They Also Serve

Colonel Ray Longknife is a desk jockey. Shrapnel earned in battle has made him unfit for anything else. But now he's married and about to be a father. The last thing he needs is for his spaceship to go awry and get sent thousands of light-years off course into an unknown sector of the universe. But once there, a stunning discovery is made. They've found the ship that disappeared three-hundred-years ago on an earth like planet, building a world of their own. Joy soon turns to suspicion, though, as they begin to realize that there is a very sinister underbelly to the seemingly peaceful life of the planet dwellers. Mike Moscoe writes great space action and adventure. His ability to pull the reader into his universe is matched by his talent for creating believable science fiction.

They Also Serve is the third book in this series about military veteran trying to build a better life, The Price of Peace and First Casualty preceded it. It is an engaging story and I enjoyed reading it.Former Army Colonel Ray Longknife and former Marine Captain Mary Rodrigo plus crew take a bad space jump and end up marooned halfway across the galaxy from home. They discover a planet inhabited by the descendants of a lost ship, the Santa Maria. The Santa Maria was lost 300 years prior in the first recorded jump point mishap. The planet turns out to be a long unused teaching machine created by the same three races that built the jump points. A million years of inactivity have driven the teaching machine insane. Ray and Mary must defeat this machine, a computer who's hardware is a planet, if they are going to save themselves, their crew, and their new friends.

The war is over with the Unity Party defeated. Ray Longknife, part of the winning team, killed the unity Party's President. As a reward for his bravery, Ray is now Wardhaven's Minister of Science and Technology. In a further ironic twist, Ray married the woman who crippled him during the war. They expect their first child soon.On a routine diplomatic mission, Ray's spaceship is sabotaged and he and the crew end up leaping into an uncharted galaxy. They land on the nearest habitable planet, which the inhabitants of the lost Santa Maria spaceship have colonized. When the spacers land, they upset the social dynamics leading to strange happenings. They learn that the colonists shared a planet for over three hundred years with an unknown being, who can change the molecular structure of their brains. When warfare seems imminent, Ray and his soldiers implement a battle plan that will either destroy the planet or return it to humanity.THEY ALSO SERVE is populated with characters that seem to live in any neighborhood, which makes it easy to care what happens to the cast as they move from one trauma to another crisis. The fast-paced story line is filled with action, but author Mike Moscoe changes the pace occasionally with thought-provoking concept that impels the reader to reflect for a moment. Mr. Moscoe provides the audience with a powerful military science fiction.Harriet Klausner