he problem with utopian societies is that they are so peaceful that any
villain with half a brain and a sharp stick can conquer them. As A Hymn
Before Battle opens, that's exactly what's happening.
Vile galactic predators known as the Posleens have begun an assault against
a peaceful federation of planets. The federation's devastated by the
attack. Its members get physically ill--or die--at the thought of killing
other living beings. Their best fighters are capable of firing one shot at
the enemy before becoming psychologically devastated by the trauma. The
Posleens, of course, have no such hangups. Their immense armies--comprised
of countless centaur-like drones and their "God King" leaders--travel from
planet to planet smashing the local defenses and then exploiting all
available resources. These fearsome killers waste nothing, even eating their
own dead as they fall in battle.
After losing dozens of worlds to the marauders, the leaders of the faltering
federation decide to unleash their own murdering savages: the human race.
The peaceful aliens knew of humanity before the invasion but were terrified
of unleashing its destructive capacity. But with the Posleens
threatening to destroy them, they have no choice but to make contact with
the humans, and hire them to fight the fight they can't handle.
First contact with the Earth's governments comes quickly, as does the
realization by the Earthers that the Posleens will be at Terra in a handful
of years. What follows is a mad scramble by Earth to reorganize its
competing military forces, develop new weapons based on galactic technology,
and learn as much as possible about their enemy.
Down and dirty military SF
A Hymn Before Battle follows three major story arcs, the biggest and best of
which deals with Lt. Michael O'Neal, a soldier-turned-web-designer/SF
writer who's forced back into the military. As a military geek, O'Neal's
charged with helping create new weaponry based on GalTech, and ultimately
for seeing how it performs in the field. O'Neal's fear of losing his family,
and later his life, are gut-wrenching, and it's his emotions that humanize
the jargon-filled novel.
Two lesser subplots deal with a covert ops team on a Posleen planet and a
grunt's-eye view of training for war. Both plots distract from the book's
primary storyline--neither is developed enough to give readers more than a
passing acquaintance with their characters--but they do serve to lay the
groundwork for sequels.
The book truly excels when it comes to combat. Author John Ringo (an
Airborne veteran himself) does superb job of showing just how hard it would
be for modern-day warriors to get their minds around the capabilities of
far-future tech, and how deadly they could be when they did finally understand
it. Weapons like relativistic bullets--which travel at a significant
percentage of the speed of light--are truly cool, as is O'Neal's innovative
use of demolitions that squash the enemy underneath mile-high skyscrapers.
The book combines the future tech of Robert Heinlein's Starship
Troopers with the down-in-the trenches perspective of Joe Haldeman's
The Forever War. As with those books, humanity is up against an alien
foe that it doesn't understand, using technology it can barely control. The
message here is ultimately positive, though--humanity may be up against
impossible odds, but it may be able to win it all thanks to its
near-infinite capacity for creativity.
