RRP £6.99 Lowest New Price £3.47

Orbit Number of pages: 448 Language: English (Original Language) Language: English (Unknown)

RRP: £6.99
And I thought the series couldn't get any better . . . boy, was I wrong!
Review date: 2008-10-21 Rating: 10 out of 10

Wow. Just . . . wow. This is a hard one to review without giving away too much, especially if you've not read the three previous novels in the series. But I'll take a crack at it.

Karen Traviss hooked me with her first "Republic Commando" book, "Hard Target," showing excellent storytelling, good character development, and intensive research into the fictional universe about which she was writing. Her second book in the series, "Republic Commando: Triple Zero" beautifully developed the characters even further. By the third book, "Republic Commando: True Colors," I was cheering for just about everyone, including the formerly unlikeable Walon Vau. This is now the fourth "Republic Commando" book, and I was poleaxed that I found it EVEN BETTER than the previous novels in the series.

The story starts over fifty years prior to the Battle of Geonosis, where the Mandalorian warrior Munin Skirata adopts a small war-orphan, upon whom he bestows the new name "Kal." The rest of the story skips ahead to the late days of the Clone Wars, up to the issuing of the galaxy-changing and titular Order 66 and slightly beyond, taking in all the consequences of everyone's decisions, taking some shocking twists and turns. And I'm sorry, but I can't possibly go into much more plot detail without spoiling some major surprises both in this book and those in previous instalments.

Suffice it to say that if you've read and liked the previous novels in the series and grown attached to the characters, you will really, REALLY enjoy this book. I hate to use a trite expression, but "Order 66" really IS an emotional roller-coaster. By page eleven, my eyes were welling up a bit. Later on, I found myself laughing with delight as more great characters were brought in, more gallows humour was cracked, and more loose ends were tied up. Either my brain's turning to sentimental mush, or Karen Traviss is one of the finest military fiction writers living. I prefer to think the latter.

I can't possibly imagine a "Star Wars" novel getting better than this, folks. Kandosii!