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Title: Warlord by David Drake, S.M. Stirling ISBN: 0-7434-3587-7 Publisher: Baen Books Pub. Date: 01 February, 2003 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $24.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.57 (7 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: First half of the classic "General" series
Comment: This collection reprints the early campaigns of Raj Whitehall on the planet Bellevue. The series takes place far in the future, as the remnants of humanity who survived a galactic civil war try to claw back toward civilization. Raj's people worship technology, quite literaly, and this leads a surviving battle computer of the old Federation to give them aid in unifying the planet.
This framing story isn't terribly important, however. The books that make up this series are about the campaigns to unify Bellevue, and the soldiers that fight in them. This is very good military science fiction, full of strongly drawn characters smacking the heck out of each other. The battles are written with energy and verve, the names of characters and places are in-jokes half the time, and the authors make clear their opinion that politics is more dangerous than open warfare.
The authors shamelessly pilfer ideas from different eras of military history in order to tell a good story. The military technology used falls somewhere between the US Civil war and the first World War; with bolt/lever action repeating rifles and breach loading field cannon. The campaigns are modeled after those faught by the Roman General Bellisarius (sometimes leading to confusion between this series and Drake's "Bellisarius" novels). The tactics used by Raj are closer to those of the British armies in the Napoleonic wars, with weapons a century advanced over Wellington's.
Raj also has the advantage that most of the time his enemies are Medieval in weaponry & tactics, simplifying his job a bit. Still, his government is so stingy in the troops it gives him that he always ends up vastly outnumbered and barely able to win the day.
Like I said; it's really good military science fiction...
I almost begrudge the fifth star in my rating because of a poor job in typesetting in this edition, but it doesn't seriously detract from the story.
Rating: 5
Summary: Building a Solid Reputation
Comment: Warlord is the first omnibus edition in the General series, containing the first and second novels. Eleven centuries after the Fall of the interstellar civilization called the Federation of Man, the planet Bellevue is in a downward spiral toward barbarism. The Civil Government controls only a portion of the planet and has been pushed out of the Old Residence, the original capital. Other areas are controlled by the Squadron, the Brigade, and the Colony.
Raj Whitehall is an officer in the army of the Civil Government of Holy Federation. He has recently been promoted to Captain for his role in suppressing rioting in the streets. He and his friend Thom Poplanich, a scion of the previous imperial dynasty, were exploring the catacombs under the Governor's palace when they found a Sector Command and Control Unit, a pre-Fall military/political computer facility.
The Center has been trying to break the downward slide of civilization, but lacked a suitable agent. It offered the ambitious young officer the chance of a military career beyond his wildest dreams if he allowed it to advise him; when Raj agreed, it provided the capability of instant mental communication by voice and pictures to and from Raj. When Raj returned to his duties, Center would present him with detailed, lifelike scenarios for various projected actions.
Center calculated that Thom would be executed when the Governor's heir took the throne, so he was retained in suspension within the Center, learning the skills of governing.
In The Forge (1991), the first novel in the series, Raj is given command of the Fifth Descott Guards, a hill unit from his homeland, during a coordinated feint with other Civil Government forces against the Colony borderlands. Raj has proposed the feint to force the Colony to react to a perceived raid and thus reconsider their plans to invade Civil Government lands.
In The Hammer (1992), the second novel in the series, Raj commands the Expeditionary Force attempting to retake the Southern Territories.
This series was created by Drake and fleshed out by Stirling. It was loosely based on the career of Belisarius, the Eastern Roman Empire general, who may have been the best fighting general in all history. Belisarius came to the attention of the current Emperor when he crushed the Nika rioters. His nemesis was the Imperial heir, and subsequent Emperor, Justinian, who was a brilliant administrator, but a poor general, and who saw Belisarius as a rival for the throne. Thus, Justinian repeatly set up Belisarius for failure, yet somehow the general kept winning.
The story of Belisarius has fascinated many people down through the ages and several other SF works have been inspired by his life. None, however, has ever generated the same degree of wonder as the original. This series, however, comes close.
Recommended for Stirling & Drake fans and anyone else who enjoys military SF set in a early industrial milieau.
Rating: 5
Summary: Unusual demand
Comment: For the last year or so, if you look on amazon for the Hammer and the Forge, books 1 and 2 in Stirling's General series, you might have noticed something unusual. They were marked as out of print, with book 2 selling from $ upwards, used. Similarly for books 3 to 5. This is very atypical for paperbacks published in the last 12 years. Typically, a used paperback of this "vintage" will go for 50 cents or so. Take a look for your favourite recent paperbacks and see for yourself. (Book 1 has been continually in print.) Quite striking. Because these prices are not determined by the publisher or bookseller, but by the independent secondary market.
Apparently, Baen (the publisher) underestimated the demand. I have also found that at least in Los Angeles, the used bookstores rarely have the General books in stock. It may well be that as Stirling's commercial successes grew in the 90s, so did demand for his backlist.
Baen has decided to assuage this demand, and strike for higher margins, by reissuing the series as 2 hardcovers. Good for them!
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Title: Crown Of Slaves by David Weber, Eric Flint ISBN: 0743471482 Publisher: Baen Books Pub. Date: 01 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $25.00 |
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Title: Empire From the Ashes by David Weber ISBN: 0743435931 Publisher: Baen Books Pub. Date: 01 March, 2003 List Price(USD): $25.00 |
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Title: The Chosen (The Raj Whitehall Series, Book 6) by S. M. Stirling, David Drake ISBN: 0671877240 Publisher: Baen Books Pub. Date: June, 1996 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: The Reformer (The Raj Whitehall Series, Book 7) by S. M. Stirling, David Drake ISBN: 067157860X Publisher: Baen Books Pub. Date: April, 2000 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: The Tyrant (The Raj Whitehall Series, Book 8) by Eric Flint, James P. Baen, James Baen ISBN: 0743471504 Publisher: Baen Books Pub. Date: 01 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $7.99 |
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