6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
A slog, November 6, 2010
Minority view here. The problem I have is that there is action galore, which I like, but that much of it is the description of simulator battles. These may be informative, but I keep saying to myself: "dream sequence, who cares?"
Also, The "pretend" battles, and the real ones, are described minutely: But in the Doc's case, it is exactly as if he played 5 intense minutes of an online first-person-shooter session, and then went back over the recording and transcribed every bit of it in excruciating (or delicious, if you like it) detail with plenty of "oowaagh!" grunts to let you know high-g forces are in play. You get Every thumb-toggle of an alternate weapon system, spiral evasion move, excited slogan-laden radio communication and techy-sounding acronym. Even the deaths feel like gamer "deaths, kind of inconsequential.
I would have said it is better to spend two pages describing action, rather than one throw-away sentence such as "and then they advanced a click under heavy fire", But this is way, way too much.
I know,I know, if you like it, you like it, but to me it really needs to be edited down.
I loved how evil the villain was. Making her human instead of a cartoon made her actions even worse. I liked the characters. It's a good story. I did my own editing by skimming: "Hmm, battle action starting, skip ahead 1, 2, 3, 5 (!) pages". This David Weber level verbosity is hard to plow through.
Sorry to be negative when there is a gem of a tale pillowed in all the that cellulose verbiage.
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3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A top pick for libraries where patrons like military science fiction action, February 13, 2010
This review is from: One Good Soldier (Tau Ceti Agenda) (Hardcover)
An excellent military science fiction pick is Travis S. Taylor's ONE GOOD SOLDIER, which takes place six years after the events of THE TAU CETI AGENDA and offers a narrowed focus on a single critical day in the history of the U.S. of the Sol System, when Ross 128 secedes from the union and action must be taken to prevent an interstellar civil war. A top pick for libraries where patrons like military science fiction action.
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9 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Satisfying Conclusion, December 7, 2009
This review is from: One Good Soldier (Tau Ceti Agenda) (Hardcover)
One Good Soldier ties up the loose ends with practically all of our favorite characters surviving about ten years of war. Most questions are answered, with the possible exception of the political dynamics behind the civil war. Either because of limitations of space or disruption to the narrative flow, why so many people would go to such lengths to destroy the United States is not all that clear. Part of it may lie in the fact that the protagonist U.S. President is a Republican. Maybe the (far future) collectivist wing of the American Left decided to take what it could of the frontier states in space to create a utopia.
The book is an action story where, in the end, the principles of a 600-year old constitution ultimately prevail. However, I did appreciate the rough justice in the concluding chapter where certain people get what's coming to them in a fashion appropriate to the latest Vince Flynn novel. (He writes about the world of special ops and covert actions in our current war.)
I give it 5-stars because it accomplishes its intended purpose quite well. This is an action story with characters we care about and a moral center. Good vs. evil and "Duty, Honor, Country" may sound old-fashioned some time but those values are at the core of this story.
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