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Dark Powers | Rating | |
| B | |||
| Jack McKinney | |||
| Series | Related Books | ||
| Robotech: The Sentinels | Genesis, Battle Cry, Homecoming, Battlehymn, Force of Arms, Doomsday, Southern Cross, Metal Fire, The Final Nightmare, Invid Invasion, Metamorphosis, Symphony of Light, The Devil's Hand, Dark Powers, Death Dance, World Killers, Rubicon, The End of the Circle | ||
The SDF-3 is stuck on the other side of the galaxy, the spacefold engines too damaged to return them to Earth. The Robotech Expeditionary Force wants little more than to stay away from the Invid - defending themselves if necessary, but certainly not getting involved - when a kludged-together ship of refugees forces their hand. Now Rick Hunter leads a force, the Sentinels, in a bid to free planets from under the Invid's heel. But the seperation of the REF into two forces plays right into Edwards' plans for ultimate power.
The start here suffers some of the same problems as the last, that of just taking too long to get things rolling. The new REF-Sentinels ship doesn't launch until seventy pages in, leaving barely a hundred fifty to relate their actions in the book. The result is an accelerated campaign to liberate Karbarra that leaves the impression of the Invid that is contrary to their reputaion. On the other hand, I'll admit that the introduction of the Sentinels and their peculiar starship are elements that cannot be entirely bypassed. Indeed, they can in some ways be considered part of "getting things rolling." But final preparations, tests, and meetings really could have been done without.
But the worst flaw of the last book, the utter simplicity and illogic of the characters, is largely absent. This is largely because Edwards is given little screen time, as it were, and in most of those he is alone and thus his actions can be considered the secrets they are meant to be. There are still plot and logic holes, of course, and the story is relatively straightforward, but at least it's not simple. There is nothing here to make me cringe, nothing that would drastically affect the story.
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