Warp Speed

Travis Taylor

Cover art by David Mattingly

288 pages

Baen Books

http://www.baen.com/

ISBN: 0-7434-8862-8

To read an excerpt from the book:

http://www.baen.com/chapters/W200412/0743488628.htm?blurb

Let me explain something that I think is fairly obvious to anyone who knows me. I hate people with talent. No, it’s true; I really do. Which really messes me up at parties since almost everyone is talented. I have to stand in the corner and try to enjoy conversations with those less talented then even I am, and lamps and wall sockets just ain’t very good company.

So along comes Travis Taylor, “Doc” to his friends. And no, I doubt if I will be allowed in that illustrious group anytime soon. Taylor is a ‘good ole’ boy’, hailing from North Alabama which is one good thing about him. At least if I ever do get to meet him, he will talk normal.

The guy is a definite renaissance man, a karate expert, mountain biker, and Astronomer. He even has his own backyard Observatory that he built back in 2003 or thereabouts. “Thereabouts” is a Southern term, meaning either ‘Over Yonder’ or ‘Back when’ depending on current use.

Currently, he is living around Huntsville, Alabama where they build rockets, and Taylor is currently working as a Space and Defense Contractor. He also has an interest in Directed Energy Weapons, Systems Engineering of Spacecraft, Advanced Propulsion Concepts, Telescope Design, and Solving Unique Problems.

In his spare time, he designs space ships.

Yes, space ships. I once built a model of a Cylon Fighter. Captain Apollo personally came to my house and stomped it into small pieces, it was so bad, and Travis Taylor designs space ships.

Sheesh. And to top it all off, he wrote what is one of the best books about faster then light travel in have read in a long, long time.

“Warp Speed” is the story of Dr. Neal Clemons, physicist and martial arts expert. He had dreamed of going to space since he could first remember, and his love of the subject was probably born at the same time he was, the day that men first landed on the moon.

And after a minor head injury at a martial arts event, he has a major breakthrough, both in construction of a warp drive and in creating a new energy form that would make the drive more then a simply blackboard concept.

Written much like Robert Heinlein’s earlier work, Taylor goes deep into Clemons both as a man and as a scientist. Exploring both his hobbies of mountain biking and karate (sort of wonder who that was based on) and his slowly budding romance with beautiful and brilliant astronaut Tabitha Ames.

Now, with the US Government funded the project, Taylor… uhm.. CLEMONS gets his chance to go into space where they are going to build the first FTL light probe. And also, much like Heinlein, there is a group working against Clemons and his team, one even willing to plunge the entire planet into a war to force their will onto the human race.

It becomes a race against time as this group uses the stolen warp tech to attack the U.S. But, Clemons and Tabitha have only begun to fight back and they are not about to let some two-bit dictator take over the world, or stop man from reaching the stars.

The only thing worse then how well written the book was, was how much fun it was to read. I started reading it with the intention of it being a ‘car book’. You know, one that just stays in the car for when I am stuck in traffic? Well, that didn’t work so well as I found myself drawn to it repeatedly and when I would start to read it, I just could not put it down.

It is filled with action, suspense and enough twists to make a can of fishing worms envious. Yes, it has science in it, just like Heinlein did in most of his work; it also deals with gadgets, plots, and devices that seem to be based on real physics and possible science fact, not just fiction.

Travis Taylor actually is a rocket scientist and he proves that over and over in this book. But, he is also a spiritual son of Heinlein, Clark, Harrison and Laumer and deserves every bit of the attention that will be coming his way one of these days.

His plots are rich, his characters are the sorts of people one hopes they can meet someday or wish they could be someday.

And it is books like “Warp Speed” that will open a mind and lead a young man or woman to a future outside the prison of the Earth we live in.

Bravo to a great first book, and I hope to see more of Neal Anson Clemons, Tabitha, Jim and the rest of the crew someday.

Oh, and great homage to Lazarus Long with Tabitha having Red Hair.