DEAD AMERICANS AND OTHER STORIES, Ben Peek's excellent SFnal collection

DEAD AMERICANS and Other Stories
BEN PEEK
ChiZine Publications (non-affiliate Amazon link)
Out of print; available at various prices from various vendors

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: Welcome to a world where bands are named after the murderer of a dead president, where the work of Octavia E. Butler is turned into an apocalypse meta-narrative, and John Wayne visits a Wal-Mart.

A world where a dreaming Mark Twain has visions of Sydney, where a crime begins in a mosque, and answers are given to a questionnaire you never read.

Where a dying sun shines over a broken, bitter landscape, and men and women tattoo their life onto their skin for an absent god.

THE PUBLISHER SENT ME A REVIEW COPY. THANK YOU.

My Review: Disclaimer: I like Ben as a social-media acquainted person. And isn't it a little sad that I need to say that.

What Ben Peek offers to discerning SFnal readers is the same thing that the camera obscura offers artists. He flips the image, sharpens the edges, and shines brighter for the darkness around him. He writes about the world through the fish-eye lens of an observer of the human comedy, often without revealing his own stake in it. These stories offer the reader the unmissable opportunity to take a bite-sized portion of the well-stocked buffet of Ben's imagination. He's written a fantasy trilogy that I think you should read as well, but for now get your mental palate used to the creator's caviar with these ten tales. I will, comme d'habitude, give short responses to them (the Bryce Method, in other words) below.

There Is Something So Quiet and Empty Inside of You That It Must Be Precious styles itself a murder mystery. What you wonder as you read it is not whodunit or why, but what the hell took so long. And then the bottom drops out. 3.5 stars

The Dreaming City brings the Winds of Change to Australia via the (factual) 1895 visit of Mark Twain ("the most American of Americans") to Sydney. From there, the Dreamtime grabs Samuel Clemens and brooms away centuries of rage and outrage, replacing them with outrage and rage. 4 stars

Johnny Cash is formally experimental and hugely Australian and left me scratching my ear and just slightly flushed with the embarrassed sense of Not Getting the Joke. 3.5 stars

Possession begins the short cycle of steampunkish dystopian future-earth (?) tales that are the gems of the collection. A Botanist lives inside the Shaft, a void in a dying earth (?) that she relishes for its grant of invisibility to God. Then Rachel falls into her life, the uninvited monster Returned being, and the world ends for them both. 4.5 stars

The Souls of Dead Soldiers are for Blackbirds, Not Little Boys regales us with the nightmare of eternal war, lost futures, and a red sun whose blackbirds eat only the cruelly used and abandoned victims. Gave me bone-shudders as I felt the reality of reincarnation hit me for the first time. 4.5 stars

The Funeral, Ruined dissects the intersection of love and character, without sparing either from a dark-adapted eye. May very well be my favorite story because "And yet, despite herself, she did not." 5 stars

Under the Red Sun is hands down the most technically accomplished story in the collection, and merits my shared favoritism. William who loved Jonas is desperate enough to go to him in his hour of starkest need; Jonas who loved William is regretful enough to help him despite knowing, fully knowing, that it will cause more hurt than any mortal man can bear. 5 stars

John Wayne (as written by a Non-American) is my least favorite story because Wayne wasn't 6'4", didn't have a folksy way of talkin', and was brutally racist so one moment in the time we spend with him makes no sense; oh, and it's Sixth Avenue, LaGuardia be damned with his stupid Americas name. An alternate reality? Yeah, okay, but I'd need a lot more to make me buy in. 3 stars

Octavia E. Butler (a remix) gets, really gets, how sexual predation occurs. I remember little else after the awful sense of having my mother carefully normalize horrible things came rushing back to me. That is why this is a very good, in a technical sense, story; again, we're in an alternate not-Butler's-actual-world. Much to appreciate in this examination of horrors become norms. 3.5 stars

theleeharveyoswaldband is a funny, wickedly sharp recasting of a modern American legend. Timeless, of course, as all legends are, but the only story rooted in an explicit time and that's one that's fast disappearing in the rear-view mirror. The Internet, back when it was capitalized, was a wild and wonderful thing. It got things wrong, gloriously and completely wrong, and the story of Lee is an example of one such thing. Back in capitalized days, the audience was smaller...anyone remember Google-whacking?...and it was possible to make some joyful noise. I think Ben Peek misses that. 4 stars

THE STONE, first in an Irish-mythology infused urban fantasy series starring two gay men

THE STONE
SEB L. CARTER (Lockstone #1)
Wolfline Publishing (non-affiliate Amazon link)
$4.99 Kindle edition, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: A stone holds an ancient secret—and the key to present-day terror.

A murder-suicide was only the beginning.

Seven years ago, Liam’s father picked up a gun, killed his family then himself. Liam was left behind to carry the burden and the guilt.

Now Liam only wants to finish college and live a normal life. But when he is handed a stone, a stone that appears plain, he is catapulted into an unknown world of mystery and magic…

…and mayhem.

A CIA agent finds himself a part of something with more secrets than the government he works for.

Patrick possesses a psychic ability to find people. Coerced to find Liam, their first meeting reawakens an ancient connection. Together, they find themselves in the midst of a culling, the destruction of a secret society formed millennia ago.

Destiny unites a group of strangers to face an antediluvian evil that has the world as its prize.

The Stone is a paranormal, urban fantasy adventure that involves a secret agent, a law man, and a gay guy who becomes a hero.

This novel features an LGBT relationship with a low-heat romantic subplot.

THE AUTHOR PROVIDED AN E-ARC FOR MY REVIEW. THANK YOU.

My Review: I don't see much Irish mythology used in fantasy literature, pace Kevin Hearne. And don't mistake me, I love Atticus and Oberon, but they need more company. One problem with folks wanting to use Irish mythology is, I am surprised to learn, its decentralized nature. How Irish, to resist any attempt to codify, regularize, organize its story culture.

And ain't that grand! It gives Author Carter a pretty damn free hand with his world-building, and that is a really good thing. Carter's free hand is played really, really well. The Irish gods and goddeses, the fabled TirNaNog, all used well as both background and setting for the scary action of the story.

What I will say is that the author needed a copy editor as well as a conceptual editor. I hope the current Kindle files are corrected.

So there's this kid named Liam. He's a super-survivor, both of a mass murder and suicide. He's living a pretty ordinary young gay man's life in Chicagoland, going to school, hanging with his buds, his BFF the beautiful and damaged young woman whose wisdom is among his anchors. His aunt, the woman who raised him after his father murdered his entire family in front of his unbelieving eyes, is his other anchor. He chairs a local suicide survivors' meeting as a way of coping with the overwhelming depression that he barely surfs the curls of.

And then comes Patrick. Well, first comes a looney old homeless guy who stalks him, gives him a weird stone, and dies in front of him (seems to be a trope with this guy, huh?); then comes Patrick the Navy SEAL/CIA agent. Hot, hunky Patrick of the many skills. Sadly, included among the skills is a deep familiarity with how to make people die. Of course, first Patrick has to find them, and he's *very* good at that...too good for it to be chance or coincidence. Hmm. And Patrick's been—incentivized—to find Liam and, well, enough about that.

So Liam meets Patrick and KER-BLAM instalove complete with magic peen! A romance cliche if ever there was one. Ah, ye of little faith. There's method in Author Carter's madness, there is. For Liam is suddenly the Hot Young Thing in the sights of all sorts of people! They are sliding out of the woodwork to get them a piece of Liam. Strangers of astounding physical attractiveness, not just Patrick; strangers who make Liam's skin crawl and provoke violence from him that he had never ever considered himself capable of.

And then there's that magical, mythical side of the story, replete with monsters out of myth and very, very bad hombres with end-of-the-world-y notions that involve all kinds of bloody horrors, families whose sole purpose it has been to keep the bad hombres in their place on the other side of a magical veil, gorgeous men with mystical knowledge galore, and the FBI.

Yep, that FBI. An agent whose role and relationship to Liam and his newly discovered magical side is as yet undefined, but guaranteed to be more than it seems. This is a first-in-series book, so Author Carter is doling out knowledge as you need to know it, but you can't have read for as long as I have and not see the writing on the wall. Agent Zach, Liam, and Patrick are not through with each other, and their connections are not going to be of the simple, straightforward ilk.

Now about the gay male romantic plot. It's there, and it does involve mild sexual content. I do mean mild. Straight readers will only wince if they're eww-ick homophobes. Gay readers won't want to blink too often or they'll miss it. This is, to me at least, a good thing because the love is there for a strong reason and the sex is, as of now, secondary. The sad truth is that I want to shake Liam and shout at him, "just fucking TALK to the man!" And I was practically beating my Kindle on sharp corners as I watched Patrick fuck things up without seeming to think about consequences, which for a covert operator to do stretched my credulity hard.

But this, laddies and gentlewomen, is the first book in a series. There's time for the author to stop using lazy-person tricks and get to the real sources of conflict between our young men. *pointed stare*

He can't do that, though, if we don't buy his book. Give this to your GBFF who devours fantasy! Give this to your teenaged cousin who can't quite come out yet...there's a scene that'll scare him or her into not wasting time and looking around at the adults in his/er life with new eyes. It's also a good idea to read it yourself, because, well, how do you know how good it is until you absorb its ideas and tells yourself? I recommend it.

THE LAMB WILL SLAUGHTER THE LION, punk trans writer blows old man's mind

THE LAMB WILL SLAUGHTER THE LION
MARGARET KILLJOY (Danielle Cain #1)
Tor.com
$3.99 ebook, $14.99 trade paper, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: Danielle Cain is a queer punk rock traveler, jaded from a decade on the road. Searching for clues about her best friend’s mysterious and sudden suicide, she ventures to the squatter, utopian town of Freedom, Iowa. All is not well in Freedom, however: things went awry after the town’s residents summoned a protector spirit to serve as their judge and executioner.

Danielle shows up in time to witness the spirit—a blood-red, three-antlered deer—begin to turn on its summoners. Danielle and her new friends have to act fast if they’re going to save the town—or get out alive.

THE PUBLISHER PROVIDED ME WITH A REVIEW COPY. THANK YOU.

My Review: ...the fuck did I just read...?

Genderqueer, gay, celibate, punk, anarchist, shaman-magical people find a town and found a stateless collective that they defend by summoning a demon to make the world stay the fuck away.

I think.

Fantasy doesn't get more exciting than this. I'm mortally sick of reading yet another iteration of Lord of the Rings and being told it's New! Different! Amazing! No. It's not. But this? This is new, different, exciting. It even eschews urban fantasy tropes. It's refreshing and I'm eager for the next one, coming out sometime in 2018.

Margaret Killjoy, with your pretty hazel green eyes, you made my reading year. This book is a perfect gift item for the jaded fantasy reader, or the fantasy-resistant reader (me) on your Yule gifting list.

My Young Gentleman Caller picked this book up during his Thanksgiving surprise visit to me. (Hint: If you want to see whether someone is Interested in you not just looking for something from you, bore them. If they hang, they're Interested.) His comments are quoted for y'all's amusement and edification.

The only electric light I saw shone inside a small grocery, which was lit up by its bank of fluorescents. The place was filled with furniture, tools, and food. Well-lettered in red and yellow along the facade were the words: EVERYTHING FOR EVERYONE. A folding sidewalk sign out front read: A FREE MARKET SHOULD MEAN EVERYTHING IS FREE.

YGC: Did you write this? You don't look like a Margaret but it sounds like you.
ME: Nope. Innocent. Though Margaret's got beautiful eyes.
{WE look at @magpiekilljoy on Twitter}
YGC: Appalachia's far enough away.
ME: For what?
YGC: That I don't have to get worried about you wandering off.

"Cuddling sounds nice," I said.

It should have been nice. The moonlight came in through the circular window, and she laid on her back as I nuzzled up with my head on her. It had been months at least since I'd been with anyone, even slept next to anyone, and my skin was alive at her touch. I could hear her steady breath, smell her pheromones. For a moment, just a short peaceful moment, I was able to revel in that simple pleasure.

YGC: That made me feel lonely.
ME: Yeah, me too.
YGC: Feeling lonely doesn't scare me as much since I started reading.
ME:
YGC: *keeps reading*

"I have this wicked crush on you," Brynn continued, "but also I'm celibate, at least for now. So I guess I wanted to just get both of those things out there before I get too hung up on you or lead you on. Also there's a non-zero chance we're both going to get eaten by a demon sometime soon."
"I haven't let anyone in for awhile," I said, after thinking about it. "You're a total badass and you're a babe. I mean, you've got everything I should want. But yeah, walls. Lots of walls.
I probably can't be with anyone while I'm like this."
"A perfect match," she said.
"Indeed."

YGC: *finishes reading aloud, stares at me*
ME: (defensive) What?
YGC: ::eyeroll::
ME: What are you suggesting?! (more defensive)
YGC: *peck*

"Fucking hell," Thursday said. "It's almost like you can't summon otherworldly beings into existence, let them loose on your enemies, and set up a culture of worship around them without people getting all crazy."

YGC: I call bullshit!
ME: On what?
YGC: You totally wrote this! That sounds just like you!
ME: Thanks, I appreciate the compliment, but no I didn't.
YGC: Go know from there's another sarcastic old smartass in the world.
ME: Love you too, ya little pisher.
YGC: *blush*

After he finished the book, it was time for the Young Gentleman Caller to meet up with his friends for whatever sporting event they were going to watch. As he left, I got another peck and a quiet, "I love reading with you."

Margaret Killjoy, you ROCK!!

THE CHAINS OF THEIR SINS, fourth Taking Shield space opera

THE CHAINS OF THEIR SINS
ANNA BUTLER
Glass Hat Press
$3.99 various ebook platforms, available now

Rating: As near 5 stars as dammit, so 5 out of five

The Publisher Says: Shield Captain Bennet arrives on the Gyrfalcon to take up his final year's posting before returning to the Shield Regiment after his rotation out.

On the Gyrfalcon he faces up to the fallout from Makepeace—ethical, political and above all, personal. Will he be able to accept necessity: that knowing what the Maess are up to outweighs the humanitarian issues surrounding the prisoners he rescued from Makepeace? Can he ride out the political furore that follows the loss of the dreadnought Caliban? How will he cope with an entire year of serving under his father, Caeden? And worst of all, how in the name of every god in the Pantheon can he stand to see Flynn every single day, with the Fraternisation Regs standing between them and keeping them apart?

It will be an interesting year. Bennet can hardly wait for it to be over. Of course, things never really do go to plan...

THE AUTHOR PROVIDED ME WITH DIGITAL ARCs FOR WHICH I THANK HER. I THINK.

My Review: Yes, yes, yes, I get it, you're tired of Noble Self-Sacrifice and Dutiful Self-Abnegation. Believe me so am I. I want Bennet to unbend his starchy spine, I want Flynn to throw his man onto the bed and have his way with him, I want this endless tease to end already and, need I say it?, with these wonderful men TOGETHER. So why the Full Five, since that sounds like a pretty big bitch? Because Author Butler made me care. I'm a cynical old man, and she made me invest actual energy in her world, her vision of humanity, and her still-struggling-with-society bisexual male leads.

But these men are showing us real, believable responses to having your back against the ultimate wall: Extinguishment. Erasure. End as final as it gets. Not your personal death, nothing so small as that; the end of your world and your culture, the death of untold numbers of your friends and family and lovers and all the strangers you can't hope to meet, know, love.

It's repression or catatonic dissociation, and there's way too much to do for such self-indulgence. And Bennet can't ever allow himself to forget the Holy Trinity of his entire life: Duty. Honor. Service. His inner life is a shambles, he's never ever again going to sleep a dreamless night after the horrors of Makepeace are burned on his brain, and he refuses to compromise his entire life's foundations to seek the comfort available to him in the love of his man, Flynn.

Or does he...?

Well, that dangling thread aside, this fourth excursion into the lives of Bennet and Flynn is deeply painful. Losses mount as the war being fought for humanity's survival drags on. The Maess, whose very appearance is unknown to humanity before Bennet's very brief sighting of what he presumes is an organic Maess back in Gyrfalcon, are clearly not going to give up their war of extermination. Their actions in this book are startling even to me. The tactics are obscure, the strategy cloudy. In the end, the danger to humanity makes the last scene of the book make all the sense in the world. But the fifth volume, Day of Wrath, had better bring some clarity to befuddled fans; and let's not forget that Happily Ever After for Flynn and Bennet, eh what, Author Butler?

England's smaller than the Texas county I grew up in, and I'm ready to go Full American Nutter to get what I want.

MAKEPEACE, third in the Taking Shield space opera series

MAKEPEACE
ANNA BUTLER (Taking Shield #3)
Glass Hat Press
$3.99 various ebook platforms, available now

Rating: 4.almost-...oh hell, make it five of five

The Publisher Says: Returning to duty following his long recovery from the injuries he sustained during the events recounted in Heart Scarab, Shield Captain Bennet accepts a tour of duty in Fleet as flight captain on a dreadnought. The one saving grace is that it isn’t his father’s ship—bad enough that he can’t yet return to the Shield Regiment, at least he doesn’t have the added stress of commanding former lover Fleet Lieutenant Flynn, knowing the Fraternisation Regulations will keep them apart.

Working on the material he collected himself on T18 three years before, Bennet decodes enough Maess data to send him behind the lines to Makepeace, once a human colony but under Maess control for more than a century. The mission goes belly up, costing Albion one of her precious, irreplaceable dreadnoughts and bringing political upheaval, acrimony and the threat of public unrest in its wake. But for Bennet, the real nightmare is discovering what the Maess have in store for humanity.

It’s not good. It’s not good at all.

THE AUTHOR PROVIDED ME WITH DIGITAL ARCs FOR WHICH I THANK HER. I THINK.

My Review: What makes a series work for me is the way the author handles the characters whose lives need to feel real enough to make me go with the unreality of fiction. A series of novels, stories, television episodes...all the same standard. Make me care, make me believe, or make your goodbyes as I move on to greener pastures.

Okay, I surrender. I am officially Author Butler's fanboy. The series has me by the eyelashes and I'm eager to dive into book four, The Chains of Their Sins.

A warning for those who follow me down this rabbit-hole: Do not buy the books one at a time. When you get to the ending of this book, you will be very frustrated if the next book isn't already queued up.

I am an old-time fan of space opera. I like the sweep of a long story. I adore space battles (I'm a guy, shut up). Tech talk isn't up there with dirty flirty but it's close. I want to be told stories that make sense (not necessarily in a straight line you understand, just make sense please) and I like 'em set in space because SPACE my goddesses what could possibly be more interesting?! I mean in fact as well as fiction. And I'm also a big old mushball and want my heroes to find love because heroes have hearts too. Sexytimes are fine, but I *need* my men to fall in love as well as get 'em some or why not just watch porn. (For the sake of argument, you understand.)

So here I am telling you to buy the series, ye fans of SF and ye readers of love-novels but not expecting sex or romance-novel level involvement in our hero's world. He is the hero, the story isn't totally about him, and his world is rich and densely packed with great stuff.

It isn't perfect, of course, but I'll accept the flaws for the great parts.

I'm also really excited by the major development of this book's self-contained plot arc, regarding the military future of Albion.

HEART SCARAB, second entry in the Taking Shield space opera series

HEART SCARAB
ANNA BUTLER
Glass Hat Press
$3.99 various ebook platforms, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: Shield Captain Bennet is on Telnos, a unpleasant little planet inhabited by religious fanatics and unregistered miners running illegal solactinium mines. It’s about to be about to be overrun by the Maess. Bennet’s job is to get out as many civilians as he can, but the enemy arrives before the evacuation is complete. Caught in a vicious fire fight, Bennet is left behind, presumed dead.

His family is grieving. Joss, his long-term partner, grieves with them; lost, unhappy, remorseful. First Lieutenant Flynn has no official ‘rights’ here. He isn’t family. He isn’t partner or lover.

All he is, is broken.

THE AUTHOR PROVIDED ME WITH DIGITAL ARCs FOR WHICH I THANK HER. I THINK.

My Review: Author Butler takes us deeper into the life of Shield Captain Bennet, eighteen months following the events on Maess-held planet T18 and on board the Gyrfalcon. As Bennet performs his duty to evacuate illegal religious-fanatic colonists on Telnos, soon to be behind Maess—the faceless, unknown aliens winning a war of annihilation against humanity's great-to-the-10th-power grandchildren—lines, he obsesses over his failing relationship with his elegant, worldly lover Joss; his burgeoning love for Pilot Flynn stationed on his father's ship the Gyrfalcon; and his patient, long-suffering Lieutenant Rosie listens to him and moons and pines for him completely unheeded, unnoticed, unconsidered for the position she (along with the rest of humanity, I'd guess) craves: Bennet's lover.

But that's just the beginning of Bennet's troubles at Author Butler's hands.

And that's why I read space opera: Pile the troubles on with the highest-possible stakes! Then make the stakes personal! Then by gawd create some scary aliens with a baseless grudge and an attitude, some super-advanced tech that is actually just like what we have now on steroids so I can get it without over-physics-ing my brain and thereby losing propulsive interest in the story.

Why I read this space opera is simple: gay guy. Bennet flies in the face of humanity's one apparently eternal character flaw, religious belief, to live his truth as a man who loves men. Add to that his father's strong religious convictions and his family's long tradition of the apparently eternally homophobic military service, his older lover's patrician disdain for exactly *how* his luxurious lifestyle is maintained, and military anti-fraternization rules that Bennet takes very seriously and that prevent him from pursuing his new love for Flynn, and you have a witches' brew of good drama.

Still very little sex. Very little indeed. And what there is is non-graphic by today's standards. More than in Gyrfalcon, I think, though I haven't done a statistical analysis. I can assure the eww-ick squeamish that no unpleasantly meaty words are used and with a small effort of intentional misunderstanding the import of the few sexual scenes can be contextualized as emotional intimacies that can't be expressed in any other way without falseness. Who here hasn't had what you *knew* was break-up sex while pretending the pleasures of a familiar touch were, after all, enough? Yeah, me too, and so does Bennet when the flypaper and prayers that've kept Joss in his life finally blow apart under the final assault: Death.

Bennet, you see, has the bad taste and rude vigor to return from the dead. It's just...unseemly. And after Joss, in the manner of their people, has made sacrifices of his and Bennet's treasures, some of the perfect and glorious antiquities Joss (archaeologist by training) offered up to the gods for Bennet (ancient historian by academic training) to use in the Field of Reeds, back comes Bennet hale and hearty and not in the Field of Reeds at all! The...the...joy? embarrassment? confusion? of it all.

And that "hale and hearty" is solely a valid description when matched against "dead and rotting on an alien-held planet." Bennet is in shards, physically and psychically and emotionally. His body will heal slowly, his psyche and emotions might or might not heal at all ever, and he might well never get to use his new bionic knee back in his deeply loved Shield role. A soldier who's too broken to soldier is by definition A Very Unhappy Man. Add to this soldier's woes the emotional mismatch between himself and his partner. The immense, irresistible force of falling in love with the right one. The awful reality of wartime military service meaning unavoidable separation from your lover.

*happy sigh*

I will say my wish (expressed in my review of Gyrfalcon) to get to sympathize with poor overmatched Joss came true. I was sad for him as he was hollowed out by loss and the hideous, regret-charged acid bath that is grief. All the times one falls short, one is unkind impatient unwilling to understand or empathize...oh gods and goddesses those will keep a soul awake and agonized as they replay unchanging and unchangeable in the darkness! But far more painful is the way they play out like movies on a screen while living, breathing people are making noises meant to distract—console—reach you when you are in the locked projection booth of your failings as the movie of your life replays in an endless loop.

Yes, Joss, I know that one. Author Butler was cruel to you. Goodness knows you deserved it, but...well...don't we all.

And the ending of this story is fascinating. It is unusual within the genre of gay-male-centered fiction. I will read the next installment of Taking Shield, called Makepeace, as soon as I've caught my breath and begun to accept the changes wrought on my feelings already.

Which, if I need to say it, is the hallmark of a really good read.

GYRFALCON, first entry in the Taking Shield space opera series

GYRFALCON
ANNA BUTLER (Taking Shield #1)
Glass Hat Press
FREE!! various ebook platforms, available now

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Publisher Says: Earth’s a dead planet, dark for thousands of years; lost for so long no one even knows where the solar system is. Her last known colony, Albion, has grown to be regional galactic power in its own right. But its drive to expand and found colonies of its own has threatened an alien race, the Maess, against whom Albion is now fighting a last-ditch battle for survival in a war that’s dragged on for generations.

It’s not certain anyone has ever seen a true Maess. They have seen drones: cyborgs animated by a small neural node of organic cells. The first drones the humans met (more than a century previously) were not humanoid in shape but, as the war progresses, the Maess start to produce human-shaped drones.

Taking Shield charts the missions and adventures of Shield Captain Bennet, scion of a prominent military family. Bennet, also an analyst with the Military Strategy Unit, will uncover crucial data about the Maess to help with the war effort. Against the demands of his family’s ‘triple goddess’ of Duty, Honour and Service, is set Bennet’s relationships with lovers and family. When the series opens, Bennet is at odds with his long term partner, Joss, who wants him out of the military and back in an academic, archaeological career. He’s estranged from his father, Caeden, who is the commander of Fleet’s First Flotilla. Events of the first book, in which he is sent to his father’s ship to carry out an infiltration mission behind Maess lines, improve his relationship with Caeden, but bring with them the catalyst that will destroy the one with Joss: one Fleet Lieutenant Flynn, who, over the course of the series, develops into Bennet’s main love interest

Over the Taking Shield arc, Bennet will see the extremes to which humanity’s enemies and his own people, will go to win the war. Some days he isn’t able to tell friend from foe. Some days he doubts everything, including himself, as he strives to ensure Albion’s victory. And some days he isn’t sure, any longer, what victory looks like.

THE AUTHOR PROVIDED ME WITH DIGITAL ARCs FOR WHICH I THANK HER. I THINK.

My Review: A classic space opera with a father-and-son reunion that starts a healing process for both men, a crappy demanding spouse whose selfish demands are his undoing, and two worthy mates who, against every single probability in this or any other time, find each other.

This is how you can tell it's fiction.

The space opera part takes up ⅔ of the book. It's really a lot of fun, and any SF fan who loved/s Battlestar Galactica (the 2004 iteration) and The Expanse owes it to themselves to try the first one out. You'll make it if you squint through the sex scene. That's right: One (1) mild sex scene and a good deal of falling in love.

A quibble I have is that I'd like to like poor Joss, Bennet's husband, at least a little bit. As it stands he's a maelstrom of selfishness, shrieking at Bennet as soon as Bennet dares to be one little bit his authentic self. What would it cost to add a little appealing lovingkindness to appear? It's not clear to me, from the man I see on the page, why a muffin like Bennet would've fallen in love with Joss at all.

A minor, minor point when matched against the manifold pleasures of the Taking Shield universe's character developments, background developments, and involving overall arc of story. I am delighted that these second Kindle editions have addressed the earliest reviewers' concerns about some repetitive language etc etc. I found no evidence of such failings in this tale.

Of special interest to me as an old gay man is the relationship Bennet builds with his father, tentatively, in this book. The old man blew his stack when he found Bennet snogging the much older man he would end up married in all but law to; that human failing homophobia was not bred out of us as we went to the stars, depressingly enough. That set off a decade's coldness between father and son that Author Butler has the sense and grace to give Caeden a shot at redemption. He essentially forces the unwilling Bennet to listen to his side of that awful story: He was wrong, he admits he was wrong, and he apologizes.

A dream come true. Any of us who lived through such an event know that this is the emotional core of the series right there. A man coming to terms with his father's love, imperfectly expressed, bone deep, and all encompassing, is an evergreen story. Author Butler gives both father and son the opportunity to speak their piece, and affords her readers the chance to let out that deeply held breath. For many this point of catharsis would be enough value to make purchasing the entire series worthwhile.

But the satisfaction of reading about Bennet's struggles and problems, so personal, so universal, as a gay son of an unhappy parent, a loving spouse to a demanding partner, a starved lover with unmet needs who is surprised by the joy he never thought he was missing...these are the hooks that could, if you'll allow them around your defenses against thoughts that aren't easy for you to relate to, bind you to the series arc for a really satisfying read.

There is so much more to savor.