Review: Relentless
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 09 7, 2010
Relentless is the 5th of a series of six books by Jack Campbell that collectively tell the story of Captain John Geary and his command of the space fleet which belongs to an Alliance of worlds occupied by humans.  The  books in series order are: 1) The Lost Fleet: Dauntless, 2) The Lost Fleet: Fearless, 3) The Lost Fleet: Courageous, 4) The Lost Fleet: Valiant, 5) The Lost Fleet: Restless, and 6) The Lost Fleet: Victorious.The Alliance has been in a state of war for 100 years with another group of human worlds called the Syndicated Worlds, or Syndics for short.  John Geary was thought to have been killed in the early opening attacks of that war.  In reality, he escaped certain doom in a survival pod launched from his Heavy Cruiser.  He was placed in a state of hibernation, with the expectation that he would be picked up in a few weeks, but something went wrong.  The emergency beacon on his pod failed, and he drifted until he was accidentally found 100 years later by another Alliance Battle Cruiser.He was revived and found himself thrust into command of the entire Alliance Fleet (which was lost deep behind enemy lines) and expected to miraculously get the Fleet home safely and to put and end to the war once and for all, and he was to do this against the overwhelming forces of the Syndicate Worlds.Compounding his problems is the fact that he must deal with a group of rebellious officers among his own crew, a love relationship that can not be acknowledged, politicians at home who want to arrest him when he gets there for a crime he has not committed and for which there is no evidence to suggest that he ever thought of committing it.  And if that were not enough, he also has to deal with an unknown enemy with unknown technological capabilities that is known to exist just beyond the border that marks the extreme edge of Syndic space.If you like SciFi that's filled with space battles based on reasonably thought out tactical plans and strategies, this series may be for you.  It is much closer to reality than the Lensman series, though I will not say that is a better or worse story line.  That is for the reader to decide.