Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)Captain Dominic Flandry of the Terran Intelligence Corps is the 31st Century James Bond. These excellent stories are set in a fabulous background in which mankind has established the sprawling Terran Empire across 400 light years and containing four million stars and countless inhabited worlds. But the Empire is decadent, and alien barbarians as well as other interstellar empires such as the Merseians are plotting its downfall. Dominic Flandry is a larger-than-life player in this game of interstellar intrigue and these stories, in which Flandry fights to save an Empire that he knows is on borrowed time, are great fun. Like James Bond, Flandry enjoys wine, women, and song and recognizes that "true decadence requires work to be appreciated--it isn't lolling around on cushions eating drugged custard!" But he is also an intellectual hero with an appreciation of history who sadly acknowledges that the Empire is in its late decadent stage, vulnerable to alien conquest or revolution from within.
Author Poul Anderson had a splendid gift for imagining and creating plausible aliens who truly were alien. In these stories the reader will come to know and like the Merseians, the Betelgeusians, the Scothans, the Urduhu and many others. These aliens are truly alien, with their own non-human motivations and characteristics. In particular the squaring off between Flandry and Aycharaych, the ace intelligent operative of the Merseians, makes for terrific enjoyment.
Poul Anderson was one of the greats of the Golden Age of Science Fiction. It is terrific that his works are being republished so that new generations of readers can enjoy these superb stories. (I look forward to the day when more of his works are available on Kindle.) Space opera does not get better than this. Those who like well-written science fiction yarns should not pass this one up. Most readers will read and enjoy these stories many times, as I have. Highly recommended. RJB.
Click Here to see more reviews about: Captain Flandry: Defender of the Terran Empire (The Technic Civilization Saga)
No longer a brash, young ensign, Captain Dominic Flandry has risen in rank, but now appreciates fully that the Terran empire is old and tired, wanting to be left in peace. But the enemies it has made and the competing empire of Merseia will give it no peace. Too evenly matched for open warfare not to destroy them both, the opponents engage in subtle thrust and counter-thrust, feint and counter-feint, with Flandry in the thick of it. Though through this and his succeeding adventures he will struggle gloriously and snatch victory from the alien jaws of defeat, Flandry is yet a tragic figure: a man who knows too much history, who knows that battle, scheme and even betray as he will, in the end it will mean nothing. For with the relentlessness of physical law the Empire is falling and the Long Night is approaching. If that darkness is not to fall in his own lifetime, if the things he cares about are to be saved, he must do what he can. And anyone, human or alien, who gets in his way will most definitely regret it.
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