Saturday, August 3, 2019

Love, it's a burning thing and it makes a firey ring

Twofer tonight, although both will likely be shorter entries. (Got delayed by taking a vacation last week.)

Starting off with Pass of Fire by Taylor Anderson, the latest installment of his alternate Earth Destroyermen series.

This volume has been a long time coming, since it marks the beginning of an actual naval assault on the Holy Dominion is a volcanically active area where Costa Rica/Panama would be in our world. Mind you, 2/3 of the book covers what looks to be about the end of the Grik conflict, but hey, at least we're getting more than a few pages in the prologue and epilogue about what's going on in Central America.

But first, we begin with teh big risks taken to take the ancient Grik city at the head of the Zambezi river, and the rather large split between the current Celestial Mother and First Regent Esshk. Indeed, by the end, the Celestial Mother forms a very strange alliance with the Allies to take down her former champion after his partisians try to kill her.

In the mean time, the assault on South America gets going as the Allied forces try to break the pass and link up all parties in the Pacific with the New United States in the Gulf. This gets particularly ugly, as the Holy Dominion likes using children to run attacks. On the other hand, one of the solutions for clearing out the Dominion Navy is one of those grand moments akin to a Dresden moment where an animated T. Rex skeleton goes on a rampage.

By the end, the Allies are pulling most of their assets out of Africa to join the South American fight, while know one knows what Halik (last seen marching through Persia from India) is going to do when he arrives. The fascist League is mobilizing some of its navy to join the fight in South America while one of their ship has been sighted taking out transports in the Pass.

It's a good installment in the series, allowing for some focus shifting, which is most welcome.

No comments:

Post a Comment