The Dark Crusade

The Dark Path introduced a new alien force into the delicate balance of power. This force was the actual puppetmaster of the human-zor war and now wishes to bring both worlds under its madness inducing shadow. The Dark Ascent brought into focus a secret conspiracy that is disrupting the balance of power on both a military and metaphysical level.But the same ancient philosophy of the zor race that prophesized "the Dark Wing" has also foreseen a hero that will meet the new menace--a hero now mystically embodied in a rebellious space commodore by the name of Jackie Lappierre.Now in The Dark Crusade as armadas clash and outposts fall, the overly confident alien menace is forced to confront a zor human alliance that has been warned, their covert and insidious plans of infiltration now exposed...but all is not as it seems to be. The "vuhl menace" may not be the ultimate enemy, and the all-powerful puppetmasters that have lurked in the shadows have entered the endgame where the mysteries of alien prophecies may have already determined the outcome.Though victory is hardly attained by either side in The Dark Crusade, the page turning and thought provoking climax will forever alter the fate of sentient life in the galaxy.From Publishers WeeklyLike its predecessors, this latest entry in the Dark Wing series (The Dark Wing, etc.) expands the bounds of military SF to touch on the philosophy and morality of war. Weaving between the sailors and marines of the Solar Empire, the cultists of the Blazing Star movement and the monklike imperial bodyguards of the Guardian Order, Hunt examines the motivations that lead to success and failure in a 25-year campaign against a series of alien foes. Honorable folks like Adm. Barbara MacEwan and glory hounds like Adm. Sir Erich Anderson must both deal with a new psychic weapon in the war against the insectoid vuhl. Hunt continues numerous plot lines from earlier volumes, but he never tangles them. His prose stays transparent, even as it shifts to metaphysical planes where the war against the true enemy is being waged. The work shows a strong affection for the military profession, while still being aware of its tendency to slip from honorable combat to heedless slaughter. In places, new readers may find the complicated mythology a bit hard to follow, but all should look forward to new entries in this thoughtful series. Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From BooklistIn the world of Hunt's well-received saga of alien contact and future interstellar conflict, of which this is the fourth volume, it is now long after the events of The Dark Wing (2001). Admiral Marais is long dead, and at the forefront of the human-zek alliance is Commodore Jackie Lapierre. It is just as well that she is fashioned somewhat in the mold of David Weber's Honor Harrington, because the alien opponent of the alliance is threatening not only military destruction by conquest and sabotage but also the total corruption of both human and zek cultures, which would make the alliance's continuation impossible. Hunt has lost none of his knack for fast action, and his skill in characterization is growing as he highlights the ethical dilemmas that large-scale conflict generates. The saga now seems to be influenced by Weber, Herbert, and even Tolkien, which is to say by three of the most proven crowd--pleasers in speculative fiction of the last half century. Librarians, stock up. Roland GreenCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved