Review: See the universe, fly a meteor right into Earth
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 12 14, 2013
In the fifth novel in the Doom Star series, space marine and overall badass Marten Kluge is again risking his life for freedom. Only this time, author Vaughn Heppner has his emissary of good old American values squaring off even harder against his conscience. Kluge has a wife now whom he rescued from certain death at the hands of the nasty cyborgs. He's got a meteor ship this time and the tacit approval of the leftover Jovian empire. But as in all Heppner's stories, any organized government appears rotten from either too much self-importance or disastrous dependence on its own short-sighted rhetoric. As a result, Kluge gets it from all sides. He can't rely on Social Unity, which has devolved into under an uneasy dictatorship under Supreme Leader Hawthorne. Nor can he trust the Highborn, who squirm under the thumb of Cassius, the strongest and smartest of them and who got them to fight against their pre-men masters. Somehow all the sides form a temporary truce to try and obliterate the artificial meteor shower headed to smash Earth. This is near impossible as the cyborg meta mind has calculated every possible threat and come up with a way to disable it either through sheer power, number of military defenses or cunning. Heppner gives all his characters something to like, however. I don't know if it's that fighting spirit or just a taste of humanity. Whatever that little something is, his characters resonate with the reader. Some I hate but understand. Others like Kluge and his crew, I respect and wish beyond all measure to succeed. This fast-paced action novel will pummel your mind like no other in the series. But you will lose some favorite characters along the way.