When a mission goes sideways, the brass wants to know why, and one of the Skyrines who returned home is trying to navigate his way through a quasi-PTSD state by telling someone who’s a friend of a friend what happened. The story is told through flashbacks to “The Red” that go through everything from a crash landing to their final extraction.
Characters
There are memorable characters, and there are spear carriers. Unfortunately, War Dogs has more of the latter than the former. I get that this is a pretty run of the mill grunt, but I had a hard time caring about anyone. You identify with the basic instinct for survival, but other than that, the characters just feel a bit flat.
One other thing that threw me for a loop was some of the accent/dialect some of the characters use. Teal, a martian colonist, speaks in an accent is nearly impossible to read for long periods of time. I don’t mind a few odd words here or there, but I’m pretty sure she used more apostrophes than vowels.
Plot
If I’m summarizing the plot, it’d be as follows: things go wrong, then they go more wrong, then there’s a bit of light, and then things turn out to be worse than you thought. Its a pretty standard formula for a military Sci-Fi novel, but that doesn’t make it less enjoyable. There were enough reveals and twists that I found myself interested in getting to the next chapter. Though the decision to tell this as a flashback took away a bit of tension, I still had several nights of white knuckled reading.
Setting
The attention to detail in this military sci-fi world is unbelievable. From the amount of air the stranded Skyrines have to how gravity impacts how they fight, it was really fun to see that Bear had clearly done his homework and come up with a believable kit for the grunts. I also believed that we could have a world structure that aligns with what Bear has set up. I can believe that not every nation would be on board with the aliens, and the the Martian colonists, named “Muskies” after our favorite car/rocket company, was cool and clever.
Tone/Voice
Bear’s depiction of the military culture, from the lingo to way orders were given and obeyed, was interesting for this civilian. I thought Bear did a great job of showing how training takes over in the moment, and men and women look for leadership when everything hits the fan. That kind of instinctual language and description of events translated well into the narrative. And our protagonist’s personal opinions helped color the events in a way that I couldn’t only believe a real grunt would think.
Fun Factor
As I said before, this was an enjoyable story that lined up pretty well with my expectations. There weren’t any big twists, but for the hard sci-fi fans out there, its a good beach read.
Overall – Everyday Drinking
The setting and technology are what really carried the novel for me. While I would never dream of going to war on Mars, I got enough gritty realism to feel like it could happen to someone else. While the story wasn’t particularly mind blowing, there was a fair amount of tension that kept me turning the pages.
Pairs well with…
Mars Maltage Cosmo, not just because of the name though. This Japanese whisky isn’t technically bourbon since its not from Kentucky, but seeing as War Dogs is a bit outside of this solar system, I don’t think its that big of a deal…