It was actually pretty decent - some action, some alien action, some bad leaders messing things up... all in all, a pleasant surprise in the plethora of self-published ebooks out there. I did pick up the second book in the series based on this one being pretty solid. ( )

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Title: Legionnaire
Series: Galaxy's Edge #1
Author: Jason Anspach & Nick Cole
Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: SF
Pages: 308
Format: Digital Edition

Synopsis:

Sergeant Chunn, along with his fellow Legionnaires (elite soldiers of the Republic), are on a planet running a political mission, ie, support the natives who want to join the Republic. They're supported by Repub-Army and are led by a political appointed “Legionnaire”, Lt Devers.

Things go sidewise when the orbiting support ship is destroyed, their base on the planet is over run and their supposed native allies turn on them with help from an alliance that is opposed to the Republic. The Legionnaire's commander, Pappy, is out of commission and Devers takes over. To disastrously bumble everything, to the point that the soldiers attack a village of natives that are hosting some Republic scientists.

Pappy wakes up long enough to make Chunn a brevet Lt and the current Lt Ford, a brevet Captain. One of the Legionnaire grunts, Exo, tries to kill Devers for all his mistakes but is pulled back by his buddies.

Everybody holes up and makes a last stand, only to have the MCR (Mid Core Rebels) show up with an old star ship and fighters. Only to have the Republic's Big Guns show up and rescue them.

The book ends with Devers getting all sorts of awards and Exo drinking himself into a stupor wondering why he's even in the legion. He runs across an old legionnaire who tells him a story to hopefully inspire him to get back in the fight.

My Thoughts:

I thoroughly enjoyed this Military SF story. It was all about the ground pounders and that is what I like.

I think the authors did a good job with the characters, as I was cheering for the Legionnaires and absolutely hating Devers the political appointee. When you can feel that much distaste for a character you know the authors did their job correctly!

There are no real surprises, which I was perfectly ok with. When it comes to Mil-SF, I prefer the tried and true formula of SNAFU, Fight, Good Guys Win, Bad Guys Lose. It is very comforting. It is like eating mashed potatoes. Good, warm and filling.

This is a longer series, currently running around 9 books. I have no idea if the series goes into a longer story arc or if each book is a standalone'ish story. Personally, I'm hoping for standalone story time but we'll see. We shall also have to see if the authors do the whole “token SJW wokeness” thing. I'd like to think not, but considering how I've seen it in other indie books, I'm not holding my breath.

To wrap up, a thoroughly fun book that hit all the right buttons for me and the start of a series. I hope the series continues as well as this book.

★★★☆½ ( )

good scifi with a marines feel to it - best guess is written by someone with experience -
nothing too far out of the ordinary but drawn together very well - plenty of room for further development
will read more by author ( )

Though I stand in the minority, I'm not a huge Star Wars fan, and I knew going in to Legionnaire that the authors refer to their Galaxy's Edge series as "Star Wars, Not Star Wars." When it comes to reading spacefaring science fiction, I like things like Peter F. Hamilton's Commonwealth Saga, the Priscilla Hutchins series by Jack McDevitt, and the Expanse books by James S.A. Corey (and Dune, too...can't forget that series!). Big, sweeping, intergalactic sagas, I guess you could say. I've read a few military sci-fi books, but I prefer the former. Yet Legionnaire by Anspach and Cole grabbed my non-Star Wars loving imagination and wouldn't let go! I usually like to know what's going on in the wider scope of things, but with Legionnaire, we get just a hint of this universe, at least in this first book in the Galaxy's Edge series. And if this is just the beginning, I can't wait to see what comes next! ( )

Jason Anspach and Nick Cole's Galaxy's Edge series has been described as "more Star Wars than Star Wars". After reading the first volume, Legionnaire, I wholly agree. Anspach and Cole nailed the feel of being a stormtrooper, if stormtroopers were actually the elite shock troops described by Ben Kenobi in A New Hope, instead of the comically inept mooks who were slaughtered by Ewoks in Return of the Jedi.

The Republic Legionnaires, leejes for short, have the technological resources of the whole galaxy to call upon, and it feels like it. Their gear is both effective [their armor actually works!], and fantastically expensive [because it is both sophisticated and an exercise in pork barrel politics], which makes the Legionnaires fierce and effective fighters, but limits their numbers.

As to the purposes to which all that warfighting capability is turned...that's over their pay grade. Legionnaires are usually happy to do what they are told, which for the most part is kill people and break stuff. However, like many elite units, a Legionnaire's primary loyalty is to the Legion, which in practice is your fellow Legionnaires. Politics are pretty abstract, except and unless it affects the chances of you and your buddies getting dead.

There is a tradition of military sci-fi books from the grunt's point of view going back at least to Heinlein's Starship Troopers, but the books that Legionnaire most closely resembles are Pournelle and Stirling's Falkenberg's Legion series, as well as David Drake's Hammer's Slammers. The hallmarks of these books are realism about the ugly face of war, a love of technological detail about the tools and gear of conflict, and an imitation of the military tactics of a particular era.

For Pournelle and Stirling, that era was 80s and 90s maneuver warfare as practiced by Western militaries. For Anspach and Cole, the model feels like Afghanistan blended with Star Wars and Imperial Rome. And I think they nailed it. I am a fan of this style of fiction in general, but I love how Anspach and Cole were able to riff off of the Star Wars universe, and end up with something that is both familiar and different.

I really, really enjoyed reading Legionnaire, and I'm excited that there is a whole series full of books to follow. ( )