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_Survival_ (Species Imperative #1), Julie Czerneda. (First book in a trilogy)
_Lost fleet : Dauntless_ , Jack Campbell. (First book in a series)
_Ragamuffin_, Tobias Buckell (Second book in a universe. More? Please!)
Three winners, sharing some interesting elements.
I got about fifteen pages into Buckell's first book, _Crystal Rain_, and put it down. It wasn't working for me. Now I am inspired to pick it up again. _Ragamuffin_ is a sequel, apparently set a few years later, and is high-quality non-expository space opera. That's right, not a single infodump in the book. The aliens are really alien, too. I think there's a bunch of spoilers for _Crystal Rain_, but I now feel more inclined to read it rather than less. Wormhole FTL.
Jack Campbell is a pen name for John Hemry, who wrote a four-part JAG-in-Space series that I quite enjoyed. _Lost Fleet_ is a naval military-political-action thriller, well-written and flavorful. Wormholes and "Hypernet" FTL.
_Survival_ is biology SF. Interesting premise: Earth is a full member of an interstellar FTL wormhole-linked community, and is neither a dominant force nor a poor relation. The community is not at war. Trade is brisk at the consumer and industrial levels. Earth has largely deindustrialized (in favor of orbital factories and asteroid mines) and environmental protection is a major policy-driver. Population pressure does not appear to be extreme. Civil liberties are at roughly 20th-Century Canadian levels. Technology is well-advanced. In short, if it weren't for the Awful Terrible Secret that is exposed in this book, it would be a very pleasant place to live.
_Lost fleet : Dauntless_ , Jack Campbell. (First book in a series)
_Ragamuffin_, Tobias Buckell (Second book in a universe. More? Please!)
Three winners, sharing some interesting elements.
I got about fifteen pages into Buckell's first book, _Crystal Rain_, and put it down. It wasn't working for me. Now I am inspired to pick it up again. _Ragamuffin_ is a sequel, apparently set a few years later, and is high-quality non-expository space opera. That's right, not a single infodump in the book. The aliens are really alien, too. I think there's a bunch of spoilers for _Crystal Rain_, but I now feel more inclined to read it rather than less. Wormhole FTL.
Jack Campbell is a pen name for John Hemry, who wrote a four-part JAG-in-Space series that I quite enjoyed. _Lost Fleet_ is a naval military-political-action thriller, well-written and flavorful. Wormholes and "Hypernet" FTL.
_Survival_ is biology SF. Interesting premise: Earth is a full member of an interstellar FTL wormhole-linked community, and is neither a dominant force nor a poor relation. The community is not at war. Trade is brisk at the consumer and industrial levels. Earth has largely deindustrialized (in favor of orbital factories and asteroid mines) and environmental protection is a major policy-driver. Population pressure does not appear to be extreme. Civil liberties are at roughly 20th-Century Canadian levels. Technology is well-advanced. In short, if it weren't for the Awful Terrible Secret that is exposed in this book, it would be a very pleasant place to live.
