| $@%&! level: Low “Bedroom” level: Low Violence level: High Back Cover: “He was a new kind of soldier, created for a new kind of war. The colony worlds Adirondack and Silvern fell to the Troft forces almost without a struggle. Outnumbered and on the defensive, Earth made a desperate decision. It would attack the aliens not from space, but on the ground—with forces the Trofts did not even suspect. Thus were created the Cobras, a guerilla force whose weapons were surgically implanted, invisible to the unsuspecting eye, yet undeniably deadly. But power brings temptation . . . and not all the Cobras could be trusted to fight for Earth alone. Jonny Moreau would learn the uses—and abuses—of his special abilities, and what it truly meant to be a Cobra.” |
This isn't necessarily a bad thing, although I personally feel like I'm missing out on a lot of interesting parts of Jonny's life. The problem is that as he gets older, I get the impression that Timothy Zahn is moving away from both his own strengths and Jonny's by making the story more about politics and less about action. He wrote the action-adventure parts really well, but the parts that require political intrigue seemed a bit forced—possibly even kind of obvious. And the climax left me disappointed all around. Yes, stopping the war is a noble goal, and yes, doing it without anyone getting hurt is the better way. It's just not as interesting, is the problem. Saving the world equals heroism, but doing it by using politics just seems like cheating, somehow. (Only in fiction, I hasten to add. In real life, saving the world equals heroism no matter how you manage it!)
I'm being silly, of course. But I can't deny that it seems pretty likely that Timothy Zahn already knew he had a trilogy to work with. He was setting things up for the next book.