The story takes place in the last days of the Terran Empire. Barbarians (hark, Ancient Rome analogies proliferate!) threaten the borders of the Empire. ex-Admiral McCormac forced into rebellion gathers discontents (he even employs Barbarians to help his cause!). McCormac's ravishing wive, Kathryn, is rescued by Flandry from a corrupt governor. Flandry falls in love of course. The result of the love triangle is a MAJOR spoiler so I will stop here. Along the way we learn about a particularly fascinating jungle planet and its unique alien inhabitants (comprised of three distinct live forms that gather together to become sentient). Anderson does dwell on descriptions but I did not find that it distracted much from the plot. My main complaint comes from the fact that Anderson skips over MAJOR action sequences. For example, very early in the story Flandry rescues Kathryn and an ingenious plan is hinted at but Anderson never tells us how she was rescued. A nice chapter could have been devoted to this sequence. Perhaps Anderson was working under a stringent page number limit.
Description:
The story takes place in the last days of the Terran Empire. Barbarians (hark, Ancient Rome analogies proliferate!) threaten the borders of the Empire. ex-Admiral McCormac forced into rebellion gathers discontents (he even employs Barbarians to help his cause!). McCormac's ravishing wive, Kathryn, is rescued by Flandry from a corrupt governor. Flandry falls in love of course. The result of the love triangle is a MAJOR spoiler so I will stop here. Along the way we learn about a particularly fascinating jungle planet and its unique alien inhabitants (comprised of three distinct live forms that gather together to become sentient). Anderson does dwell on descriptions but I did not find that it distracted much from the plot. My main complaint comes from the fact that Anderson skips over MAJOR action sequences. For example, very early in the story Flandry rescues Kathryn and an ingenious plan is hinted at but Anderson never tells us how she was rescued. A nice chapter could have been devoted to this sequence. Perhaps Anderson was working under a stringent page number limit.