Come and Take Them

Carrera, Book 5

By: Tom Kratman

Narrated by: James Fouhey

Length: 22 hrs and 26 mins

Publisher's Summary

The Carrera saga continues with entry number five, and the sequel to Amazon Legion. Carrera. Relentless. Machiavellian. Without compunction. Victorious. Pity his enemies. Be thankful he is on the side of freedom from totalitarian domination. On the colony planet of Terra Nova, soldier turned political leader Carrera has achieved his revenge, destroying those who killed his wife and children in a terrorist strike, and helping to establish a free country. But Carrera’s fight is not over. War with the Tauran Union is inevitable. Carrera has been preparing his new country for this all-out conflict for years, intending to drive out the last vestige of foreign imperialism in Balboa, the Tauran Union Security Force. He doesn't care that he's outnumbered 100 to one. He doesn't care that the Taurans are 1,000 times wealthier. A true Machiavellian, Carrera is convinced that gold cannot always find good soldiers, but that good soldiers can always find gold. After all, his good soldiers have already found quite a bit. Moreover, he's been preparing for the war he intends to start and fight on his own terms, while the TU has been preparing for a progressive fantasy. But then his own government calls a halt even as the commander of the United Earth Peace Fleet, High Admiral Marguerite Wallenstein, injects a dose of realism and spine into the Tauran Union. Any other government, giving similar orders, Carrera would overthrow without hesitation. But this is his own creation; he must follow these orders. But the Taurans are provoking Balboa mercilessly, and Carrera knows that sooner or later, he must fight - only now the task will be more difficult and more bloody. No matter. When that time comes, Carerra knows he will do whatever it takes to win. He is, after all, Carrera.

©2013 Tom Kratman (P)2014 Audible, Inc.

This isn't going anywhere...strike three

This is the third book in which we see the same time-frame of the story, without advancing the plot. Lotus Eaters, Amazon Legion and Come and Take them all explore the period leading up to and the initial TU invasion of Balboa. If the author has any idea of what comes next, there's no reason to suspect it, as he's written three books and not gotten anywhere. Admittedly, each of these books explores the time from a different point of view, but without advancing the plot, Lotus Eaters, Amazon Legion and Come and Take Them just come off as rants or position papers thinly wrapped in repetitive fiction (and I'm either curious or partisan for the authors position). I'm interested in seeing how things work out with the UEPF, but, since the author isn't ever going to tell that story, there's no point in continuing.

The Story Continues.

After having by now listened to this series multiple times, I have more or less come to grips with all but one of the negativs that these audio books suffer from.

The narration.. The narrator whispers every inner monologue. The volume drop is so extreme that I personally found it necessary to double the regular listening/conversational volume to make out the narrators mumble. The result being that when the guy stops whispering, if not quick enough with returning the volume to normal one is apt to get an unpleasant earful.

Hours and Hours of Nothingness

This book wasn’t for you, but who do you think might enjoy it more?

A deaf person.

Would you ever listen to anything by Tom Kratman again?

No. I am done with this author. I brought two earlier books from this series and this one pretty much ended it. The first book took a good story line and backed it up with some solid action scenes. I had hope. This book took that promise and tossed it in the dirt, then unzipped its fly and pissed on it. There simply was nothing ever going on except a bunch of bored people talking on and on about things that didn't drive anything forward.Oh, I do remember one story running through this book - Carreras's kid, for some reason I have since forgot, has a dozen or so 12 year old girls comprising a harem in training who worship him and can't wait to be "deflowered" (Carrera's kid's word) by him. They think he is some kind of god. And Carrera's wife is the girls' den mother. There was a time (1st book) when this woman actually had something to say and played an important part in the story. Now she is running around trying to corral a bunch of screeching virginal 12 year old girls on some pathetic mission to be impaled on Carrera's kid's pole. Kratman ran out of ideas and this greasy scenario seeped in. I think it was pretty much pathetic.I guess Kratman sees women, and pre-teen girls for that matter, as good for only one or two things. Equipment needed: mood lighting and lubrication. Hey Kratman, you were supposed to be a writing a military sci-fi book, remember? If this is what you got, I don't want it. You bore me.

What three words best describe James Fouhey’s voice?

did his job

If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from Come and Take Them?

I would turn this twenty-something hour meandering yawner into a 3 1/2 hour novella and cut out the plodding coming of age story and kid-god garbage. I would probably keep scenes concerning the gal who is running one of the spaceships who had to act like a dominatrix when she secretly wants to be the one ravished by some other gal's tongue and forefinger all night. So, make the edited audiobook 5 hours.

Any additional comments?

Too long, too much $$$$$. A huge dose of blah, blah, blah.

First 4 books were good...this one, not so much

The first 4 books were good but book 5 is of a lower quality. During the main battle scenes this book is a jumble of mostly unimportant places and locations. One thing that particularly irritates me is the constant detailed mention of scene location. I think 30 minutes of the book is nothing but this. Some of the scenes are so short that the location intro's are much of the scene.
I have to agree with some of the others comments...that much of this book is a whole lot of nothing.