Fearless (The Lost Fleet, Book 2) by Jack Campbell
|
List Price: Our Price: $3.93 You Save: $4.06 (51%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $0.01 (click here) Category: Book See more book details and other editions |
|---|
Book Reviews of Fearless (The Lost Fleet, Book 2)
Book Review: Rip Van Winkle in Space - Part 2
Summary: 4 Stars
This is the second book in the Lost Fleet series and it does not disappoint. The space battles are presented in crisp clean prose, with believable attention to physics. The hero, John "Black Jack" Geary evolves and changes under pressure and even, with due discretion, acquires a girlfriend. There's stronger speculation about the existence of aliens as a driving force for the 100 year old war.
My biggest complaint is structural. Book One: Dauntless and Book Two: Fearless could have been combined in a single volume. The story arc would have been a lot stronger that way and a certain amount of repetition designed to bring the out-of-sequence reader up to speed could have been eliminated. As it is, I feel that the overall arc of the series has just barely crept forward. And the author is not really exploring the psychological complexity of his characters. Some of the dialog is just daft (Scottish dialect for whacko) instead of striving for depth.
But I love the way Jack Campbell writes his action sequences. He manages to capture some of the agonizingly slow motion imposed by the vast distance of space and combine it with an ability to keep the reader on the edge of the chair. I'll keep reading and hoping for more. In some ways, Jack Campbell is the science fiction equivalent of Dick Francis in the mystery genre: he's a slick stylist with a knack for action.
Book Review: An enjoyable sequel with many influences
Summary: 4 Stars
I just finished devouring the second book this weekend, and did enjoy it quite a bit. One bit of criticism I might throw out, is that I tended to over analyze some of the influences of the book.
Whether intentional or not, you might catch a glimpse of:
Honor Harrington (On Basilisk Station (Honor Harrington Book 1)) from David Weber
Adama and Roselyn (Battlestar Galactica - Season One) from Battlestar Galactica
Nicholas Seafort (Challenger's Hope (Seafort Saga)) from David Feintuch (which I've heard is based on Horatio Hornblower (Horatio Hornblower Collector's Edition), but I cannot compare them firsthand.)
Overall, a very enjoyable read, I'm recommending it to my friends.
Prediction-without-giving-away-too-much: I strongly suspect one of the supporting characters will turn out to be an Artificial Intelligence. :) Let's see if book three gives that up or not.
Book Review: Great start for an interesting series
Summary: 4 Stars
First off, the first book was a 5-star book for me. The reasons this one gets 4 stars are as follows:
1. The first book hinted of a 'third party' and I was hoping to get a bit actual information in this book. Instead, another hint was given about the possible third party's intentions... I guess I should be happy that the author is able to keep me interested, but I wanted more and the books' lengths look like they're locked into only providing so much information per book. So this background storyline looks like it'll take a while to resolve itself.
2. Although the battles are very well thought out and written, I'm starting to worry that the author has exhausted the supply of surprises - yes, light-speed battles and the problems they bring make for interesting reading, but it's only the second book and I'm losing interest.
3. Great character and plot development. This part of the series is excellent and no concern there.
4. The time between books has me worried - I had to go back and re-read the first book because I had forgotten so much about the characters' specifics... I don't want to have to wait 12 months between every book, so unless the publisher can up the speed of the releases, I may not want to continue with this series.
Book Review: To wait or not to wait for the whole thing!
Summary: 4 Stars
The review and comments by Mr. McCallister have pretty much hit all the points about the book to tell you if it might be your cup of tea. With perhaps one exception, the ability of the books to stand on their own. Again a personal preference, and this appears to be one of those series that falls somewhere in the middle - not as standalone as some of the greats, like Miles Vorkorsigan (Bujold), or the Laiden novels (Lee, Miller), or even Kris Longknife (Shepherd), but nowhere as badly done as the artificial division of "The Final Encyclopedia" into 2 volumes.
Perhaps it will be a series more like Honor Harrington, some novels in the series stand alone well and others not quite, though hopefully none of those *really* aggravating cliff hanger plots.
Unlike a John Scalzi novel which goes on my pre-order list instantly, I might try to wait, at least until there's a plot with some sort of resolution to the original objective of the first book (getting the fleet home). Of course, because it's such an enjoyable read, that plan is likely doomed!
I hope there are plenty of novels in this series (or longer ones), but I also hope I don't have to wait too long for resolution of some of the plot story lines...
Book Review: Second piece of a puzzle
Summary: 4 Stars
When I reviewed the first book, I called it a space western with John Wayne taking a wagon train across Indian land. Well the second book is still John Wayne, but now it is the navy in the Pacific during WWII. Now this book is different from the first one and I recommend that you read these books in order. The second book FEARLESS is what I call a set up book. Campbell is like a chess master, thinking several moves or books ahead. This book developes the secondary characters more. It seems the women this time are "fleshed" out more. A love interest is started, a mature love interest that is. We are given a very detailed character called Falco[Custer?] who is what Black Jack Geary could turn into if he isn't careful. We have big space battles. BUT Campbell has begun to give us clues to why this war started and to set up the "true" enemy. I would lay odds that old enemies join forces to face an unknown foe. This is not a quick read and it reguires the reader to think about what is being said. FEARLESS does make one look forward to the third novel.