Burden of Proof (JAG in Space, Book 2) [Mass Market Paperback]

John G. Hemry (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 24, 2004

After a suspicious explosion on board the galactic space cruiser USS Michaelson costs an officer his life, the ship's legal counsel, Lieutenant Sinclair, risks everything to expose a cover-up--and prosecute the son of a powerful vice-admiral.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Paul Sinclair and the good ship USS Michaelson are back in another absorbing and credible novel of space navies and justice. Shortly after the Michaelson's captain is changed and a Lieutenant Silver reports aboard, an engineering accident kills a chief petty officer and does major damage. Suspicion falls on Silver's happy-go-sloppy ways, but there is little proof, and he is the son of a vice-admiral. Moreover, Captain Kay Shen, father of Silver's lover, Jen Shen, conducts the initial investigation that exonerates Silver, and he is fiercely protective of his daughter. Sinclair is walking through a personal and professional minefield as he tries to assemble a trail of evidence sufficient to bring Silver before a court-martial. Fortunately, he enlists enough capable allies to ultimately obtain justice. Hemry's series continues to offer outstanding suspense, realism, and characterization, and this book, no less than its predecessor, A Just Determination [BKL Ap 15 03], only ratchets up readers' appetites for more. First-rate military sf. Roland Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Ace (February 24, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0441011470
• ISBN-13: 978-0441011476
• Product Dimensions: 6.5 x 4.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #883,187 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Shaping up to be a great series, September 6, 2004

By 

John S. Ryan "Scott Ryan" (Cuyahoga Falls, OH) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Burden of Proof (JAG in Space, Book 2) (Mass Market Paperback)

I devoured this book and its predecessor (_A Just Determination_) in one weekend. They're both excellent.

As I said in my review of the earlier book, John G. Hemry may not have personally invented the genre 'military-SF legal drama', but there can't be too many examples of it out there. And reading these two superbly crafted novels will show you why: if you pay attention to the details, you'll see a lot of expertise lurking unobtrusively in the background. There can't be all that many authors who can write with confidence about the US Navy, the physics of space travel and spaceships, _and_ military law -- let alone keep all that stuff in the background while competently _telling an interesting story_ that doesn't bog down into technical exposition.

I'm not going to tell you a great deal about that story itself, and as with the earlier book, I strongly advise you _not_ to read the cover blurb and other book information if you haven't done so already. In each case, Ace has seen fit to promote the book by giving away things that happen well over a hundred pages in, and I would have enjoyed each of them more if I hadn't known in advance what was going to happen.

I can safely tell you that as this one opens, Paul Sinclair has just made Lieutenant Junior Grade and is still serving aboard the USS _Michaelson_. Again, the first hundred or so pages follow him through his shipboard experiences as we watch him grow and mature as a naval officer.

I can also tell you that early on, there's an extremely well thought out (and, incidentally, extremely funny) sequence involving a protest by an organization called 'Greenspace', who apparently do much the same sorts of things in space as their present-day predecessors do at sea. Hemry's portrayal of the Space Navy's personal and professional responses to these 'hippies' is both hilarious (this is where the meat of the humor is) and accurate (as a measure of Sinclair's assimilation to Navy life); his portrayal of the Greenspacers themselves is a _little_ bit of a caricature, but no one will have any trouble recognizing their real-life counterparts. One of my complaints about Heinlein's mostly-excellent _Starship Troopers_ is that Heinlein sets up and shoots down way too many straw men; Hemry doesn't make that mistake.

(Any actual hippies who read this book should read the narrative and dialogue very carefully. Hemry isn't taking sides at the authorial level; if he's making a sociopolitical point here, it's the one Commander Sykes makes: by all means question assumptions and challenge beliefs -- every society needs people who will do that -- but don't, don't, don't do foolish things that put lives in danger. And if anybody out there is still under the illusion that people in military service are 'fascists', Hemry's books should help to disabuse them of such silliness.)

Otherwise I won't give anything away. This is some of the best recent SF I've read, and I'm looking forward to reading the next Paul Sinclair book (due out in March 2005, I think).

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Matter of Negligence, February 24, 2004

By 

Arthur W. Jordin (Smyrna, GA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Burden of Proof (JAG in Space, Book 2) (Mass Market Paperback)

Burden of Proof is the second novel in this series, following Just Determination. In the previous volume, the USS Michaelson destroyed a SASAL ship as ordered by Captain Peter Wakeman when he perceived that the other ship had powered up its weapons in preparation for a firing run, but onsite investigation determined that the other ship had no major weapons. The subsequent court-martial was ready to slam the captain, but Ensign Paul Sinclair, the ship's legal officer, testified that the ship's orders were vague, emphasizing the possibility of Q-ships, and thus set up the possibility of such a confrontation. The court found Wakeman guilty only of minor charges and sentenced him to receive a letter of reprimand, but otherwise exonerated him of all other wrong doing. Of course, he had already been relieved of command and would probably never receive another command, nor would he ever be promoted again, but he might retire without a major blot on his career.

In this novel, about a year later, Sinclair has just been promoted to Lieutenant Junior Grade. Captain Gonzalez, who received interim command after Wakeman, is being replaced by Captain Hayes. Lieutenant Carl Meadows, who is Command Duty Officer on the Sinclair's watch, has completed his third year aboard and is being replaced by Lieutenant Scott Silver. Lieutenant Colleen Kilgary is taking over Meadows' job as Weapons Officer and Silver will take her job as Main Propulsion Assistant. However, Silver will replace Meadows as Command Duty Officer on the second watch.

Silver soon impresses Sinclair as a charming individual, but also a slacker who lets everybody else do his work. Then an explosion and fire occur one Saturday just before the second watch. When Sinclair arrives on the bridge, it becomes obvious that Chief Asher, the Damage Control Officer, is not available, so he asks permission of the Officer of the Deck, Silver, to lead the damage control team in fighting the fire. Silver okays his request and the damage control party goes in and cools down the fuel, which contains its own oxidizer, enough to flicker out. The damage control party is then ordered out and replaced by a team from another ship.

The body of Chief Asher is found in the damaged compartment. Although the fire suppression equipment was nonfunctional and the engineering log was damaged, the investigating officer did not find enough evidence to determine the cause of the destruction. However, Petty Officer Sharpe, the ship's Master-at-Arms, requests permission to bring an expert onboard to examine the logs. When Chief Warrant Officer Rose arrives, Sinclair provides him with physical access to a terminal and Rose looks for, and finds, evidence of computer cracking which occurred a few hours after the fire. Sinclair reports this information to the Captain.

In this story, Sinclair once again sticks his neck out to serve justice as he sees it. Despite his lack of desire to become a lawyer, Sinclair is becoming very familiar with naval law and court-martials. He makes a few enemies on the way, but maintains the respect of those that mean the most to him.

As with the previous volume, this story reflects fairly recent events in the US Navy. Although not that similar in detail, the explosion and fire are suggestive of the explosion in the #2 turret of the USS Iowa in 1989. Of course, the Iowa disaster involved explosive propellants for the guns, but the fuel on the Michaelson is also a propellant, only with a slower burn rate so that it does not detonate. The Michaelson incident was potentially much more deadly than the Iowa disaster; spaceships are more vulnerable than sea-going battleships.

While I have not yet mentioned Sinclair's love life, it does have some relevance to the plot. Early in the story, Lieutenant JG Jen Shen orders Sinclair to dine with her father aboard his command, the USS Mahan, and a good time was had by all ... NOT. Captain Kay Shen is later assigned as the investigating officer for the incident on the Michaelson and bends over backwards to avoid any appearance of approving the actions of his daughter's boyfriend. However, his report assigns no blame for the incident.

The storyline also continues the daring adventures of Seaman Alvarez, who seems to get sick frequently and then screws up because of it. Somehow, the corpsmen never can find anything wrong, so she is often brought before the Captain's Mast as a troublemaker and malingerer. When Alvarez appears at Captain Hayes' first mast, he clearly expresses his displeasure in her activities and record.

Highly recommended for Hemry fans and for anyone else who enjoys tales of naval action and legal proceedings.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good read, a few stylistic quibbles., January 26, 2005

By 

Lisa J. Steele (Bolton, MA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Burden of Proof (JAG in Space, Book 2) (Mass Market Paperback)

This is a good legal procedural novel. It isn't a whodunnit, more a howcatchhim book. Hemry does a fine job with the naval atmosphere and setting.

The two things keeping this from a 5 star review are:
the exposition is a bit clunky in places -- the exposition doesn't flow smoothly from the characters, it is there to make sure the reader is keeping up. This can be a persistent problem both in the SF genre and in legal stories.

the antagonist seems to lack any redeeming features. It is fairly clear who the antagonist will be within pages of his appearance in the story. It would have been nice to see some redeeming features to flesh him out as a 3D person. As it is, even the people who liked him are doubting their judgment by the end.