It's Sunday. Let's Talk BOOKS 📚

Some of my favorite books over the years which have been read and re-read will be the focus of this series, as long as it lasts. I’ll cover a different genre and at least two books in that genre in each edition.

Genre — MilSpec or Military Speculative Fiction

When I first gave a few books that were labeled as MilSpec a read, I thought I’d be getting something like The Thin Red Line with spaceships, and to a certain extent, I did. 

In these stories there are people who are either in some kind of military service (Planetary Corp or Space Marines) or used to Serve and now act as Mercenaries or private security for a ship or fleet or an interstellar armada. 

I also wondered if the storylines would be full to the brim with battle scenes. Let me be perfectly honest, one of the first recent MilSpec series I tried out started out like this and kept on like that for about 30 books, before the author had some sort of epiphany, and stopped it.   

Here’s my review of the 3rd wave of his long running series, the author is Ryk Brown and the series is The Frontier Saga https://frontierssaga.com/

This is book 1 in the 3rd set of novels in this series: Aurora EV-1 

This is the review I left on Amazon after reading this book: 

I’ve read the entire Frontier Saga series. What I’ve always wanted, Ryk Brown finally gave me… 

I've read all of Part 1 and Part 2 of the Frontier Saga stories starring Nathan Scott and the starship Aurora. A lifelong lover of science fiction, in particular I enjoy tales of what awaits the human species after we depart Mother Earth. Which is exactly what the Frontier Saga stories are all about. Great characters you come to care about. Interesting story arcs within each of the two major story arcs  comprising Parts 1 & 2 of the Frontier Saga, outside of the main storyline all of the combined novels follow. Entertaining dialogue. But in Parts 1 & 2 there is an awful lot of moment by moment descriptions of the MANY battles the ship Aurora and her crew are involved in. I mean, you can only read how many times the quad rail guns fire and blow up another ship’s emitters and take down it's shields before it all becomes a bit blurry. Thank the gods the story line and characters kept my head from catching fire! But with the first book in this 3rd series? 

Ryk kept all of the interesting characters, the amazing science, the nearly sentient AI-run starships but he reduced the battle scene action and most of all, the descriptions of it. So after 30 entries in the ongoing story of Nathan Scott and the crew of the newest version of the Aurora, I'm ready for the next 14, and as excited as ever to learn about what is next for all of them! THANK YOU, Ryk Brown, for writing these stories and sharing them with all of us.

An old school MilSpec author many of you might know, David Weber, has a new series out recently with two books aready out and #3 set to publish in Jan 2024. 

Out of the Dark is book one, and here is Weber’s blurb:

Earth is conquered. The Shongairi have arrived in force, and humanity’s cities lie in radioactive ruins. In mere minutes, over half the human race has died.

Now Master Sergeant Stephen Buchevsky, who thought he was being rotated home from his latest tour in Afghanistan, finds himself instead prowling the back country of the Balkans, dodging alien patrols and trying to organize the scattered survivors without getting killed.

His chances look bleak. The aliens have definitely underestimated human tenacity—but no amount of heroism can endlessly hold off overwhelming force.

Then, emerging from the mountains and forests of Eastern Europe, new allies present themselves to the ragtag human resistance. Predators, creatures of the night, human in form but inhumanly strong. Long Enemies of humanity…until now. Because now is the time to defend Earth.

Weber wrote one of my all time favorite MilSpec series; Honor Harrington, which begins with On Basilisk Station https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00ARPJBS0

The blurb from Amazon:

INTRODUCING HONOR HARRINGTON Having made him look a fool, she's been exiled to Basilisk Station in disgrace and set up for ruin by a superior who hates her. Her demoralized crew blames her for their ship's humiliating posting to an out-of-the-way picket station. The aborigines of the system's only habitable planet are smoking homicide-inducing hallucinogens. Parliament isn't sure it wants to keep the place; the major local industry is smuggling; the merchant cartels want her head; the star-conquering, so-called "Republic" of Haven is Up To Something; and Honor Harrington has a single, over-age light cruiser with an armament that doesn't work to police the entire star system. But the people out to get her have made one mistake. They've made her mad.

The ultimate in MilSpec may be the story which won John Scalzi a Hugo, Red Shirts . Scalzi also turned out The Old Man’s War series, which is also MilSpec.   https://whatever.scalzi.com/about/books-by-john-scalzi/

Red Shirts https://www.amazon.com/Redshirts-Novel-Three-Codas-Winner-ebook/dp/B0079XPUOW

The Amazon blurb

Ensign Andrew Dahl has just been assigned to the Universal Union Capital Ship Intrepid, flagship of the Universal Union since the year 2456. It’s a prestige posting, with the chance to serve on "Away Missions" alongside the starship’s famous senior officers.

Life couldn’t be better…until Andrew begins to realize that (1) every Away Mission involves a lethal confrontation with alien forces, (2) the ship’s senior officers always survive these confrontations, and (3) sadly, at least one low-ranking crew member is invariably killed. Unsurprisingly, the savvier crew members belowdecks avoid Away Missions at all costs. Then Andrew stumbles on information that transforms his and his colleagues’ understanding of what the starship Intrepid really is…and offers them a crazy, high-risk chance to save their own lives.

But there is one author out there who has been pumping out MilSpec stories as co-author with a cast of other writers. J. N. Chaney https://jnchaney.com/

The first MilSpec of Chaney and co-author Terry Maggert https://terrymaggert.com/ that I read were the first few novels in the Backyard Starship series. It all starts with 

Backyard Starship https://jnchaney.com/books/backyard-starship-book-1-backyard-starship/

Chaney’s blurb: 

When Van Tudor returns to his childhood home, he inherits more than the family farm.

His grandfather used to tell him fantastic stories of spacemen and monsters, princesses and galactic knights. Little did Van realize, the old man’s tales were more than fiction. They were real.

Hidden beneath the old barn, Van’s legacy is waiting: a starship, not of this world.

With his combat AI, an android bird named Perry, Van takes his first steps into the wider galaxy. He soon finds that space is far busier and more dangerous than he could have ever conceived.

Destiny is calling. His grandfather’s legacy awaits.

Van and his collected crew whom he acquires one adventure at a time, become part of a galaxy spanning organization known as The Guild, which is a defacto interstellar law enforcement organization. Van rises in the ranks as time goes on, and he and his excellent friends pursue Justice wherever their latest case takes them. 

Then I went to another Chaney co-authored series, The Ruins of the Earth https://jnchaney.com/books/ruins-of-the-earth-series-book-1-ruins-of-the-earth/https://www.christopherhopper.com/books

My review of The Ruins of the Earth by J N Chaney and Christopher Hopper on Amazon 

RUINS OF THE EARTH BOOK 1: RUINS OF THE EARTH An ancient secret buried in the Antarctic. A puzzle unsolved for ten thousand years.

And a Brooklyn-born Master Gunnery Sergeant who’s royally pissed that he has to babysit the researchers sent to figure it all out.

Patrick “Wic” Finnegan’s last op as a MARSOC Marine before retirement sends him to the frozen Ellsworth Subglacial Highlands. The only reason he’s here?

He owes a favor for an old friend–but that doesn’t mean he has to like it.

When Wic finally sees what the team has uncovered, he can’t believe his eyes, nor is he prepared for the violence to come.

Soon, the portal opens and unleashes a storm of unbridled fury upon humanity.

From the Antarctic tundra to the streets of Manhattan, Wic and his team will be pushed to their limits as they fight to hold back Earth’s ultimate threat.

The odds are against them. Governments are falling. And the Earth has fallen into ruin.

Can you tell I really, really love this genre of storytelling? 

I’ve fallen in love with these stories because, in the end, the authors make their characters come to life on the page. And in the end, that is what every great storyteller has, the ability to not just write words, but to paint a picture of a person who captivates your imagination. 

MilSpec authors you may enjoy: 

Ryk Brown https://frontierssaga.com/episodes/ J N Chaney https://jnchaney.com/ Christopher Hopper https://www.christopherhopper.com/books Terry Maggert https://terrymaggert.com/the-books/ David Weber https://www.davidweber.net/books John Scalzi https://whatever.scalzi.com/about/books-by-john-scalzi/