Forerunner

AI Fleet, Book 1

By: Isaac Hooke

Narrated by: Paul Heitsch

Length: 7 hrs and 44 mins

Publisher's summary

A fleet of warships operated by the digitized minds of former humans. An unknown enemy lurking in the dark of space. The one man who hopes to conquer them both.

Jain was the lieutenant commander of an elite SEAL team. He was accustomed to order and discipline, which he used to give the men under his command that particular brand of killer instinct his unit was known for.

But one day that semi-comfortable, ordered life ended when he opened his eyes to find his body replaced by a starship. His mind had become its AI core.

He is somewhere in deep space. Most of his systems are badly damaged. He has no memory of how he got here, or what his mission is. Evidence points to an attack by an unknown entity.

He finds other damaged vessels in the vicinity and reactivates them. They, too, have no memory of the events leading up to their current situation.

Jain, thrust into a leadership role, soon learns that commanding a fleet of starships isn't all that different from leading a platoon of SEALs. It helps that his database is chock-full of tactics and military strategies gleaned from every space battle humanity has ever fought.

As he and his fleet explore their surroundings and slowly piece together what happened to them, they realize their attacker is not from any human system.

And that any misstep means not only the loss of his fleet, but potentially the destruction of humanity itself.

©2018 Isaac Hooke (P)2019 Podium Publishing

Forerunner: Breath taking

A fantastic Audible rendition of the book Forerunner, written by Isaac Hooke, performed by Paul Heitsch. Paul Heitsch is another great Podium actor, in the vein of Eric Martin or Luke Daniels, who does great justice to this military Sci Fi epic. Once the action gets going, it doesn’t stop, and just keeps going. Each of the Void Warriors has their own personality and ship capabilities, and together they work well and complement each other in different tactical situations throughout the book. There are some great discussions, everything from philosophical discourses between Aristotle and Plato to quotes from the battle of Thermopylae.

Forerunner was breath taking!

Excellent story, Damaged AI's with amnesia

Excellent story featuring battle damaged warships awakening after a major battle that left them crippled with no idea what their mission is/or was and an unknown enemy that could possibly be lurking in their midst.

space ships as a collection of super heros

"digitized minds of former humans" in space war ships each with its own "super power" weapon

Interesting

This was a different spin on a AI ships. The story begins with their defeat. I liked this and the personalities of the crew. I wish we had learned how they originally defeated the mimics. It did however leave a few questions near the end I thought the wtiter glossed over. Like why did the aliens just wipe out the larger fleet of refers instead of infiltration? Why didn't the colony send distress calls with word of a alien invasion?Oveerall I enjoyed both the storyline and performance.

decent

I was looking for more indepth story line of the ai ability over war strategy.

Good book.

A good book but the AI's are not very smart. Not very realistic space battles vs reality. Worth the listen.

Pretty Good Listen

While not the most exciting story it did set the foundation of what could be an exciting series. It's an interesting concept of where & how humans explore the vastness of space. I will be listening to the 2nd book.

Paul Heitsch does a very good job narrating the story.

Nice premise, too short.

The story is enjoyable, the narrator skilled, I love audio books and have spent 100s of credits typically 24-30 a year. I usually look with suspicion at books less than 13 hours of length and avoid books under 10 hours per credit. at seven hours per book, this author hits at lower limit of twenty one hours or so for three books for two credits, with first book as free sample. there are many free sample intros.... maybe I will come back, but I have other samples to test. one of them may be more compelling for my credits

Awesome narration. Decent story.

good story. great narration. wish it would focus more on building. a little too much filler.

All in all, an excellent read.

While the book falters from time to time with not quite enough science-science and a bit too much science-magic for my tastes, overall it's a refreshing variation on military sci-fi novels, and does a good job dealing with sentient AI overall.

Probably my one big gripe is the author pinning some of the philosophical discussions of death and the soul on a combination of a particular bit of pseudo-science woo already discredited in our time, and the presumption that such a thing as a soul might exist in the first place.

However the same theme in future books is a bit more balanced and not a huge part of the book so I'll give it a pass.