Review: The Wandering Engineer books by Chris Hechtl 5/10
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 02 20, 2013
Almost completely lacking in development for plot, character, world building or tension the first three books of the planned 9 book series New Dawn, Fools Gold and Destiny's Choice can be a chore to read.Particularly annoying is the lack of exploration of anybody but the Admiral himself with a tiny bit reserved for his AI assistants. For everybody else in the universe friend or foe . . . well they do stuff and at the end we might get a line or two that kind of talks why they did it.Long and rambling with sudden POV and scene changes and the few lonely chapter breaks seemingly thrown in at random these massive books (two are 350 pages long and the other nearly 900) chronicle the adventures of Fleet Admiral (Engineering) John Henry Irons a man who has slept for over 700 hundred years as his civilisation fell as he works to rebuild the golden age of the Federation in a galaxy reduced almost to barbarism.The technology is a mishmash lifted from Star Trek, Andromeda, Honor Harrington and half a dozen other franchises.Where most stories try to be plot or character driven the Wandering Engineer books so far have been technobabble driven, with the vast majority of the novels filled with descriptions of repair and manufacturing the second book had a space battle that lasted a good ten pages which was a nice break.And I kind of like it, its neat to read about the massive engineering obstacles taken on and over come. I generally enjoy books that focus a little on construction and logistics and Chris Hechtl's stuff here is no exception, despite the many many problems these books were still an entertaining read. The third book is my least favourite so far without all the engineering and repair work to prop the stories up they really don't have a lot left.