The Ember War

Publisher's Pack, Books 1-2

By: Richard Fox

Narrated by: Luke Daniels

Length: 15 hrs and 37 mins

Publisher's summary

The Ember War, book 1: The Earth is doomed. Humanity has a chance.

In the near future, an alien probe arrives on Earth with a pivotal mission: to determine if humanity has what it takes to survive the impending invasion by a merciless armada. The probe discovers Marc Ibarra, a young inventor who holds the key to a daring gambit that could save a fraction of Earth's population. Humanity's only chance lies with Ibarra's ability to keep a terrible secret and engineer the planet down the narrow path to survival. Earth will need a fleet. One with a hidden purpose. One strong enough to fight a battle against annihilation.

The Ember War is the first installment in an epic military sci-fi series. If you enjoyed A Hymn Before Battle by John Ringo and The Last Starship by Vaughn Heppner, then you'll love this explosive adventure with constant thrills and high stakes from beginning to end.

The Ruins of Anthalas, book 2: An ancient holocaust holds the key to humanity's survival.

Only a sliver of mankind survived the Xaros invasion. With Earth's defenses in ashes, nothing can stop the aliens' inevitable return. Hope arrives through a cryptic message from a long-lost alien race, promising the means to rebuild the shattered space fleet. Captain Valdar takes one of the last strike carriers, the Breitenfeld, and his shell-shocked crew on a desperate mission to the dead world. Unfortunately humans aren't the only power that received the ancient message....

The Ruins of Anthalas is the second book in The Ember War Saga, a military sci-fi space opera. If you like David Weber and John Ringo with a touch of Isaac Asimov, then you'll love this fast-paced and captivating adventure where humanity survives at the edge of a knife.

©2015 Richard Fox (P)2016 Podium Publishing

A COUPLE OF BULLETS AND FOUL LANGUAGE TO DEFEND

OURSELVES
The book starts out pretty good with a Scott Meyer type opening. Then the book jumps ahead in time and all imagination is replaced with clichéd, cardboard cutout characters and action. Hard core military fans and the paid help seem to like it a lot. You probably know what you like, so if your looking for some shoot-em up action, this is your cup of tea. Did you know that the American Flag is so superior to all other flags, that after sitting on the top of a pole for thirty years in bad weather and good, it will still wave?

YOUR EYES ARE SECRETING
Luke Daniels is excellent as always.

I want to be ARMOUR

I am quadriplegic and applaud Mr Fox's creativity in turning the disabled into powerful mech warriors. This is the first series I listened to where the disabled play an integral part of the story. The battles and fast paced action is entertaining but one of the core principles of the series is inspiring: ALL LIFE IS PRECIOUS human, alien, AI, tube grown humans, disabled, robots etc. Sentience is the means by which the universe is self-ware.

GOTT MIT UNS!

I just don't understand the hype.

Overall it's not a bad listen, there are moments where you actually care what is going on. Mostly though it's two dimensional characters playing out a story the feels like you've already heard it a dozen times from a dozen different authors. I got this because of the narrator and Luke Daniels is still good though he does mispronounce a few things here and there.

My biggest concern is that I had very little desire to listen to the book at all. It wasn't fun, entertaining, witty, interesting, dynamic, or really any of the things you'd like to hear in a good book. I guess I'd compare this to microwave macaroni and cheese. It's not actually bad, but it isn't really good either.

Everything you ever wanted in space warfare.

Space marines, giant robot armor, space battles, manipulative AI, mysterious aliens, and a human race struggling to start over from scratch while fighting a war that they have little understanding of...what more could you want?

"The Ember War" is so satisfyingly entertaining for science fiction adventure fans that it is a wander that it isn't a household name yet. The writing for it all has so much personality and characterization that the story's pacing is perfect. Richard Fox did a fantastic job putting this story together.

Then Luke Daniels does the narration and the audiobook experience will hook any listener instantly for the entire read through books 1 and 2. His ability to add personality to all these characters and make you care about each of them just using his voice is incredible.

"The Ember War" is definitely a series this reviewer will continue to follow and is highly, HIGHLY, recommended to anyone who has ever enjoyed any science fiction adventure on any form of media. Played "Halo" or "Mass Effect"? Watched "Robotech" or "Stargate SG-1"? Have you read "I, Robot" or "Enders Game"? Everything you have ever loved about any of those examples can be found here.

Amazing Military Space Sci-fi

This is definitely one of my new favorite space sci-fi audiobooks. The book is filled with everything you could want from a sci-fi novel... Space battles, ground battles, advanced technology, alien adversaries, alien allies, action, mystery, and suspense.

The book starts from the point-of-view of Marc Ibarra. A young scientist, Marc is lead by an unknown person (who seems to know everything about his unpublished work in mathematics) to the middle of nowhere. What he discovers is not a person, but an advanced, self-aware alien probe. It tells Marc that it was sent on a mission to help humanity prepare for an approaching threat that promises to destroy everything and everyone in it's path.
With the help of the alien AI, Marc and his company are successful in advancing humanity's technological level at a rapid pace. Even with all of the advanced technological breakthroughs, Marc is only able to hide one unsuspecting fleet of ships from the oncoming swarm of alien drones. When the fleet emerges from what they thought would be a short jump into FTL, they emerge in the same place decades in the future. They discover that while they were hidden, the rest of humanity has been destroyed, and it is up to the few remaining ships to combat the alien drones in an effort to save not only the human race, but countless other races the drones will undoubtedly destroy in their unstoppable advance.

Luke Daniels, of course, does another amazing narration with the Ember War books. I have listened to him in several other space sci-fi novels, and he is just as good in this book as he was in the others.

This was an all-around great listen. Anyone who enjoys space sci-fi will love this book.

Okay story, awful dialog

The story's premise is pretty good and had potential. Too bad none of the characters are remotely likable. There are basically only two personality types in the entire book. The I charge jerks and the wise cracking comic relief characters. Sure there are a few normal people in there, but it's too little to make the story work.

The author also makes almost every character constantly make wise cracks. None of it is funny in the least. The timing of these wise cracks is even worse. Life threatening situation? Only seconds to make a life or death decision? Let's make the character rattle off a few jokes. Ugh. Saw your buddies just die a few minutes earlier? Perfect time to crack a joke. You get my point. It gets old real fast, but he keeps hammering away. Three four five inappropriate comments in one or two paragraphs is not uncommon.

Good sci-fi needs to allow the reader to suspend disbelief. Constantly making virtually every character say ridiculous things during what would be incredibly stressful situations brings the reader out of the story.

Lastly, the narration is bad as well. The narrator makes several characters sound like they're mad all the time when there is nothing in the writing that would give that impression.

This one is a train wreck folks. Do your self a favor and pass.

Don't bother.

I've listened to dozens of audio books in this genre and this might have been the worst.

There is no single protagonist, and all of the military personnel who come close are unlikable, irrational bullies.

The voice acting would have been good except for the voicing of all characters in "armor". Their digital voices sound like the 1990 version of Siri, not a fight tech modern equivalent.

I can't recommend.

could be better

interesting premise. there is plenty of skipping around in the story, some plot holes. Campy characters. lots of events that happen just in the nick of time to save everyone. this story could be great but needs to go through a few rewrites.

Decent story, but alot of clichés

The author certainly has a deep understanding of military structures and protocols , but at time seems to over excess in there details. In general, the bike are loaded with tropes, and while not a bad thing, the "you-know-something-bad-will-happen" cliche is overused. All in all, the audio performance was good, and the story entertaining, if not ground-breaking.

Good tech spoiled by jingoistic racism

I got as far as chapter 8 before I realized how annoying the racism was. The premise was ok but the characters are cardboard cutouts and the story a caricature of decent SF.

Avoid the waste of time

Very good space saga let down not by the narration but by the narrators accents.

Great book but terrible accents from the narrator. Being Scottish I was a little upset but the Scandinavian was like Indian!

Really had to stick at listening for the first 3 chapters

Very enjoyable fast-paced space story.

I enjoyed these two fast-paced works of art immensely. Lovable characters, with nail biting twists and turns that had me on the edge of my seat till the very end. Looking forward to reading the next book in the series.

Difficult to Follow at Times

I generally enjoyed this book, however I often felt lost in what was going on. I think the main reasons for this is that the book often fails to convey the scope of what is happening and I felt little attachment to the characters.

Good listening material

I likes the story and and individual characters. The armour is funny and well voice acted. What I don't like is the over use of 'said'. Would be better if the author used something different.

A good space Opera

A good old yarn. Bits of lots of sci fi stories from battlestar galactica to stargate and star trek. Some interesting twists along the way and well performed throughout. Now I've got to listen to the next five in the series, oh well there goes £100!

Borderline racist

The books are good. With some interesting concepts.

I felt the jump from chapter 1-2 missed out on an interesting build up to the later events. I actually thought the publisher had forgotten to put in about 20 chapters and even looked on line to make sure I hadn't missed a book.

The performance of Doogal is borderline racist. It's the worst over acted and stereotypical depiction of a Scottish character I have come across. It's truly appalling. I found myself getting angry at the performer. This book should be re-recoded without the pitiful attempts at accents.

I am talking from the point of view of having Scottish family and friends.

Audible please remove this book until this is done as it is offensive.

I want

Giving Up After 6 Hours

How did the narrator detract from the book?

The narrator is either not very good or the style doesn't fit this book, or more likely both. I would describe the style as 'comic book' with some of the characters sounding like Michelangelo from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon.

Any additional comments?

The audio preview is misleading because the book quickly jumps 60 years later. The story is pretty boring and builds up no character relationships of note. I didn't find myself caring about anyone in this story, nor about the story itself. The enemy is some soulless destructive force seemingly out to destroy everything 'just because'.

Good Military SiFi

Listened to thid 3 years ago on Youtube. Enjoyed it, almost if Pournelle quality. Worth buying as a long time keep and re-listen.

fairly enjoyable

not a bad deal with 2 books in one. it was ok fairly decent story but a bit hard to follow at times
some of the characters were a bit annoying and this was made worse by the accents. the narration was generally good but for that. other characters i just didnt get behind at all and found it was easy to zone out from the story.
will give book 3 a go and hope it picks up from there

Brilliant Series!

Cannot recommend this series more highly. Every book has a great story and the pacing is excellent throughout. It also has the best narration I've heard on Audible.