There is nothing I cna say to do David Drake's series justice. It was the first military science fiction I ever read (I was around 10 I think and reading one of my brother's books; this was around the time I read First Flight by Claremont too). Drake, at least in this series, always treated his characters as nothing more, or less, than just regular guys having a job to do. Many of them liked the job and many of them hated it, but it's what they were paid to do. Going back to these stories was like curling up with a childhood stuffed animal, comforting and nostalgic.