#BookReview: KTF part 2 (Galaxy’s Edge #18)

Jason Anspach and Nick Cole’s renowned Galaxy’s Edge series comes to its completion in KTF Part 2.

Jason Anspach and Nick Cole’s renowned Galaxy’s Edge series comes to its completion in KTF Part 2.

The Story

Captain “Wraith” Keel and the Legion have ridden a bloody wave starting from the disaster at Kublar, which has carried them through the crowning of the Emperor Goth Sullus at Tarrago, the end of the Galactic Civil War at Utopion, and a myriad of brushfire wars across the galaxy. But they have never had a clear shot at the hidden hand behind thousands of years of galactic war:

The Golden King, leader of the aptly named Savage hordes.

The worst of Earth’s technological past, warped by alien technologies, the long dark of space, and that special cruelness only humans can master.

Until today, at the newly rediscovered Earth, where the identity of the Golden King is stored within a newly-discovered vault. An identity that would shatter the millions of fictions the Golden King has crafted about himself. An identity the Golden King would raze the galaxy to obliterate.

The Golden King is returning to his home. And only the brave sacrifice by the Legion and their irregular allies can prevent the galaxy from burning.

But the Legion would have it no other way, and stands ready to meet the Golden King, shouting their motto to the stars.

KTF.

Kill Them First.

The World

Jason Anspach and Nick Cole have crafted an homage to Star Wars that blends considerable inspiration from the Prequel and Original Series with the endless deployments of America’s desert wars. Generally, this is a universe that has the squalor of Mos Eisely and all the dust of a Saharan outdoor market. Other environments are present, as are reshadings of Star Wars stalwarts such as starfighters, star destroyers, Jedi, and a corrupt Republic. But the heart is ground combat centered around the Legion, an elite fighting organization combining the best of the French Foreign Legion and an actually competent and elite stormtrooper corps.

The Characters

The surviving fan favorites from the last 17 stories return. And while single men in barracks might not be plaster saints, all are united heroically around the idea that the Legion is the force for good in the Galaxy—even if some commit some of the bloodiest acts outside a Savage raid to accomplish it.

The major new addition is the Golden King himself. Previous plots focused on Star Wars-inspired villains, with Goth Sullus combining Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine into a single being. The Golden King combines Warhammer 40,000’s Emperor of Mankind with all the vileness of California elite culture. A psychically endowed and charismatic leader in golden armor seeking to unite Man (and the entire Galaxy) under one benevolent rule—at gunpoint, if necessary. His crusades rend the Galaxy in search of glory and perfection.

Too bad this Emperor made common cause with Chaos. And his labs have vomited forth alien races and biomechanical monstrosities to serve his pride.

The same pride that becomes his downfall.

In many ways, the appearance of The Golden King feels like it occurred too late in the story to adequately explain events. But Anspach and Cole are clever and meticulous plotters, and it would not be a surprise to see, upon a reread, the hidden hand of the Golden King as early as the first book.

Now that he has been exposed for all to see, that is.

The Politics

Galaxy’s Edge as a series does not address contemporary politics in the form of Left or Right. Such concerns are distractions in the countless conflicts ripping up the skies of Galaxy’s Edge. However, within the worldbuilding is a scathing critique of California elite culture, showing how the rich, the famous, the powerful, and the technobarons use people in their hubris and how their hubris allows themselves to be manipulated in turn. The greatest threat to the galaxy has been the reappearance of these elites in the form of immense hulks filled with Savage hordes, each illustrating some perversion of culture and science that preys upon the galaxy as a whole.

Content

Violence.

Lots of it.

Galaxy’s Edge is an unabashed war story. People die. Often in horrific ways. And Anspach and Cole do not pull punches with the various atrocities and betrayals committed by the various factions.

They just don’t dwell on each bullet, bolt, and explosion. Loss and the capriciousness of combat, not gore, is the focus. The authors do not shy away from the terribleness of war; they just don’t glory in the carnage like 2000s horror.

Who is it for?

18 books in, and this is for long term fans of Galaxy’s Edge who have followed the Legion from its near ruin on Kublar.

Military science fiction and Star Wars fans intrigued by the Galaxy’s Edge story should start with Legionnaire.

Why read it?

Galaxy’s Edge is for military science fiction fans who have grown tired of endless A Helmet for My Pillow/Starship Troopers remixes. Instead, Galaxy’s Edge uses a mixture of Black Hawk Down and The Black Company and tempers the battles with experience gleaned directly from the forever wars of Iraq, Afghanistan, and the Global War on Terror.

Science Fiction’s Great Conversation on war and warriors has changed radically, just as warfighting has changed since 2000 AD. Read Galaxy’s Edge, and particularly Legionnaire and Order of the Centurion, to understand why military science fiction is no longer an Old Man’s War.

At the same time, those looking for flashes of what Star Wars once was under George Lucas will find considerable inspiration and homage in these books. That said, KTF Part 2 reveals the hard SF underpinnings to its universe and where all these aliens suddenly came from.