Resolute

Kris Longknife, Book 4

By: Mike Shepherd

Narrated by: Dina Pearlman

Length: 14 hrs and 45 mins

Publisher's Summary

Kris Longknife is back - and ready for battle.

Kris has been given her first independent command in the very remote system of Chance, an assignment that's as much exile as promotion. But Kris isn't on the job long when she captures pirates hiding the location of an uncharted and unpopulated planet of miraculous technology.

Listen to another Kris Longknife adventure.

©2006 Mike Moscoe (P)2009 Audible, Inc.

Engaging

This is book four in the Longknife series. In this book Kris Longknife is ordered to take command of a backward naval base in orbit around an independent planet on the frontier. She is responsible for the defense in this out of the way naval district. When replacing buoy’s Kris captures a pirate ship. Kris has to get help by rounding up a rag tag fleet of ships to fight off a Greenfeld’s four ships led by Hank Peterwald. She also must deal with the distrust of the planet inhabitants. I am fascinated with “Nelly” Kris’s wearable super computer. In this story Nelly finds an anomaly in space which Kris and her crews investigate and discover an old warp point. They also find an undiscovered alien planet that was home to three lost alien civilization.

Kris’s old nemesis Hank Smythe Peterwald shows up with the Greenfeld fleet and is trying to engender a crisis on the planet as a pretext to take over. Kris and crew take action. The book has lots of action, suspense and politics.

Shepherd has continued the competent banter by the characters making it fun to read. We learn more about her assistant Abby, the mysterious steamer trunk bearing maid in the story. The plot construction is improving with each book and the characters are worth following. I am looking forward to book five. Dina Pearlman narrates the book.

love this series

This is my favorite book of the series, though the series isn't complete yet so I reserve my right to change my mind later. :) I have read them all, and am now really enjoying listening to Dina Pearlmans' rendition of them. I highly recommend the series if you like military sci-fi!

not as much filler

The series had become real formalistic, and continues this trend in this book. However, the twists and turns in this were entertaining.

Good story, poor narration job.

Just about all of the Kris Longknife books are good, Resolute is no exception. In this exploit, Kris gets her first independent command, grabs her first prize ship, then goes off exploring new jump points that were built by "The Three" long before man was walking upright. Of course, this is just the beginning of the story so telling more will only spoil it for you. Needles to say, it gets better and better the deeper you get...

The only real problem with this Audio Book is in the narration. Dina Pearlman continues to do a fine job with character voices, but insists on adding pause and inflection where none exist. She sounds more and more like she's reading a children's book. I honestly don't understand what drives her to ignore the written punctuation, but she does it in every sentence so it's no accident. Her continuing practice destroys the flow of the narration and has become a major distraction to an otherwise great series.

I give Resolute 4 Stars as a great story and Pearlman 2 Stars for trying to make it into a "Children's Book."

The Big Peterwald Confrontation

By this fourth book, the formula is well established: Kris gets a new assignment, finds herself in the middle of a political upheaval, samples the local culture and events, then finds a way out of the situation. That's not necessarily a bad thing since the series so far has not taken a right turn into something strange and instead gives us the same of what we liked in the previous installments. So while there is nothing new under the sun, it is still enjoyable sci fi opera escapism.

Story: Now assigned to a remote outpost planet that doesn't take well to strangers interfering in their business, Kris tries to diplomatically run the orbital station that has been neglected far too long. Unfortunately, this remote world, Chance, has not decided whether to join the Peterwald or Wardhaven alliances and therefore is of interest to both. Although the orbital station is Wardhaven's, the planet could go either way. A fine point Kris finds herself in the middle of when Hank Peterwald Jr. arrives with a war fleet in tow.

One thing that keeps the stories from being stale is that there is some character development. In this book, we learn more about Abbie, Kris and Jack's business relationship becomes more defined, and even Penny is given time to mourn and then let go of Tommie. Similarly, Kris and Hank's political relationship sours terribly and turns into something far more deadly than hinted at from the veiled barbs of previous books.

There are space battles again this book, which are always welcome. The pew pew is what makes space operas thrilling and I am enjoying this off-world action. In addition to the battles, we have a preview of coming developments when the crew discover and travel an otherwise unknown jump gate. It's a hint of more fun to come.

In all, this is a light but fun sci fi with a heroine who uses her brains rather than luck to make victories happen. I don't look at it too seriously and just enjoy the ride.

Note: I am listening to the audio version and the narrator does an excellent job.

What happened to Hank?

Was Resolute worth the listening time?

Yes - a fun listen. Some interesting twists that I hope signal better direction for the series.

Any additional comments?

The character of Hank got some interesting development in the earlier books. The author took a strange direction with him in this one. He suddenly turned into a one-dimensional twit. I found it annoying throughout this book - it made the main plot seem almost pointless. The plot going on in the background was intriguing though.

Awesome Sci-fi series

I am writing this because i think it is one of the best series books out there. Mike Shepherd always tells a good action packed story. This one has a female lead and she has some great friends that are willing to die for her and what she stands for. The narrator Dina Pearlman is also one of the best !!
ALWAYS REMEMBER TO READ THE BOOKS IN ORDER.

its same old same old

same as the first 3 books. nothing else to say but it wont let me post unless I right this sentence ty bye

after the battle of Wardhaven

well this girl is having a bad bad day.And romance ? well we will see who the traitors are

Resolute

I found the tone of this book lighter and more humorus than the last. Still lots of good quality story and stuff getting in the way of Kris living her life, like a Peterwald commanding a battle squadron.

"Resolute" is a merchant ship hired to help around Kris' new command but, as Abby had a hand in it's choice, all is not what it seems. The Captain is inspired by "The Pirate King" and there seem to be way too many ex-military personel on board. Nelly found something interesting on her alien chip and wants to go exploring. Abby admits to very little but we discover a few more intriguing details. Kris really tries hard not to blow anything up or shoot anyone at all, but, really, they should not have given her a ship called "Resolute" if anyone wanted her to run away! Oh, and Jack gets jealous, sort of. Maybe. (Trivia: If you wonder how they got to this story from the last and "what happend to the training they were ment to be giving!" there is an e-novella "Training Daze" out there. Not on audio yet but who knows?)