370 pages
English language
Published April 22, 2014 by Ace Books.
"The Great Reawakening did not come quietly. Across the country and in every nation, people began 'coming up Latent, ' developing terrifying powers--summoning storms, raising the dead, and setting everything they touch ablaze. Those who Manifest must choose: become a sheepdog who protects the flock or a wolf who devours it. In the wake of a bloody battle at Forward Operating Base Frontier and a scandalous presidential impeachment, Lieutenant Colonel Jan Thorsson, call sign 'Harlequin, ' becomes a national hero and a pariah to the military that is the only family he's ever known. In the fight for Latent equality, Oscar Britton is positioned to lead a rebellion in exile, but a powerful rival beats him to the punch: Scylla, a walking weapon who will stop at nothing to end the human-sanctioned apartheid against her kind. When Scylla's inhuman forces invade New York City, the Supernatural Operations Corps are the …
"The Great Reawakening did not come quietly. Across the country and in every nation, people began 'coming up Latent, ' developing terrifying powers--summoning storms, raising the dead, and setting everything they touch ablaze. Those who Manifest must choose: become a sheepdog who protects the flock or a wolf who devours it. In the wake of a bloody battle at Forward Operating Base Frontier and a scandalous presidential impeachment, Lieutenant Colonel Jan Thorsson, call sign 'Harlequin, ' becomes a national hero and a pariah to the military that is the only family he's ever known. In the fight for Latent equality, Oscar Britton is positioned to lead a rebellion in exile, but a powerful rival beats him to the punch: Scylla, a walking weapon who will stop at nothing to end the human-sanctioned apartheid against her kind. When Scylla's inhuman forces invade New York City, the Supernatural Operations Corps are the only soldiers equipped to prevent a massacre. In order to redeem himself with the military, Harlequin will be forced to face off with this havoc-wreaking woman from his past, warped by her power into something evil."--Publisher's description.
A book with heart but some blind spots in the author's sensitivities, especially with regard to marginalized social groups and some language.
Interesting book--I walked into this with some trepidation as some of my reviewer friends knocked it about pretty harshly but the premise intrigued me enough to lure me further. I think some of its negative character qualities mentioned by others is a bit overblown. So don't worry yourself too much about it.
I'd love a prequel of the great awakening. The world must have gone to chaos for a moment.
What happened later was no less knee-jerk and really in today's age I am not terribly surprised.
Cole brings a lot of sensical notions to this book of magic in the modern age. His system for it is pretty solid and his general geopolitical temperature seems right on the mark. My hiccup in the early start of this book is Oscar is far too much a thinker. I mean this guy is rowing over way too much deep thought in …
Interesting book--I walked into this with some trepidation as some of my reviewer friends knocked it about pretty harshly but the premise intrigued me enough to lure me further. I think some of its negative character qualities mentioned by others is a bit overblown. So don't worry yourself too much about it.
I'd love a prequel of the great awakening. The world must have gone to chaos for a moment.
What happened later was no less knee-jerk and really in today's age I am not terribly surprised.
Cole brings a lot of sensical notions to this book of magic in the modern age. His system for it is pretty solid and his general geopolitical temperature seems right on the mark. My hiccup in the early start of this book is Oscar is far too much a thinker. I mean this guy is rowing over way too much deep thought in moments where fight/flight/adrenaline/reaction rule the day. I understand the why, he is trying to set up the motivations of a character--but it all feels so expositionally (new word!) heavy that it could have been laid out in a novelette instead of the first few chapters with a hammer.
Regardless, the world get's moving, crap as always hits the fan and poor human instincts leads to bad decisions, casualties, and new causalities.
After the beginning warbles the book pretty much hits a good stride of character development, team building, exploration, and of course a generous amount of exploitation. Oscar continues to have more diatribes than a school girl before prom but you learn to let a bit of that go for the overall good of the flow.
Part of me wished this was a choose-your-own-adventure because like a good community film there were plenty of times I heard the audience yelling, "Don't do it!" or "Behind you!" or.. "WTF!?", haha.
Solid start, crazy adventure, fun magic system, military protocols, and some seriously bad decisions create what is in here. You may like it, you may love it, you may have issues. Welcome to the SOC..
Bunny..
Did that grate on anyone else after a while? Maybe it was just me.. "Oh hai bunny!" no.. just.. no.. Do guys really hold on to pet names for their wives this hard?
Ok, see I'm getting ahead of myself. What's funny is I liked this book more than the first. First book 3-3.5-3.75*--this one gets moving harder into that solid 4 district.
Bookbinder starts out as a wet noodle, which is normal, he's a paper pusher and that's ok. His world gets turned upside down. That's ok. But he grows a spine. Oh I love you. I ab-so-freakin-love-it when a character grows a spine.
His odyssey-like journey gets a bit timey-wimey on us as I don't quite understand their real survivability nor the FoB's but the interactions along the way and some of his discoveries are pretty cool. I'm often surprised there is not more recon in the …
Bunny..
Did that grate on anyone else after a while? Maybe it was just me.. "Oh hai bunny!" no.. just.. no.. Do guys really hold on to pet names for their wives this hard?
Ok, see I'm getting ahead of myself. What's funny is I liked this book more than the first. First book 3-3.5-3.75*--this one gets moving harder into that solid 4 district.
Bookbinder starts out as a wet noodle, which is normal, he's a paper pusher and that's ok. His world gets turned upside down. That's ok. But he grows a spine. Oh I love you. I ab-so-freakin-love-it when a character grows a spine.
His odyssey-like journey gets a bit timey-wimey on us as I don't quite understand their real survivability nor the FoB's but the interactions along the way and some of his discoveries are pretty cool. I'm often surprised there is not more recon in the Source. I'd think they'd have a low-level satellite, high altitude balloons, or a lot of drone flights up stat to understand anything more than their general/localized map. This was published in 2013 so I know we're not fully where we are today but the military was still all over the map with their drones. Anyhow-- digression...
Source politics, further geopolitical embattlements and chains of command that are both good and turdburglers embroil this episode. I'm glad to see more of characters I thought we're truly vile be more human, and not just human, ruled by rules that they then have to come to terms with breaking for the good of saving people.
Neat book, continued interesting world building and more magical disciplines unheard of (oh and races.) Kudos!
I like this book even more than the first one. Bookbinder is indeed more likeable. Love the use of Hindu folklore.
Love it. Refreshing, fastpaced, original. Action scenes are really good, perfect blocking, fluid and smooth as silk. Great military ficion, great mix of sci-fi and fantasy.
This is the thrilling conclusion to the Shadow Ops trilogy. This time it's reversed and the indigs from the Source pay our plane a visit! The story concentrates mostly on Harlequin and Bookbinder, and it dips back 6 years into the past. We'll learn more about the limbic dampner and how Scylla became who she did. All in all, a very fun read. Even though Myke is a "new" author, he has a way with words that surprised me many times. All in all, very fun military fantasy, and I recommend it warmly. :)
Did I mention there are gahe? Lots and lots of gahe. And goblins.
Second book in the Shadow Ops series consumed! Another wild ride, though a little more fragmented than the first. It makes sense later in the book. The first quarter of the book, we get to know Bookbinder. A pencil pusher dropped in at the deep end when he discovers he's not like everybody else. We reconnect with Britton and his gang later in the book and there are some pretty cool twists in there.
Did I mention there are snakes? Lots and lots of snakes. And goblins.
Off to read the third book now. :)
I have read a fair bit of military science fiction books, but this was my first military fantasy book. In short, I thought it was awesome!
The book is about Oscar Britton, a soldier. He wakes up one day with magical powers. As his luck would have it, his powers are of a prohibited school. The book tells the story of how Oscar comes to terms with his new found powers and how the government has chosen to deal with and regulate magic users. Oscar has several difficult choices to make. Does he trust the military he's used to? Does he follow orders blindly?
I've just bought the next two books in this trilogy and they're already on my Kindle.
Did I mention there are goblins. Lots of goblins.
Loved it!!
I really liked Cole's mix of the military sci-fi and fantasy genres. His portrayal of the rogue sorcerer on the run made for a really fun read. I would highly recommend this book to anyone who's a fan of either the Military Sci-Fi or Urban Fantasy genres. If you're a fan of both, I'd say this should basically be required on your shelf.
I was looking for SO:CP to be the book equivalent of a summer blockbuster. Plot driven, lots of action, some mindless fun. In a way, it did deliver that. Cole does an excellent job with combat sequences, with building a vision of what the military might look like in this world.
Unfortunately, there are some major flaws in the book. SPOILERS FOLLOW.
I won’t bother to go into the character problems with the Oscar, the protagonist. They have been much discussed in a variety of reviews. Suffice it to say, his actions and decision making did not seem to be consistent of what we had learned of his history. So let’s move onto some other issues:
1. Gender. There are really only 3 female characters in the book. Scylla, a sociopath who believes that Latents should rule the Earth. Donner, who is consistently infantilized & portrayed as a child, incapable …
I was looking for SO:CP to be the book equivalent of a summer blockbuster. Plot driven, lots of action, some mindless fun. In a way, it did deliver that. Cole does an excellent job with combat sequences, with building a vision of what the military might look like in this world.
Unfortunately, there are some major flaws in the book. SPOILERS FOLLOW.
I won’t bother to go into the character problems with the Oscar, the protagonist. They have been much discussed in a variety of reviews. Suffice it to say, his actions and decision making did not seem to be consistent of what we had learned of his history. So let’s move onto some other issues:
1. Gender. There are really only 3 female characters in the book. Scylla, a sociopath who believes that Latents should rule the Earth. Donner, who is consistently infantilized & portrayed as a child, incapable of making good decisions. Finally, Theresa, the love interest, who is….well, the love interest. She seems to be attracted to Oscar because he’s the protagonist. (& she’s the Madonna in the traditional dichotomy. So all the women are one dimensional at best, and those single dimensions are horrible stereotypes.
2. Colonialism. There’s a subplot involving the US military invasion of the “Source”. The native peoples, referred to as “Goblins” are either resisting or working on the US base, doing menial tasks in exchange for sugar. In case you weren’t smart enough to make the connection yourself, there’s another subplot involving a separatist movement on a Native American reservation in New Mexico, just to make the connection explicit. We only meet one “Goblin” , Marty, who’s the “kind & spiritual” native. The resistance is portrayed as “savage and primitive”. So only 1 actual character, but it’s all solidly a stereotype.
3. Politics. While the story explicitly tells us that the US policy of mandatory military service is wrong, that’s not what the story implicitly tells us. The only articulate spokesperson for the counterargument is Scylla, the supervillan. And emotionally, the reader is led to enjoy the government actions. That’s the fun part of the book.
