I picked up a copy of Anna Carven‘s Dark Planet Warriors as an Amazon freebie last year.
Abbey
Some scary looking aliens have just boarded Fortuna Tau, our little asteroid mining station. Kordolians, by the looks of things. What the hell do they want with this floating rust bucket? What are they even doing here?
Come to think of it, I’ve never seen a Kordolian up close before. They’re huge and intimidating, with strange silver skin and pointed ears. They have freaky nano-armor, and they’re packing a serious arsenal. We stand no chance against them.
When I encounter their General, I find him insufferable. Arrogant. Domineering. He won’t tell me anything. I guess that’s what happens when your race is kicking ass across the Nine Galaxies. You get pigheaded.
So why do I keep running into him? Why does he keep looking at me like that? And what’s with this weird feeling I get when he’s around?
Tarak
Sucked into a wormhole during a fierce skirmish with an enemy ship. Spat out near a human mining station in a remote corner of the Nine Galaxies. Stuck with weak humans who operate with inferior metals and technology.
This mission couldn’t get any worse.
We need to fix our craft, kill the cursed Xargek, and get out of here before the wormhole collapses. I don’t really care about these humans. Their existence makes no sense to me.
So why has this strange human female captured my attention? She’s messy, awkward, and she babbles nonsense half the time. These humans are crazy. I don’t understand them at all, especially this female. Why do I keep coming back to her?
I need to leave this place before I go insane.
This started out well, but I’m afraid it wasn’t able to maintain momentum. My overall impression is ‘bland.’ Nothing about this—the characters, the plot, the world, the romance, the writing—stands out as interesting in any fashion. It’s not horrible, true, but I was bored, and the author just didn’t bring what could have been an interesting story to fruition.
Honestly, I can’t even tell you what the series’ true overarching plot is. Sure, we’ve got a little Mars-Needs-Women going on in there, a little Evil Empire, and a little super soldier on the side. But what is the series really about? No idea, even having finished the 1st book.
Lastly, there’s just a little residual ick here. We have the main military general of a galactic colonizing force as the male romantic lead. Take this out of space and place it in a more familiar setting, and one begins to see some truly horrifying parallels of who is being propped up as a worthy romantic hero.
Mostly, I was just bored, though.
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