Rating: 
Summary: Nice action, psychology after very slow start
Review: After a busted mission, the mostly human Deep Reconnaissance Team stumbles across an ancient artifact--working technology from the vanished Aldenata aliens. The Captain plans on returning it to base, getting the bonus and commendations that come from such an important find--but a billion credits worth of alien technology is enough to tempt a saint and the DRT is definitely not made up of saints. When one member frags the others, the three survivors must battle it out for survival and for a chance at the billion credit prize. Unfortunately, none can trust either of the others and the stage is set for a brutal three-way battle to stay alive in a dangerous and enemy-occupied planet. THE HERO starts painfully slowly, with history lectures, anti-environmental statements, and a military mission that wasn't really going anywhere. But in the second half, once the artifact is discovered and the true conflict begins, the pace picks up, characters have a chance to become fully defined, and the real story takes place. Authors John Ringo and Michael Z. Williamson know their military and write convincingly of both military tactics and of the friction between front-line soldiers and the officers in the rear. The Bane Sidhe Elf (Darhel alien) adds interest with his combination of extreme physical skills and his inability to kill. The sociopathic human killer with a the superior sniper rifle, an eagerness to kill, and an unstoppable greed seems to have all of the advantages in the three-way struggle. Although I wish that Ringo and Williamson had condensed the first hundred pages, the second half of the book definitely makes it worth reading. Ferret, the wounded soldier who must track down and kill both the elf and the killer makes a fascinating character and Tirdal the Elf, with his difficulties in causing violence definitely gives the story a twist.
Rating: 
Summary: Not very original
Review: I'm a big fan of military SF books and movies, and this book was a little disappointing. This was because the plot was thin, and I got a sense of "I've read this book before..." feel from the book,but mostly the book was not very interesting. For example, (without giving too much away), one of the characters betrays the rest of the team for reasons there were...well, not original. Out of all the reasons the authors could have used for a book that was set in the future, the character's motivation was not original. I really wanted to like this book, but I couldn't. On a positive note, I thought the military culture written in the book was well written. When references were made about their troop movements, or their weapons, it kind of reminded me of the "Starship Troopers" movie.
Rating:
Summary: The Bane Sidhe
Review: If you have any familiarity with John Ringo's "Legacy of the Aldeenta" series, then the Bane Sidhe is familiar territory. 1,000 years after the Posleen invasion of Earth (see A Hymn Before Battle by John Ringo), the Bane Sidhe is the opposite of what the Darhel, manipulators of human beings for so long, are and represent. Slowly building to a climactic ending, the cat and mouse chase near the end of the book is one of the most well-written scenes in recent memory. Ringo and Williamson know how to work together harmoniously. Watch for the sequels if Baen Books Publishing picks up the option for the final two books, which both authors have expressed a desire to write.
Rating:
Summary: The Bane Sidhe
Review: If you have any familiarity with John Ringo's "Legacy of the Aldeenta" series, then the Bane Sidhe is familiar territory. 1,000 years after the Posleen invasion of Earth (see A Hymn Before Battle by John Ringo), the Bane Sidhe is the opposite of what the Darhel, manipulators of human beings for so long, are and represent. Slowly building to a climactic ending, the cat and mouse chase near the end of the book is one of the most well-written scenes in recent memory. Ringo and Williamson know how to work together harmoniously. Watch for the sequels if Baen Books Publishing picks up the option for the final two books, which both authors have expressed a desire to write.
Rating: 
Summary: Just Barely OK.
Review: If you've read Ringo's other books about the legacy of the Aldenata, you probably know why this book should be more than OK. I'll tell you why I thought it was lacking. First of all, the characters were never people I could care about - well - maybe Ferret. I would have liked to know Tirdal's motivation regarding the artifact before the very frickin' end, and a good bit more information about the Darhel in general. The intro took way too long. There were also the story holes that never got filled in. Why didn't Tirdal ever need the enzymes from the camp? What the heck are the Bane Sidhe? Why are they special? Why were the local carnivores only dangerous at just the right moments of the story? The real problem comes back to the fact that none of the major characters ever became real people to me.
Rating:
Summary: Williamson's First Outing with Ringo: Okay...
Review: Mad Mike Williamson followed a terrific first novel (Freehold) with a collaboration with John Ringo that is only so-so. It suffers from the old Hawaiian disease lakaeditin and should be about 100 pages shorter. There was a terrific opportunity to delve further into the psychology and physiology of the Darhel, hereditary enemies (maybe) of humanity, aka the Elves, and it was a little disappointing to see how superficially Williamson and Ringo treated it. Overall, the book was good, just not up to Williamson or Ringo's previous best.
Rating: 
Summary: Tight, well-written action with plenty of one-liners.
Review: The first collaboration between multiple-NYT bestseller John Ringo and Mike Williamson, the author of the seminal <i>Freehold</i>, I expected Hero to be pretty good. It is. Technically, Hero isn't the fifth Posleen book; it's the first post-Posleen book, set about a millenium after the Posleen war and long after its aftermath. There are a few allusions to distant-past stuff that presumably will happen in future "continuum" books, but not enough to constitute spoilers. What we do have, though, is the series' first Darhel character - a soldier, no less. Darhel are unable to kill; this one has to. There's a normal "nice-guy" character, who surprisingly isn't the main viewpoint character. And there's a human psychopath. No Posleen, no other aliens although they are alluded to. Williamson knows snipers and knows sniping; he's the author, I hear, of a forthcoming sniper trilogy. Whatever research was done for those books is reflected here, along with some fairly astute social observations and a handful of brilliant one-liners. Not a sweeping multithreaded epic of world conquest as you might expect from a Posleen book - but a very, <i>very</i> tight and well-written novel of action and suspense. You want this one.
Rating:
Summary: Tight, well-written action with plenty of one-liners.
Review: The first collaboration between multiple-NYT bestseller John Ringo and Mike Williamson, the author of the seminal Freehold, I expected Hero to be pretty good. It is. Technically, Hero isn't the fifth Posleen book; it's the first post-Posleen book, set about a millenium after the Posleen war and long after its aftermath. There are a few allusions to distant-past stuff that presumably will happen in future "continuum" books, but not enough to constitute spoilers. What we do have, though, is the series' first Darhel character - a soldier, no less. Darhel are unable to kill; this one has to. There's a normal "nice-guy" character, who surprisingly isn't the main viewpoint character. And there's a human psychopath. No Posleen, no other aliens although they are alluded to. Williamson knows snipers and knows sniping; he's the author, I hear, of a forthcoming sniper trilogy. Whatever research was done for those books is reflected here, along with some fairly astute social observations and a handful of brilliant one-liners. Not a sweeping multithreaded epic of world conquest as you might expect from a Posleen book - but a very, very tight and well-written novel of action and suspense. You want this one.
Rating:
Summary: Gripping!
Review: The Hero is a top-rate action novel set 1000 years in the future of John Ringo's "Legacy of the Aldenata" universe. Williamson, the primary writer, does a fantastic job of creating engaging characters and keeping the pace of the story quick enough that you have a hard time putting the book down. His combat scenes are top-notch, gritty, and realistic.
If the book has any weakness, it's that Ringo hasn't fully revealed his Aldenata universe to us, and that Williamson is unable to flesh the novel out with the backstory of the thousand year gap to save room for future novels set earlier in the universe.
If you are able to look beyond that limitation, the book is incredibly enjoyable, well written, and just a plain fun read.
Rating:
Summary: Mud, muck, bugs and betrayal
Review: The Hero is set in John Ringo's Aldenada universe, but well after the initial series. In The Hero, we see the universe after the Posleen invasion is stopped. Things are awry. The distant human systems have split from Earth's hegemony, with a wide philosophic gulf between them. Another alien invasion is in progress. The Darhel have survived -- just barely. This is the story of a special ops team with a Darhel soldier. The Darhel race cannot kill and survive. This one can. A soldier who has secrets within secrets. The story goes from tightly paced action to doldrums -- just what happens in the field. The tension level is high throughout. There are giant bugs -- real ones, not the stuff of a badly made SF movie -- who are impervious to most weapons, inhabiting a planet that is both dull and deadly. The team's mission is critical. One is a traitor. One is a hero. One wants to survive. Only one can. The ending is surprising -- until the last few pages the reader doesn't know how it will come out. If you like military SF or cliff-hangers, you'll like this.
| 
