Lost Fleet: Valient by Jack Campbell (#4)

Valiant by Jack Campbell


My rating: 3 of 5 stars


From Goodreads: “Black Jack” Geary has ordered his fleet back to the Lakota Star System where the Syndics nearly destroyed them, a desperate gamble that may give them a fighting chance of survival—or tear them apart.




I found this book to be more engaging than the previous two. I don't know if it was because the book starts with a space battle, or if characters and situation seemed to finally be meshing. Whatever combination of factors it was, I felt more drawn into the story line with one exception - I believe I noted in Book 3: Courageous, that I wished the author would just space Co-President Senator Rione. Halfway through Valient I just wanted to space the woman. The petty jealousy building between Captain Desjani and Rione just did not work for me. Rione wanted everything and yet nothing from Geary. He couldn't give her that. She was jealous of his professional relationship with the ships Captian, yet as a character building scheme, it just didn't work. Rione was too conflicted, too uptight, and too demanding to work as a believable character. If you want someone to like you, don't chew their ass off every time you get them alone in their cabin.



My other complaint is the constant hero worship, the "You were brought back from the Stars to lead the Alliance to victory!" And "You were brought back to remind us what honor really was...". The author seemed to stick in these rah rah moments that felt a bit like, well, political speeches. Or something similar. Made me roll my eyes.



Okay, one more gripe. The women kept talking about Geary taking their 'honor' because they were attracted to him, slept with him, or harbored secret love for him. Point - it was established that most of this society had forgotten what honor was. Point - felt very 'old fashioned' for a woman to be worried about her 'honor' in this far future society where they are Co-presidents and Captains of starships. That just didn't fly with me.


So, overall, pretty good. The jealousy between the two women was old fashioned and over done. Recommended if you've read the first three in the series.


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