ISBN: 0-7434-7188-1
Publisher: Baen Books
Pub. Date: 01 February, 2004
Format: Hardcover
http://www.bane.com
Now, this is what is called “Good Science Fiction”. The Two Space War takes the reader outside the normal space opera and into a universe filled with reality, honor, bravery and truth. Looking at mankind in both the future and the present, it uses humor and circumstance to make a statement about humanity and where we could be going, as well as where we should be going.Co-author Dave Grossman, whose excellent book On Killing took a hard look at the truth of combat, uses his extensive knowledge and imagination to help Leo Frankowski to create a book that should be read by every soldier and Marine alive.
I find it difficult to actually describe this book. It was so impressive, I found myself crying over the characters, both human and ship.
The book is simply one of the best Science Fiction stories I have ever read. The charcters are some of the most heroic and honest I have read in years, and the use of poetry and prose is simply wonderful.
Try to picture the image of men who go to space and travel between the stars. Men and women who are willing to leave home, friends and even family to search out new worlds filled with beings who could become our greatest friends or deadlyiest enemies.
The men and women who are not only adventureers, but diplomats, explorers and even warriors.
Warriors who are willing to do as all warriors have done for generations, fight the fight that others can’t or won’t. Men and women who know that honor and freedom sometimes must be bought by blood and fire.
Picture these men and women who go to the stars for us.
Now, picture them doing this in wooden ships.
That’s right, wooden ships. Six hundred in the future and man has learned to move between the vast distances in space by traveling through Two Space, a mysterious and massive universe where living wooden ships move under canvas sails since this universe is deadly to almost all technology.
Modern weapons don’t work, so warriors use musket’s, cannon and swords to fight their enemy. Computers won’t function, neither do TV, radio or virtually any other ‘modern convience’.
Humans have discovered that they are not alone, meeting races that have become not only our friends, but who have embraced our culture in many ways. Like the Sylvans who live in the vast forrests of low gravity planets and look somewhat evlish. Or the dwarf-life Dwarrowdelf, who survive deep in the mineral rich heavy gravity worlds and love a good fight.
These races belive that Tolkien was a prophet, telling of when the races of man and alien would meet and join together. They have taken the classics of Science Fiction as a guide, bequeathing an almost Saint like status on Heinlein, Asimov, Clarke and others.
And don’t even think of suggesting that Horatio Hornblower or Jack Aubrey were not real.
The hero of our story is Lt. Thomas Melville, a young man who must brave a fleet of angry aliens to save not only his own men and crew, but the worlds of his allies as well.
Melville is the epitome of Heoric Fiction; seldom thinking of himself, he dedicates almost every waking moment on how to protect his ship and his crew. Even wounded and tired, he fights along side his men showing them courage and bravery and a willingness to sacrifice his own life to defend others.
His captain killed in a vicious sneak attack and his ship mortally wounded, Thomas must attack and capture a sentient enemy ship, fight his way across the stars to warn the rest of the galaxy of the massive alien armada about to attack.
Toss into this a beautiful alien princess, and you have one heck of a story.
But, while Melville was the hero the rest of the cast is nothing short of stellar. Watching Lt. Daniel Fielder, the First Officer of Her Majesty’s Frigate, Fang, grow from who and what he was in the first pages into who he becomes is frankly beautiful. Reading the banter between Lady Elphinstone, the Ship's surgeon, a Sylvan and Mrs. Vodi, her "lob-lolly girl" is both funny and heart-warming.
And seeing (yes, seeing. I read good books like they are a movie) Sgt. Broadax, a Dwarrowdelf who joined the Marines in search of a good tussel and a hard fight work to help bring the Marines into battle readyness, while chomping a cigar constantly made me think of every Marine Corp drill instructor I have seen in film or in books since I was a kid. With a couple of differences; first, the Lt. is not from Earth. The Lt. is around 3-4 feet tall. The Lt. has a beard. And the Lt. is a woman.
Don’t tick her off, I might add.
It is this combination of characters and situations that make The Two Space War a cut above many other Science Fiction war books. And it is what makes it so great as well.
Dave Grossman’s introduction gives some excellent history of warfare and the role literature and poetry has played in it. His innsight into Lord Wavell and his book, Other Men's Flowers is both wonderful to read and beautiful to think about.
The book does not glamourise war; it tells the truth about it, while making each of the characters a hero in their own right.
Grossman and Frankowski don’t gloss over the blood and carnage, nor do they glorify it. Instead, they try to show the nobility of a warrior, and the nature of those who are willing to fight for us.
This is one of the most amazing books I have ever read, and the most fun I have had with a story in a long time.