Claws that Catch (Looking Glass, Book 4) (Hardcover)

by John Ringo (Author), Travis S. Taylor (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
It's Not Over Til The Skinny Lady Sings . . .

 

            Working off of a piece of intelligence from the alien Hexosehr, the Vorpal Blade is dispatched to investigate rumors of an ancient and powerful civilization that may have been the creators of the ?black box? that drives humanity's only space ship. Any remnant technology would be nice but what the Blade finds is much more than they bargained for. Worse, the ship is infested by an alien species of scorpion-like arachnoids that has the potential to wipe out a world. Worst of all, instead of being Astrogator, Captain William Weaver is now the XO and he is not getting along with the new commander. And the new commander does not get along with Weaver, the ship's female savant-linguist or most of the rest of the original crew. And what is that weird noise the ship makes every time it's in hard maneuvers?

 

            Leave it to the oddball geniuses of the Blade to sort it all out. And the Dreen are not going to like the answers.

About the Author
John Ringo is author of the New York Times best-selling Posleen War series which so far includes A Hymn Before Battle, Gust Front, When the Devil Dances, and Hell’s Faire, as well as the connected novels Cally’s War (with Julie Cochrane), The Hero (with Michael Z. Williamson), and Watch on the Rhine (with Tom Kratman), and is the hottest new science fiction writer since David Weber. A veteran of the 82nd Airborne, Ringo brings first-hand knowledge of military operations to his novels of high-tech future war.

Travis S. Taylor—“Doc” Taylor to his friends—has earned his soubriquet the hard way:  He has a doctorate in optical science and engineering, a master's degree in physics, a master's degree in aerospace engineering, a master's degree in astronomy, and a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering. Dr. Taylor has worked on various programs for the Department of Defense and NASA for the past sixteen years.  He's currently working on several advanced propulsion concepts, very large space telescopes, space-based beamed energy systems, and next generation space launch concepts. He lives in Harvest, AL with his wife Karen and their daughter.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 343 pages
• Publisher: Baen; Har/Cdr edition (November 4, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1416555870
• ISBN-13: 978-1416555872
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.3 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #41,354 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Enemies MAY kill you, people problems WILL, November 6, 2008

By	Geoffrey Kidd (Berkeley, CA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This one got five stars, which should tell you how I felt about this latest entry in the Looking Glass Saga. Once again the A.S.S. Vorpal Blade(II) goes forth to find out "What's out there? Thataway," and runs headlong into more trouble than you'ld want to see in one lifetime.

As with the last book, Manxome Foe (Looking Glass, Book 3) the first two-thirds or so of the book deal with daily living, people, preparations for lift-off, and the people problems of getting a crew working as a team. This is followed by the sort of space and small-unit battle that the authors handle superbly.

All of it was very well-written and thoroughly engrossing to the point where I hated having to interrupt my reading with little things like eating, work, dinner with my wife, websurfing. And I'm very glad, as I write this, that I finished it in time NOT to lose anything as unimportant as sleep.

The title of this review, however, is how I'll be thinking of this story for a long time. Remember the problem of shaking down a crew of people, most of them strangers to each other, into a smoothly functioning team? THAT is truly, for me, what this book was about. The really important battle in this book was creating that team, getting the screwups to learn better, INCLUDING the captain, and turning them into a family. I won't give you any spoilers here. Each and every one of those scenes is engrossing, and taught me powerful lessons about how to function at my job and do the people parts WELL.

And, as the last parts of the book make pellucidly clear, if the people problems hadn't been worked on BEFORE the "murthering great battle" at the end, NOBODY would have made it out of this one alive.

FYI, the CD that comes with the book has:

All of the books in the Looking Glass series(Into the Looking Glass, Vorpal Blade, Manxome Foe, Claws That Catch)

All of the books in the Council Wars series(There Will Be Dragons, Emerald Sea, Against the Tide, East of the Sun, West of the Moon)

All of the books in the Paladin of Shadows series(Ghost, Kildar, Choosers of the Slain, Unto the Breach, A Deeper Blue)

All of the books in the Empire of Man series (co-authored with David Weber)

Almost all of the books in the Aldenata Series (Honor of the Clan isn't out yet, darnit!)

All of Doc Travis' books for Baen, both solo and co-authored with John Ringo.

The Last Centurion

The Road to Damascus (The Bolo Series)

Getting that with this book is rather like being told "You liked this gold coin, eh, boy? Well, here's a sack of 'em. Go have fun."

It just doesn't get better than a package like this.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars What Happened to Vorpal Blade?, December 25, 2008

By	Jason Cordova (Denver, CO) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I truly have enjoyed the series so far. That is, until I hit this book.

In the past two books (Vorpal Blade and Manxome Foe) the focus of the characters have shifted from Dr. William Weaver (Into the Looking Glass) to a character not even mentioned in the first book, with the new character Eric "Two Guns" Bergstresser taking over as the star. While this in itself wouldn't normally bother me, the fact that Dr. Weaver becomes a cardboard caricature of what made him so cool in book 1 really gets me down.

There were parts of it I really enjoyed, such as when the space spiders eat the Dreen and the taking of the Dreen "mother ship" by the space Marines. The action scenes, when they do occur, are marvelous and fast paced. The romance behind "Two Guns" and his new wife is superb, though she seems quite mature for a teenager fresh out of high school. Maybe that was just the impression I got...

However, my enjoyment of these scenes was dampened by the Tum Tum tree and the subsequent anime change. It was confusing and slowed the story down immensely, not to mention it was just plain odd. I understand the inspiration behind it, but I felt it was placed into the book to fill space until the action could start for real.

Also, the authors left out Tuffy and Mimi in this book, shifting instead the main "oddness" factor onto Miriam. The voice in her head, while interesting, really can't replace what Tuffy and Mimi as a duo brought to the series. Miriam was a known genius that was played up in earlier books, but Mimi and Fluffy brought a feeling of innocence and power that the character Miriam seems unable to duplicate. I hope that Tuffy and Mimi make a triumphant return later.

One major quibble: Poertena. He was, to me, annoying in the Empire of Man series Ringo coauthored with David Weber. To bring him into this universe, with the same accent, personality and everything, smacks of laziness and arrogance. It's as though the authors suggest that it doesn't matter what they do in the book or how lazy they can be, people will buy it nonetheless.

The problems in this book can and probably will affect the later sales of this series. I'm hoping that the series can go back from "anime" scifi to "hard" scifi that made it so promising initially.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Military Science fiction, October 27, 2008

By	William Howe "wildwily" (Terrytown, LA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Cover to cover in one day. A very engrossing read, with non-stop action. Too bad the XO never did find his door.

Now for the bad news: You need to read the earlier books in the series to get up to speed. Most of the information is there, it just comes at you real fast.

The good news: the publisher has once again added a cd-rom to the book. This contains (unless I miss my guess) the earlier books in the series!! This is the kind of bargain that shouldn't be missed.

I haven't perused my cd because I already own most of Baen's backlist (everything by John and Doc).