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Battle Hymn | Rating | |
| B | |||
| William R. Forstchen | |||
| Series | Related Books | ||
| The Lost Regiment | Rally Cry, Union Forever, Terrible Swift Sword, Fateful Lightning, Battle Hymn, Never Sound Retreat, A Band of Brothers, Men of War, Down to the Sea | ||
During the Merki War, Sergeant Major Hans Schuder was thought killed by the enemy horde. But unfortunately, he was only captured. Unfortunate, because he has been sold to the Bantag Horde. Unfortunate, because he is now a slave working to modernize the Bantags for their eventual conflict with the Republic. Unfortunate, because the Republic is unaware of any of this. He needs to tell them, and the sooner the better, but he is over a thousand miles behind the front lines with no means of transportation. But necessity is the mother of invention, they say, and this is very necessary indeed.
This book is unlike any other. There are fights, yes, but by and large it is a tale of Hans leading a great mass escape, and their flight through enemy territory while being pursued by angry Bantag. There is no real logistical problem, though there is plenty of planning. There are no politics. It's just trying to get the hell out. As such, this has a directness, a singlemindedness that I don't think any other book in the series has had. Even the last book, which was really one battle and planning for it, had a lot of side stories within it of personal struggles.
However, there are some problems that make the book a little less than it could be. The first was that there were several continuity errors. Two names are changed - Ferguson's wife changes from Olivia to Varinia, and Jim Hinsen becomes Dale Hinsen. More significantly is the change in what the horde used to demand of the humans. In previous books it was clearly stated that two in ten went to the slaughter pits each circling, but now it is claimed they only demanded one in ten. It wouldn't have been difficult for him to check his old manuscripts for accuracy, but he didn't. It's sloppy.
Also sloppy is how Forstchen justified the Bantag's modernization. The Merki used captured Yankee equipment and personell and lots of human slaves. The Bantag, on the other hand, got some others of their race through a Tunnel of Light, and this person came from a world at roughly World War Two level technology. So he was able to do for the Bantag what the Yankees did for the Rus. I felt it would have been better for the Bantag to delve into the burial mounds and city ruins that dot the planet, and which had already been described, and thus regain technical knowledge that way. To have someone just give them the technology is not only an irritating shortcut, but it's an echo of what was already done! Forstchen should have used the plot elements he'd already introduced, rather than bring in new ones.
And lastly, the reconnaisance mission from the Republic manages to take place just in time to witness Hans as he makes his break for freedom. Possible, yes, but it struck me as awfully coincidental. If there were common overflights of Bantag land, or even if the recon mission was supposed to last longer than a day or two, I could forgive it, but a mission that is supposed to be in enemy territory for a day, two at most, just happens to see this? No, that's stretching it.
This is a good book, and it probably read well in notes and outline. But it was, in my opinion, sloppily executed. It's a needed lead-in to the next war, but I just wish Forstchen had paid a little more attention to his own previous books.
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