Customer Reviews

Citadel

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

In Robert Heinlein's seminal "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress," the world's first true AI gets drafted to assist in a revolution of essentially unarmed prisoners in a moon colony against the overwhelming might of Earth. In what is probably the purest example of a "never tell me the odds," desparate-battle-against-overwhelming-foes story ever, the AI literally calculates the chances of success and tells the human conspirators that their chances are but one in seven. And, in what is probably the purest example of the essential difference between humans and AI ever, the conspirators, much to the AI's confusion, respond with unmitigated glee that they have a big fat chance of one in seven when they had feared the odds were much *worse.*

The very best science fiction adventure stories, like the "Troy Rising" series, take this example and run with it, screaming fearless human battle cries in the teeth of certain death - which turns out to be not so certain. Make no mistake: this is pure "humans-will-mess-you-UP" space opera, although written much more tightly than the exhilarating but rather silly afternoon-serial style of the Golden Age. Although things gradually start looking up over the course of the series, the whole thing from beginning to end is cliffhangers, suspense, and nearly-Pyrrhic victories. From time to time the "human interest" parts of the story get a little burdensome, but not so much as to really detract from the main point, which is to blow stuff UP. Highly recommended.

Very entertaining read. Ringo manages to maintain quality in this second book of the series.
The plot stays the same. Earth is oppressed and in great danger having won its initial freedom from alien oppression. Earth continues to prepare for anticipated invasions.
In this book Ringo shifts the focus and develops secondary characters - a welder and an eventual pilot (read book to see why I say 'eventual'). With this one gets the sense of work and the grand scope of the space projects from the toils of the little folks. Ringo eases back into the big picture mostly seen in the previous book in this series, does an excellent job of starting to link the little folks with the big movers & shapers, and also manages to better link government actions with the efforts of the private sector than done in book one.
Ringo continues with his strength - character development and humor - while also developing the plot.
At the end of the book the stage is set for space opera on a grand scale (and I like well written space opera) in the following book. If Ringo chooses to go in that direction. He wrote this book so well that he has options.
In summary, this is a very entertaining book. It definitely would enhance an day spent waiting in airports - the gold standard of my book reading judgements these days. Ringo plays to his strengths well and maintains a high quality standard in this second book in the series. I rated this a 4 mainly due to the high standard the author has set in previous books. This is not the top level of work that Ringo has produced in the past but it is very, very good reading.

For some weird reason, Amazon has split the hard cover and MMPB versions of this book, just like it's predecessor, _Live_Free_Or_Die_.

Anyway, a cracking good read if you like space opera and/or milsf. As usual, good stories work on their minor characters and John Ringo put in the sweat here.

BTW, Ringo dedicated the book to his mother who passed away in 2009 and as always, Captain Tamara Long, USAF, who died in Afghanistan in 2003.

"Citadel" is a sequel to "Troy Rising" and continues the theme of wily humans first outwitting, and then outfighting, various aliens. Ringo writes this in a very free wheeling style, amazing feats of in-space engineering are accomplished in a very short time and the physics is a bit wild, but it's all in good fun.

Ringo has the Heinlein streak of proselyting the independent, anti-government, survivalist philosophy, and while I can take a certain amount of that it gets a bit wearing after constant repetition. That is the reason I give "Citadel" four instead of five stars.

A third book in the series, "The Hot Gate", is out in hardback but I'm waiting for the paperback due in the Spring of '12.

This was a simplistic plot and charecters. But it was an easy fun escapist read. Saying that I would have continued with the series and bought all the books except the publisher has kept prices for sequels totally outragous. The costs for the sequels are consistent with a top line first release best seller that is still only in hard back. Kindle prices should reflect closer to mass market paperbacks, or cheaper, since no printing and book distribution costs are incurred. I resent starting a series to find I am being held for ransom to buy mediocre books at top quality prices. Feels kind of like going to Mcdonalds and finding out fries have going up to $10. The hamburger still costs the same, but somehow doesn't taste as good, and I skip the fries. Since this book was not that extraordinary I switched my money to other more reasonably priced publisher/writers ; just as I would go to Burger King. I hope you also send a message to publisher by avoiding their outragoues prices.

Disappointing from a big picture, action oriented writer such as John Ringo. Sometimes attention to details can lose the reader. I had to skip pages to get to the interesting parts.