - Amanda's son. He wants Fuchs to die. He wants to control the Moon. And if the free space prospectors of the asteroid Ceres stand in his way, he promises to destroy them. But another power is building its strength in secret, waiting for a chance to seize the Humphries empire.

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Audiobook, Science Fiction Fantasy, Space Opera, Hard Science Fiction, Speculative Fiction

Paperback

First published May 1, 2004

About the author

Ben Bova was born on November 8, 1932 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In 1953, while attending Temple University, he married Rosa Cucinotta, they had a son and a daughter. He would later divorce Rosa in 1974. In that same year he married Barbara Berson Rose.

Bova was an avid fencer and organized Avco Everett's fencing club. He was an environmentalist, but rejected Luddism.

Bova was a technical writer for Project Vanguard and later for Avco Everett in the 1960s when they did research in lasers and fluid dynamics. It was there that he met Arthur R. Kantrowitz later of the Foresight Institute.

In 1971 he became editor of Analog Science Fiction after John W. Campbell's death. After leaving Analog, he went on to edit Omni during 1978-1982.

In 1974 he wrote the screenplay for an episode of the children's science fiction television series Land of the Lost entitled "The Search".

Bova was the science advisor for the failed television series The Starlost, leaving in disgust after the airing of the first episode. His novel The Starcrossed was loosely based on his experiences and featured a thinly veiled characterization of his friend and colleague Harlan Ellison. He dedicated the novel to "Cordwainer Bird", the pen name Harlan Ellison uses when he does not want to be associated with a television or film project.

Bova was the President Emeritus of the National Space Society and a past President of Science-fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA).

Bova went back to school in the 1980s, earning an M.A. in communications in 1987 and a Ph.D. in 1996.

Bova has drawn on these meetings and experiences to create fact and fiction writings rich with references to spaceflight, lasers, artificial hearts, nanotechnology, environmentalism, fencing and martial arts, photography and artists.

Bova was the author of over a hundred and fifteen books, non-fiction as well as science fiction. In 2000, he was the Author Guest of Honor at the 58th World Science Fiction Convention (Chicon 2000).

Hollywood has started to take an interest in Bova's works once again, in addition to his wealth of knowledge about science and what the future may look like. In 2007, he was hired as a consultant by both Stuber/Parent Productions to provide insight into what the world is to look like in the near future for their upcoming film "Repossession Mambo" (released as "Repo Men") starring Jude Law and Forest Whitaker and by Silver Pictures in which he provided consulting services on the feature adaptation of Richard Morgan's "Altered Carbon".

http://us.macmillan.com/author/benbova

Reviews

[Chris Jackson · Rating 2 out of 5]

Rather disappointing in the characterization department, and the story seems to be stilted. Bova writes clean, crisp, hard SF, but when the characters aren't right, that's not enough. A lot of incoherent thought and action. I also find it difficult to buy that a raving maniac could ever reach the position of CEO of the biggest corporation and, and richest man in the solar system.

One thing he nailed, however, is the idea that if and when corporations reach an environment (the asteroid belt, in this instance)that they can exploit without any governmental intervention, disaster will be, and has been in the past, the inevitable result. I don't really see the CEOs of big corporations making decisions that will make or break the corporations based on personal desires really working, however. That's what boards of directors are for. They also, if they have any savvy at all, do not hire drug-addicted, psychotic, mass murderers as their heads of their quasi-military space fleets.

Sorry, Ben, but you lost me...

[Christian · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Silent War by Ben Bova is the final book in the Asteroid Wars series, following The Precipice and The Rock Rats. This book is action-packed, with the novel chronicling the Second Asteroid War between Humphries Space Systems and Astro Corporation. However, the book actually dedicates little time on the actual battles of the war, instead mentioning it multiple times and occasionally showing a battle between ships. I was disappointed by this, but there was still plenty of other action to go around, much of it involving Pancho Lane, Lars Fuchs, and Dorik Harbin. I won't spoil anything, but the two large action sequences towards the end of the book were VERY intense and kept the pages turning. The book's prologue, while intriguing, also requires a follow-up epilogue that doesn't make sense. The prologue should have been more directly tied to the events of the novel, as should the epilogue. Bova also continues to struggle with romance, for in my entire time reading the Asteroid Wars series I never truly believed that Fuchs loved Amanda Cunningham or that Humphries did either. Fuchs' feelings towards Amanda by this book finally become somewhat believable, but I honestly never REALLY felt that there was any sort of love from Humphries to Amanda. Bova also seems to struggle slightly with including out-of-date themes in this book, such as the somewhat macho sexism, mainly in The Rock Rats. The pet names, such as "darling" and "dearest", also seemed out of place and annoying. All in all, The Silent War, like many of Bova's other books, offers a wild, if flawed ride, but doesn't ever really appeal to be read a second time. For those of you who have read the first three books in the Asteroid Wars series and are considering Book 4, The Aftermath, my advice is don't. While I haven't read The Aftermath personally, I have read of the plot, which doesn't involve any of the best characters from the first three books and just seems like something tacked on last minute. Finishing The Silent War is a good way to wrap up the other two books of the series. All in all, Bova is a decent but flawed writer, and I recommend this and other books for one-time adventures.

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was the best of the first three books. Ben Bova moves the plot quickly, making the action exciting and knuckle-biting. One of the things I loved was the technical detail Ben Bova gives to the science of space and physics. His space battles aren't like Star Wars. There's no sound in space. I also liked how the author developed the political personalities of his characters. Each major character in the story has a strong political view of the World. The author defines each character's views and keeps them consistent throughout the books.

[AndrewP · Rating 3 out of 5]

Book three in the Asteroid Wars sub series and tenth overall in the Grand Tour series.

Following on from the events told in The Rock Rats, the two mega corporations continue vying for control of the asteroid belts resources. Because the corporations control a lot of the media, little information about the escalating violence gets out to the general population, hence the title The Silent War. Things really get out of hand at the end and flew through the last 100 pages in one sitting. Exciting stuff.

I enjoyed this one a little more than the previous one. It had most of the same characters, so less back story. Some action, but at times a bit predictable knowing that this mini series had another book to go. There were a couple of references to something I have not read yet, so now I need to go back and read Jupiter before the last book in this sequence 'The Aftermath'.

3.5 stars overall.

[Daniel Kukwa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I nearly knocked it down to three stars, as the on-going war combined with multiple plot lines to drive me to distraction in this novel's middle section. Luckily, the emotional stakes were considerably raised in the third act, and Martin Humphries remains one of the most deliciously vile & despicable characters in science fiction. This is as grand & expansive as space opera gets.

[Andy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty much continues from where The Rock Rats left off....the characters that Bova developed so well in the first two asteroid war books continue to battle for the riches of the asteroid belt, as well as resolve their personality differences in various ways. Humphries, Astro Corporation, and Yamagata Corporation fall into a deadly battle for control of this vast area of treasures. Bova ends this one with mention of an alien artifact which casts an air of morality over the entire story. Another good read in the Grand Tour.

[Tim · Rating 3 out of 5]

I hadn't read any Ben Bova previously and this was maybe not the best place to begin. This was the third of a trilogy 'The Asteroid Wars' and part of a much bigger 'grand tour' series and was concerned with a war over raw materials in the asteroid belt in the future. I don't read much pure space opera but will read more Bova in the future, I shall read the first two in the trilogy at some point.

[Crusader · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good read. Much more action packed than the first couple of novels in the series. The ending is a bit disappointing, leaving quite a few questions to be answered. However since there is now a fourth book in the series I think some of those will be addressed there.

[Sean Crandall · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'd probably give this more of a two and half stars rating - the beginning and end of this book were odd and even awkward to the story in this book and the series as a whole. The rest of the book was decent, but I wish some things were resolved. I felt disappointed after finishing this book.

[JP · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Silent War feels like a conclusion to the Asteroid Wars (The Precipice and The Rock Rats), with the war continuing to escalate to father and father atrocities with even more sides to the conflict than before (Yamagata is back! If a bit weirdly.). It's a bit strange to see what feels like such a conclusion with one book left, but I guess that's why it's called The Aftermath? We'll just have to see.

Overall, The Silent War is a satisfying enough conclusion to the Asteroid Wars (as a war and as a subseries) building up both the overall conflict and one within the book itself. It's nice to actually see everything come to a head and I think the conclusion is workable, if a little ridiculous. It really feeds into the idea that behind every powerful corporation is a handful (or one) of powerful men and women really driving things forward.

Nothing really more to say. I still really like Pancho Lane and can't really stand Lars Fuchs or Humphries. That's pretty much all intended. The series as a whole could have probably been a single book, but so it goes. Worth reading for completeness' sake. I still prefer the more science driven / less corporate of the Grand Tour books. So it goes.

On a final note... what's with that prologue and epilogue? They're interesting enough and hint at something completely different than anything else we've seen in the Grand Tour thus far... but why here? I expect/hope we'll see why in The Aftermath, but it's just weird.

[Durval Menezes · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's not easy to rate this book.

On the positive side, the story's main body is an action-packed, fast-reading space opera, if a little naive; in other words, the standard Bova fare we've all come to love. Its conclusion is a little disappointing, but not too bad. For this main body, it would be tempting to rate it 4-stars.

On the negative side, Bova 'sandwiches' that main body between two weird chapters that have almost nothing to do with the rest, nor with anything else in the Asteroid Wars or in the Grand Tour 'arches' so far.

To make it worse, the first of these weird chapters (which is the first chapter of the entire book) contains a stupid spoiler for one of the main events in the main story (!). This was so strange that I thought the edition I was reading was somehow mangled; I investigated it by checking other editions and it seemed not to be the case, so I read on. Now, after reading the entire book, I think it was some kind of 'esthetic' or 'stylistic' decision the author decided to take; for this, I would rate this book 1-star, as it was really distracting and unnecessary.

So, I'm rating this book as the average of 4 and 1, which would be 2.5, and rounding it up to 3 as a concession to the rest of Bova's great works.

PS: perhaps these two chapters are in some way a "preparation" for something that will come later in the Grand Tour 'arch' (perhaps even in the next book, which is listed here in Goodreads as the last one in the Asteroid Wars 'subarch'), and therefore not really unnecessary. If I find this is indeed the case, I will come back to revise this review, and my rating.

EDIT: now that I've read the next book in the series ("The Aftermath"), I can see some sense in these two chapters: they basically serve as the jumping board from which that next book starts (see my review). But still, they do nothing for this book (and the stupid spoiler I mentioned is still totally unnecessary), which is why I keep its rating at 2.5 rounded up to 3.

[Kevin Phyland · Rating 4 out of 5]

With the creation of the nanotech gobblers - micromachines which could reduce asteroidal rock to its component minerals or even atoms - the battle for monopoly control of the resources of the Asteroid Belt heats up. Astro Corporation led by Pancho Lane and Martin Humphries of Humphries Space Systems have engaged in a tit-for-tat running skirmish which has escalated into all out war. Unbeknownst to both antagonists the powerful Yamagata family has instigated it all and are smugly sitting back waiting to pounce on the leavings once the two are destroyed. However, the wildcard is the exiled rockrat Fuchs, whose wife was taken by Humphries to humiliate him and who is driven almost to madness with his desire to kill Humphries. Ben Bova has tied up most of the loose ends in this, the third and final book of The Asteroid Wars set in the midst of his much larger Grand Tour series, and it is a satisfying and logical conclusion. There is just one niggle however, and that is the fate of a small character that supplies a major plot point. Hopefully this is sorted in a later book. This is a page-turner and one you will enjoy. Watch for an alien artifact…

[Mike Pollack · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good end to the trilogy, I agree with another reviewer who said it was probably the best of the three... definitely better than the second. I will certainly look to read more books by Bova. However I also agree with another reviewer who said that the maniacal behavior from Humphries makes it a bit unbelievable that he would have been a successful CEO. I am sure there are many CEOs and leaders who are grossly egotistical but some of Humphries ravings, obsessions and actions were a bit far fetched.

[Tommi Mannila · Rating 2 out of 5]

Hyvin pitkälti samat ongelmat jatkuvat tässä kuin sarjan aiemmissakin osissa. Tyhmät, itseriittoiset, suuryritysten johtajat leikkivät käytännössä muulla maailmalla ilman minkäänlaisia seuraamuksia pelkästään omista, varsin naiiveista, mielijohteista. Sinänsä ajatus asteroidivyöhykeen louhiminen, siihen liittyvä bisnes ja politiikka on hyvä ja valitettavan vähän hyödynnetty lähtökohta scifi-tarinoille, mutta tässä se ei vaan ns "lennä", Expanse tekee tämän paljon paremmin.

Vaikka Ben Bovalla on laadukkaita ja ehdottomasti suositeltavia kirjoja, tämä sarja ei kuulu niihin.

[Albert_Camus_lives]

When corporations go to war, standard business practice goes out the window. Astro Corporation is led by indomitable Texan Pancho Lane, Humphries Space Systems by the rich and ruthless Martin Humphries, and their fight is over nothing less than resources of the Asteroid Belt itself. As fighting escalates, the lines between commerce and politics, boardroom and bedroom, blur--and the keys to victory will include physics, nanotechnology, and cold hard cash.

[Kevin Black · Rating 4 out of 5]

Remarkable book. It helps greatly to have read the 2-3 books that introduce the main characters. The book animates the people, conditions and factors that lead gradually but inexorably to a war. The characters are bigger than life but quite believable.

[Timothy Miller · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't like the wrap up. It was like another book started.
The first in the series was the best.

[Tom Rowe · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wars in the asteroids. It is bad stuff.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

Duration: 12:49:56

[Whizilliam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really good story and really good sci-fi, but it is slow sometimes because there are 4 or 5 POVs that all compete for page time. Overall really good though.

[Guido]

Why you might like it: Continued Belt politics. Rubric match: not yet scored. Uses your engineering/rigor/first-contact/world-building rubric. Tags: economics, conflict

[Derek · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ben Bova knows how to create some interesting characters and stories. In particular, I liked how many of the characters would develop and change over the course of these books (this is the third book in the Asteroid Wars series). Lars, Amanda, Pancho, Big George and others take interesting but believable turns throughout the story.

Another strong point of this book was its portrayal of the "fog of war". In the final 1/3 of the book, everyone's plans begin breaking down and it seems like absolutely NOTHING turns out as expected. That alone kept me up until l2:00 one night finishing it!

So why only 3 stars and not 4 or 5. In short, it was the ending. The war ended way too abruptly. (I think there is another half to this book sitting as a manuscript somewhere.) Also, what's up with the alien artifact that begins and ends the book? Is it the lead-in to another story somewhere?

I liked this book (and the entire series) but you can't just end it like that. I feel like I was on a (fusion) rocket headed for Mars and, for whatever reason, it dropped me off on the moon!

[Dark-Draco · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's been a while since I read the first two books in the series, so it took me a while to get back into the swing of things.Lars Fuchs is still acting the pirate out in the asteroid belt, punishing Humphries business because he stole his wife. But Humphries has other things on his mind - he wants another son and he wants Amanda to give it to him. She in turn plots her own revenge. Meanwhile Pancho Lane chaffs at being the CEO of Astro Corporation, but when an assination attempt nearly works, she only has Humphries to blame. Soon, both Corporations are at war, blaming each other for losses of life and money, unaware that a third party is pulling all the strings.

Like the other books, this jumps around quite a lot and whereas the short chapters add urgency to the later action packed storylines, they are a bit annoying at the slower beginning of the book. I'm not sure that I get the very beginning and ending of the book - maybe that will all come clear in the final installment of the series.

[Devon · Rating 1 out of 5]

Silent War is a repeat of Rock Rats (book #2 in trilogy). All the same characters fighting over all the same things. The battles and settings have a fresh coat of paint, but Bova has already told this story before. The only difference is the relative LACK of character development compared to the previous book. The action picks up in the second half of this book as it did in Rock Rats, but it's not enough to drag this book up to two stars.

On top of that there are the usual issues that keep Bova books stuck in the 1 or 2-star category:
-- Viewpoint is sloppy
-- Too many unimportant characters, each with a corny half-page biography
-- Too much telling, not enough showing
-- Too many morons
-- Main characters are shallow, difficult to sympathize with them
-- Frequent bad science & contradictions
-- Frequent gaping holes of logic
-- Too much melodrama

[Chris Dietzel · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was the first Space Opera I've ever read and also the first Ben Bova book. There was a lot to like and also a lot that left me scratching my head. On the downside, the characters were extremely two-dimensional and the writing relied heavily on devices that are typically frowned upon (i.e., constant use of adverbs and varying speech tags). But on the upside, the pace was nonstop and the author did an excellent job of managing a huge cast of characters. For me, the book's biggest strength was how well it incorporated the idea of two of the world's wealthiest people going to war against each other. I could easily see one of Cornelius Vanderbilt's famous historical feud's being placed into outer space and having it carried out there.

[George · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another, and third book, in the Rock Rats series--this one covers corporate war in the asteroid zone. Corporations at war? Hmm, now that's a concept. There's good strategy in this book and just enough fighting to make it fun; too much more and it would be as exciting as reading US revolutionary war stores about battles in the counties of New Jersey (Yawn!). The book is chock full of really bad guys--our heroine tries like mad to kill them off. The crescendo at the end is followed by a bland war's end, which isn't an unrealistic one...just unexciting. On to the next Bova book.

[Doc Kinne · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the few times I can say that I couldn't put this book down from 55% onward. Bova's pace built up to a breakneck speed as several things came together. Really nice.

The ending seems tailor made for some sort of next book, and now, of course, we know there is one.

The Asteroid Wars is Space Opera at its best. Read it.

[Gene Sheppard · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is typical Bova and a good read with exceptional characters and world building. The future world he creates is believable and your disbelief is easily suspended.

I still have heartburn over Bova lending credence to _climate change_ all four of the Asteroid War novels.
I recommend all of the Asteroid War novels.

[Anthony · Rating 3 out of 5]

An enjoyable sci-fci read. The concepts, cities on the moon, greenhouse disaster on Earth and corporations excerting insane amounts of influence, were very cool and timely.

I would have given it a higher rating if the ending wasn't a bit lame.

[Rowan Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting...sideways step...into a new plot-line and unexpected stuffs. Still some loose ends that need tieing up, I hope he hasn't forgotten. Really really quick read, I think this book has been much shorter than the others.