Review: Five Stars all the way!
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 11 1, 2013
Slaver Wars: First Strike picks up the action some 200+ years after the events from its predecessor in the series, Fleet Academy. With the technology on the crashed ship and with help from the survivors of the original Human Federation, Earth has been preparing to fight the Hocklyn Slaver Empire for over two centuries..Now the enemy has found that not all humans were exterminated the first time round and they're keen on a rematch.That's the background of First Strike and without giving the plot away, the battling humans decide to take the fight  in to enemy space to buy time complete their defences.So how did the story read?Absolutely first class! It's a difficult thing to write a story where the reader has to keep track of multiple invasions, space battles, strikes and counter strikes all going on at the same time. Weil manages to pull this off and does so cleanly, clearly and in an exciting fashion. The plan the humans are running too is also impressive - it makes complete sense logistically, militarily and politically. I found this of aspect of the book particularly good as even the best space operas often don't make operational sense - here the action and strategy is well plotted, makes complete sense and therefore makes following the multiple strands of action easy.So what did I especially like? The space battles and strategy of course, but also the skilful way further backstory is introduced - Earth has been out collecting allies for the last two hundred years and no doubt we'll be seeing those allies in future books. Other good points were a return to a more adult, less juvenile writing style - Alien Contact was pure `adult' writing, whereas the four bridging Moon wreck Novellas were more distinctly juvenile. Now the authors seem to have decided on their target audience the story readers better accordingly. It was also good to see the return of Admiral Streth and his friends - some characters in some books just catch the imagination. Streth is one of them.Things I didn't like? The occasional dip in to juvenile angst and the way the Katie character plays so blithely with the AI systems of the ships she is on. I'd have her brigged or maybe brigged and spaced on the first occasion she mucked around she fiddled with the ships AI. Then there's the not sharing of all her results with other fleet officers and ships when things do work.But all this is small potatoes to what is a good solid and most importantly, highly enjoyable piece of Space Opera/Military SF writing. I can't wait to see what happens to the humans when they at last come up against an AI fleet, and I'll definitely be finding out. Mr Weil, well writing and I'll be buying the next one. Five stars.