A Band of Brothers

Keane is hurt and that changes him. The leader of the humans becomes the most deeply human of the lot, forced to face his fear and his guilt, while a vicious street by street fight erupts in the city of Roum, from the sewers to the buildings. The Redeemer shows himself as a less than ideal tactician, reacting to the circunstances more than creating them, which is actually what has been documented as real war, where combat is changing and fluid. Hans will end up leading "his" people, the Chin, into battle against the Bantag with little more than their hands. This is stirring writing, which appeals to our emotions as much as to our rationality. This alien world is very possible, and the technology to get there is part of theoretical physics, with wormholes between universes and/or galaxies, or sectors of galaxies, and the reversion of the hordes to primitive nomads after their ancestors "walked between the stars." "A Band Of Brothers" manages to keep the suspense alive just at the moment (the seventh installment) when most series that last this long wind down and either die, or crawl ahead to ever-diminishing interest. By shifting the focus and by making his characters more fallible and, therefore, more human, Forstchen has written a dark, different winner.

An epic, that is all I can call it. While waiting for #8 Men of War, I sat down and re-read all seven books and believe now more than ever that these are some of the finest books I have ever read. I have a library of over one thousand books in my home, and The Lost Resiment stands high as the best I have read. Never has a book or series of books so moved me as an American and a student of American history. You can feel the power and the pain of their struggle as these fine men fight against overwhelming odds for one simple reason - to live free. The most important factor of the stories is that the heroes are people just like you and me. Just like any hero, a moment before they were a hero they were plain old folks, just another person. You can connect with the people in the story because of that, you feel for them, you feel their joy and pain, when they laugh, you laugh, and when they cry you cry with them. When one of them quotes "We few we happy few, we band of brothers" tears will well up into your eyes, because you feel the brotherhood he speaks of. I am now going to sit down and read "Gates of Fire" by Steven Pressfield, which was recommended to me by William R. Forstchen. 'Nuff said!

This book is great! It combines world war II with the civil war. Brutal eastern front type knock down drag out battles fought with muskets and steam driven tanks.

_A Band of Brothers_, _The Lost Regiment # 7_, is the capstone of one of the greatest series of novels I have ever read. In spite of some problems with proof-reading, which never really got in the way, this novel, like all its predecessors, manages to combine hard science-fiction, masterful military and general history, and anthropological and sociopsychological insight in a blend that cannot fail to move even the most dedicated critic. William R. Forstchen's greatest skills lie in so accurately and insightfully portraying an entire alien culture that one cannot fail to identify with those characters that are drawn from that culture -- and thus be set up for hideous disllusionment when the darker side of that culture is revealed. He presents the alien Bantag with the skill of a master antrhropologist, revealing them in all their barbaric glory, giving us glimpses of their religious and domestic life side-by-side with their enormous military skill and powerful grasp of the principles of war, so that one can't help but sympathize with them -- and then jerks the rug out from under the reader by showing the monstrous aspects of their culture. Further, he shows the Bantag in contrast with the human beings who have come to this world by accident, bringing their own strnegths, skills, weaknesses, their culture, their hopes, dreams, and fears with them, showing the two species, human and alien, locked in a life-or-death struggle to determine which will ultimately populate and master this world -- and for all their cultural glories and tremendous physical size and strength, the aliens finally come off the losers, lacking as they do any real understanding of what human beings can do, the value of such knowledge for military purposes, and even the "soft underbelly" of humanity, the capacity for compassion even toward defeated enemies, love of others that spurs them on to supreme effort when by all rights they should fall and be defeated, and their capacity for vision and creativity by means of which they are able, even in the face of overwhelmingly superior numbers, to crate a military machine capable of utterly destroying their monstrous enemies. Couldn't put any of the novels in the series down until I had finished them. I am looking forward to new novels in which that battle-torn world is presented to us a century after the events taking place in A BAND OF BROTHERS, to see what has become of the human beings and their alien foes during that time. I would also like to see a comprehensive atlas of that world, perhaps a world globe to set on my desk. William Forstchen is a serious rival to Harry Turtledove and Harry Harrison, the mastera of alternative-history science-fiction, as well as Frank Herbert, author of DUNE, and a true heir of Murray Leinster and H. P. Lovecraft. May he live for many long, productive years more, opening countless clear windows not only on this world, but many others besides.

Book 7 of the Lost Regiment series stays true to form. The Bantag horde, led by Haark the Redeemer is closing in on Roum.The transplanted Yankees, led by Civil War Colonel Andrew Keane have been on this alternative Earth for ten years. Under the very real threat of being killed and eaten by Merki warriors, the humans have advanced 50 to 75 years in military technology in only ten years and three wars.They have tanks (land ironclads), hybrid blimp/airplanes, hand grenades, and hollow charge anti-tank rockets. Fortchen does a good job of showing the difficulties of using these new weapons effectively. He also spends a lot of time on logistics, weather, morale, etc.My only complaint is that the book is too short at only 315 pages. I finished it in less than a day, and now I have to wait too long for the next installment.