Rating: 
Summary: In the beginning there was . . .
Review: This book is the beginning of a series which has the potential of making a truly remarkable universe. Although it has been criticised for not being well executed (literary) it makes up for those failings by being consistently paced. Many of the sub-plots are wrapped up in later books of this series, giving the satisfaction fo seeing minor characters & plots wrapped into the whole.John Ringo does seem to have a common problem, that of modeling the main character on himself and his experiences. As he progresses in his writing the character moves away from being an alter ego and developes into a solid creation. Definitely a 'keeper' that will become a mainstay of the Military SF world. Then again, if you are more into 'feel-good' novels where all the stories are Pollyana clean and tied up like Star Trek episodes will be disappointed.
Rating: 
Summary: Beginning Author
Review: While this is Mr. Ringo's first effort, it is in no way a poor one. While the author does tend to jump around between [seemingly] unconnected characters and plot lines, the book possesses an overall fun disposition. As many of the other reviewers have noted, the plot line to "Hymn" is not the most original. It does however maintain it's individuality in it's handling and it's characters. Mr. Ringo does an excellent job breathing fresh life into old veins. Aside from purely literary criticism, there are few faults. For example, the employment of a 50 caliber sniper rifle in the book is misleading, as are some of the other military "facts". Finally, Mr. Ringo's bias against military officers is plainly visible in the book. He repeatedly reiterates how incompletent senior officers are while praising virutally every enlisted man. Lastly, if you're only reading this for combat, you're reading the wrong book. The book spends a small time in actual combat, mostly dealing with preparations for the series. The next book, "Gust Front" is much more focused on action. Overall, the book is wonderful and I have reread it more times than I care to count. No matter the blemishes, Mr. Ringo writes an exciting and engaging novel designed to please Military SF fans. Good job Mr. Ringo!
Rating:
Summary: Good space warfare book
Review: The negative points that other reviewers made are valid. Still, I enjoyed very much the gruesome fighting and destruction depicted in this book. The war tactics and strategies were fairly interesting. The second book was a big dissappointment so I stopped reading this series.
Rating: 
Summary: An obvious first try.
Review: This book suffers more than anything from the fact that it is the author's first book. The story jumps around between groups and time, in a somewhat jumbled manner, only to have the focus shift and stay on one primary engagement towards the end. This forgoes almost all of the other story threads until a "summary" at the end. About half way through, some great thing is revealed about the Darhel to a US government official, only to never touch on what is revealed again. Some of the writing is bogged down in military lingo. And I have gotten weary of SF where the leadership can do only wrong. My own world has enough incompetents in it that I don't want to read about more of them. I did not realize until the end that this was the first in a series. So when I finished it, I was thoroughly irritated that so many things were left hanging. There are better examples on how to write series books; perhaps he should pay more attention to Weber. Overall I have to say that this book feels as though it was written straight through; without a lot of outlining or planning.
Rating: 
Summary: Doesn't measure up
Review: I give the book one star for decent grammer and ability to string together coherent ideas. That's all.
Unfortunately, the characters suffer from one-dimensionality, the pacing is horrible, and the actual plot suffers from boredum induction. The threat, in the book, is dull to the point of extreme - the enemy is, essentially, a mindless mob, goverened by not so clever leaders. They win through superior numbers, nothing more. Battle scenes are similar all through the book - the brave, skilled, highly intelligenct (sometimes) and ultra-high tech armed powered suits of earth kill millions (yes, millions) of them, only to fall through the weight of superior numbers.
The pacing is awful. In the midst of climactic battle sequences, the author will pause to give a dry, two page explanation as to the science behind exactly what is about to happen, when two lines would have sufficed. In addition, detailed scientific descriptions of a kill vie for attention with people being blown to 'goop'.
Without giving spoilers, I can only say that the main character suffers from one-dimensionality to the point of extremity, and the secondary characters are nothing more than cardboard cutouts. The author even steals characters from noted Sci-fi author David Drake. It is BLATANT (how many Joachim Steubens are there in military sci-fi?). I am unsure if Drake gave his permission to do this, but I doubt it - Drake's writing is leagues ahead of this book, as is that of David Weber. Which begs the question as to why Weber endorsed it so well.
The author is apparantly of the opinion that A- people not in the military are useless/corrupt/both. B- Very few officers are anything but idiots. C- Those who are not are ineffectual without their Sergeants. D- US Marines are, bar none, more effective than anything the universe has to offer. E- Woman are meant to be token wives or sex objects - otherwise, they do not enter a story.
Thus ends the review.
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