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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A stunning achievement - a tour de force of the writer's art, August 23, 1999
This review is from: A Band of Brothers (The Lost Regiment #7) (Mass Market Paperback)
_A Band of Brothers_, _The Lost Regiment # 7_, is the capstone of one of the greatest series of novels I have ever read. In spite of some problems with proof-reading, which never really got in the way, this novel, like all its predecessors, manages to combine hard science-fiction, masterful military and general history, and anthropological and sociopsychological insight in a blend that cannot fail to move even the most dedicated critic. William R. Forstchen's greatest skills lie in so accurately and insightfully portraying an entire alien culture that one cannot fail to identify with those characters that are drawn from that culture -- and thus be set up for hideous disllusionment when the darker side of that culture is revealed. He presents the alien Bantag with the skill of a master antrhropologist, revealing them in all their barbaric glory, giving us glimpses of their religious and domestic life side-by-side with their enormous military skill and powerful grasp of the principles of war, so that one can't help but sympathize with them -- and then jerks the rug out from under the reader by showing the monstrous aspects of their culture. Further, he shows the Bantag in contrast with the human beings who have come to this world by accident, bringing their own strnegths, skills, weaknesses, their culture, their hopes, dreams, and fears with them, showing the two species, human and alien, locked in a life-or-death struggle to determine which will ultimately populate and master this world -- and for all their cultural glories and tremendous physical size and strength, the aliens finally come off the losers, lacking as they do any real understanding of what human beings can do, the value of such knowledge for military purposes, and even the "soft underbelly" of humanity, the capacity for compassion even toward defeated enemies, love of others that spurs them on to supreme effort when by all rights they should fall and be defeated, and their capacity for vision and creativity by means of which they are able, even in the face of overwhelmingly superior numbers, to crate a military machine capable of utterly destroying their monstrous enemies. Couldn't put any of the novels in the series down until I had finished them. I am looking forward to new novels in which that battle-torn world is presented to us a century after the events taking place in A BAND OF BROTHERS, to see what has become of the human beings and their alien foes during that time. I would also like to see a comprehensive atlas of that world, perhaps a world globe to set on my desk. William Forstchen is a serious rival to Harry Turtledove and Harry Harrison, the mastera of alternative-history science-fiction, as well as Frank Herbert, author of DUNE, and a true heir of Murray Leinster and H. P. Lovecraft. May he live for many long, productive years more, opening countless clear windows not only on this world, but many others besides.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Forstchen does it again - almost, December 21, 1998
This review is from: A Band of Brothers (The Lost Regiment #7) (Mass Market Paperback)
Band of Brothers continues the Lost Regiment series, an intriguing blend of historical and military science fiction. The premise is fairly derivative of dozens of other SF books, especially Harry Turtledove's Videssos series. A US civil war regiment is transported to a world where humans are kept as slaves - "cattle" - to be eaten by a race of monstrous nine-feet high aliens reminiscent of Genghis Khan's Mongols. By the time Band of Brothers comes around, it is 10 years after the 51st Maine arrived, 10 years in which they have freed several human states and defeated two of the many hordes that feasted on them, all through the application of 19th century technology such as rifles and artillery. Beginning pretty much where book six left off, Republic troops are engaging in skirmishes with the Bantag Horde after narrowly escaping annihilation in book six. It is no secret to reveal Andrew Keane, the Commander of the 51st Maine and of the Republic's armies, is wounded (the book has the scene on the inside cover). The action focuses around Pat O'Donald, the gruff Irish artilleryman as he tries to hold the armies together. Most of the action takes place in Roum, in brutal city fighting which Forstchen writes quite well. His military actions are much better described than the tortuous scenes in Harold Coyles contemporary Civil War novels, and at least as good as Bernard Cornwell's Starbuck novels. But Band of Brothers, while not the weakest of the Lost Regiment series, is not the best, an honour I reserve for numbers three and four, Terrible Swift Sword and Fateful Lightning. Forstchen's narrative sometimes gets bogged down in descriptions of battle which are all too similar, a problem with a series like this. The technology once again takes small leaps forward in the book, one of the best parts of this series. You keep asking yourself, "what if the civil war kept going?", "What if technology leaps were injected, such as the Horde's harnessing of powered flight". But for novels which rely so much on descriptions of logistics, the lack of a map is not only annoying, but a serious omission. Forstchen should rectify this as soon as possible, even by posting one on the Net, so fans can properly appreciate his vision. In all, a good read, I stayed up till 3am to finish it.
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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Seven books, an epic!, December 1, 1999
This review is from: A Band of Brothers (The Lost Regiment #7) (Mass Market Paperback)
An epic, that is all I can call it. While waiting for #8 Men of War, I sat down and re-read all seven books and believe now more than ever that these are some of the finest books I have ever read. I have a library of over one thousand books in my home, and The Lost Resiment stands high as the best I have read. Never has a book or series of books so moved me as an American and a student of American history. You can feel the power and the pain of their struggle as these fine men fight against overwhelming odds for one simple reason - to live free. The most important factor of the stories is that the heroes are people just like you and me. Just like any hero, a moment before they were a hero they were plain old folks, just another person. You can connect with the people in the story because of that, you feel for them, you feel their joy and pain, when they laugh, you laugh, and when they cry you cry with them. When one of them quotes "We few we happy few, we band of brothers" tears will well up into your eyes, because you feel the brotherhood he speaks of. I am now going to sit down and read "Gates of Fire" by Steven Pressfield, which was recommended to me by William R. Forstchen. 'Nuff said!
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