Shadow of Freedom
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4.3 • 241 Ratings
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- $6.99
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- $6.99
Publisher Description
New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal and international best-selling phenomenon David Weber delivers book #15 in the multiple New York Times best-selling Honor Harrington series.
Wrong number? There are two sides to any quarrel . . . unless there are more.
Queen Elizabeth of Manticore's first cousin and Honor Harrington's best friend, Michelle Henke, has just handed the ""invincible"" Solarian League Navy the most humiliating, one sided defeat in its entire almost thousand year history in defense of the people of the Star Empire's Talbott Quadrant. But the League is the most powerful star nation in the history of humanity. Its navy is going to be back—and this time with thousands of superdreadnoughts.
Yet she also knows scores of other star systems—some independent, some controlled by puppet regimes, and some simply conquered outright by the Solarian Office of Frontier Security—lie in the League's grip along its frontier with the Talbott Quadrant. As combat spreads from the initial confrontation,the entire frontier has begun to seethe with unrest, and Michelle sympathizes with the oppressed populations wanting only to be free of their hated masters.
And that puts her in something of a quandary when a messenger from Mobius arrives, because someone's obviously gotten a wrong number. According to him, the Mobians' uprising has been carefully planned to coordinate with a powerful outside ally: the Star Empire of Manticore. Only Manticore—and Mike Henke—have never even heard of the Mobius Liberation Front.
It's a set up . . . and Michelle knows who's behind it. The shadowy Mesan Alignment has launched a bold move to destroy Manticore's reputation as the champion of freedom. And when the RMN doesn't arrive, when the MLF is brutally and bloodily crushed, no independent star system will ever trust Manticore again.
Mike Henke knows she has no orders from her government to assist any rebellions or liberation movements, that she has only so many ships, which can be in only so many places at a time . . . and that she can't possibly justify diverting any of her limited, outnumbered strength to missions of liberation the Star Empire never signed on for. She knows that . . . and she doesn't care.
No one is going to send thousands of patriots to their deaths, trusting in Manticoran help that will never come.
Not on Mike Henke's watch.
At the publisher's request, this title is sold without DRM (DRM Rights Management).
Customer Reviews
One of my favorite authors
I have read just about everything David Weber has published and the Honor Harrington series is by far the some of the best Sci-Fi I have encountered. I have read and re-read all the books in this series numerous times, and this latest addition did not disappoint me. The down side is that now I will need to wait about a year for the next installment. If you are a fan of the Honor Harrington series, and especially the last few books dealing with the Mesan Alignment, this is a must read.
Disappointing
Listen - I love the HH series. So much I'm starting through my 10th re-read - every other year I read the "main series" start to finish.
However... David has succumbed to the advice of bad editors or greedy publishers, or perhaps listened to neither. The you should know there's a main series (books 1-12, roughly), a 5 book anthrology of short stories whose timeline interweaves the main series, and two offshoot series with various authors, about 3-4 books each. Here's the problem. The story got out of control; you need a wikipedia list to figure out the chronology of the stories, and the author himself admitted "he let go of the characters to another author, and then wanted them back". He dug himself in a hole.
I believe it's this book that has 1/3 of the pages directly lifted from another book (one of the side trilogies) to "get you back up to speed in case you missed the side series"... but this portion is dull and trying to synchronize the stories - either mentally for the reader, or by chronology, becomes impossible. No matter what order you read the last 3 books + spinoff series (Saganami Island series, although only one book has this in the title) or Crown of slaves series (ditto) you're going to be jumping back and forth through past events told in current tense and entire chapters cut and pasted from the other books.
Look - I cannot recommend the original series highly enough. Start with On Basilisk Station and read through Mission of Honor. 12 books. Buy Basilisk, and if you like, buy the oher 11 immediately. But you need to treat it like an afficianado of the original three Star Wars. Yeah, they retconned some garbage in the beginning, yeah, they're making up some stuff that's not quite the same after... Treat the 1-12 books in HH as the original Star Wars trilogy, and forget the rest.
No honor? No worries.
So, like many people, I was at first nonplussed to find very little of Honor Harrington in this split from the main storyline. I feared that the hardline "last guardian at the gate" feel would be gone from the books and that the bit players from the series would water down that pure untrammeled Honoresque experience we've all come to know and love.
Not happening.
The book is great, and what's more, it's believable.
No one, but no one, can be the lone hero forever. Odds catch up, people fail. Honor HAD to be promoted or she had to die.
I loved this book. If you are a fan you will too.
Besides, Mike is awesome!