Rating: 
Summary: A Masturbatory Potboiler
Review: We can settle without too much trouble the question of whether this is a good novel or not. Simply put, it isn't. We're tempted to say this is like a Tom Clancy book with aliens as the enemies instead of terrorists, drug cartels, or ambitious foreign countries. In keeping with the more typical Tom Clancy style of prose, this author is a veritable windbag of military jargon, military in-jokes, long digressions into the history and/or mechanics of certain weapons or war technologies, and so forth. Though the "Mike O'Neil" character essentially plays off as the main character, the author here opts for an almost unlimited number of tag-team narrators and characters, so many that we can hardly pause to get emotionally attached to a single one: and they all eventually sound the same. Tom Clancy and his many imitators at least usually know when to quit when it comes to this stuff - this author doesn't seem to.It seems as if the author is writing mostly to please himself - though admittedly, the overload of arcane military content will likely please the few veterans and reservists not turned off by the sci-fi orientation of the book, and the sci-fi fans who find in this military flavor a pleasing departure from the usual boilerplate may like it as well.
Rating: 
Summary: Best in Class of Sweeping Alien Invasion
Review: With all respect to David Drake and the "Slammers", David Weber's "Honor Harrington Series", Eric Fint's "1632" or the "Mother of Demons" and Harry Turtledoves Alternate History of Alien Invasion in Work War II, all of which I dearly love, John Ringo's Gust Front is the very best SF techno thriller Alien versus human warfare novel I have ever read. Four things strike me about this series: 1. Ringo is very relalistic about the multiple and perhaps divious motivations of our erstwhile "alien" allies and their intrigues as a background to the Story. 2. The hero and his family;The O' Neals are beliveable and do things a real family would in the crisis. 3. The battle scenes; the description of confusion and the awful reality of war are depicted in as real a detail as my memory serves. 4. The insistance by the leadership namely the President to commit forces in head on up protected attack against the polseen depspite all evidence to the contrary really jives with my personal experience with all upper mangement types putting politics before common sense. I am glad the character paid with his life; would that all such cratures meet the same fate. I cannot wait for the next sequel: Mike has lost his wife what will he do?; What is the next chapter in Cally's upbringing?; What is the Monseignor really doing with the Indowy?; Will the new President be up to the task?. This is a great story everyone and anyone who has enjoyed Drake, Weber, Fint, or Turtledove should rush to buy this series and get ready for Ringo's next edition.
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