Valor's Choice

By: Tanya Huff

Narrated by: Marguerite Gavin

In the distant future, humans and several other races have been granted membership in the Confederation - at a price. They must act as soldier/protectors of the far more civilized races who have long since turned away from war.©2000 Tanya Huff (P)2008 Tantor

Pretty good military sci-Fi

Forget the cartoonish cover art. This book deserves better. Granted it has a slow start that relies on clever banter to hold your interest. But once the platoon gets into the fight, they’re off and running.

Story okay but ploting uneven

It took far to long to get the meat of the story. At first the book read like a slice of life story and all the while I kept thinking to myself when is the story going to start. And then my wandering mind soon picked up on what this was all about even before the story got started. If you take to long to get the point, someone else will get there first. And what was revealed at stories end, was what I had figured out all along.

Still, I liked the action that starts about half way in. And it was an unusual enough setting and situation to keep my interest throughout. I did not realize I lucked into reading the first book in the series. And while there was enough there to make me interested to see what happens in Book 2, Book 1 I was just okay.

Enjoyable

Rourke’s Drift in Space. Enjoyable but not remarkable. I will however continue with the series.

A witty rendition of the usual military SF story

Valor's Choice stays surprisingly close to the standard model for military science fiction featuring the ubiquitous space marines - super-competent sergeants, inexperienced officers, gruff but endearing grunts, and sketchy politicians pitted against waves of less sophisticated, but deadly enemies. Think David Weber or John Ringo and you won't be far off.

Tonya Huff adds a couple nice elements that elevate the otherwise standard (but still enjoyable) storyline. First, she has a bit of a sense of humor that makes the story occasionally quite funny. Secondly, her characters are more well-rounded than the traditional military fare, making the back story more interesting than most.

Overall, if you like military science fiction, you'll like this. If you think you might like it, this is a good place to s tart.

Strong female lead character

So often female leads are meant to be assertive and strong but come off lacking in those areas. Tanya does a great job at displaying a stong female and not someone who is looking for a man to complete her. She is already complete, god dammit. I know she later gets a love interest, but that doesn't deminish her baddassness.