Book Recommendation: On Basilisk Station (Honor Harrington Book 1)

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FlyingPenguin
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Book Recommendation: On Basilisk Station (Honor Harrington Book 1)

Post by FlyingPenguin »

Steve Gibson has been talking about this series for weeks on the Security Now podcast, so I finally read up on it. Good stuff, and there's 12 books with another coming.

It gets really exciting and detailed during combat. The author really gets into details on ship vs. ship combat tactics. He carefully explains the technology of the weapons, defense and propulsion systems and their realistic limitations, and then works within that framework like good sci fi story telling should.

Space combat is somewhat equivalent to galleon vs galleon naval combat due to the way the defensive systems protect the flanks of the ship far more than they can defend the bow and stern, so ships try for a "T" attack with broadsides. There's also a lot of tactics borrowed from submarine combat.

Even though the time is set 500 years from now, the technology isn't like magic. Long range weapons are missiles with either nukes or nukes that power x-ray lasers when they detonate (ala the Reagan era proposed "Star Wars" defense system). When a laser-nuke detonates, it shoots a 24 powerful xray lasers in every direction. If it gets past the point defenses and detonates within ideal range on a single ship, it generally scores at least one or two hits: a 1 - 2 meter diameter beam that cuts through metal like butter.

Close up the ships fire torpedoes and lasers, and even closer they can ram with a gravity lance.

He gets into a lot of detail on ECM systems including decoys and jamming, and counter-missile defenses.

He also gets into the nitty gritty of what damage control parties have to do during combat in vivid detail. Combat is not pretty, and things can get pretty gory inside a ship during combat. He doesn't spare us the horror of a naval ship's sickbay in the midst of battle.

Ships carry marines for ground actions and ship boardings, and they have "powered suits" ala Heinlein's Starship Troopers, but with realistic limitations. They can be configured as fast scouts with light weapons and long range and speed whose power source could last up to 12 hours on one extreme, or as heavy support troops with monstrous firepower, limited range and speed, and only 3 or 4 hours of power, and anything in between. Makes for some interesting tradeoffs in tactics.

The author really gets into the details of what life is like aboard ship, with very realistic military command structures (the author must have served in the military IMO).

On the larger stage he also gets into the world of politics, both civilian and military. A lot like Clancy does in his novels.

Because the first book has to introduce us to the author's universe (the "Honorverse"), it takes a while before we get into combat. There's no war on, more of a cold war, with all sides publicly trying to avoid any incidents, but incidents happens. However the beginning of the book spends a lot of time covering fleet wargame exercises where you get to learn about how ship vs ship tactics work.

We also get introduced to Captain Honor Harrington, the major protagonist of the series. A female Horatio Hornblower who a lot of people (myself included) compare to Captain Janeway from Star Trek Voyager. In this book she has been assigned her first major command of a light Cruiser.

Lot's of good stuff here for everyone if you're a fan of Tom Clancy, the Hammer's Slammer's books, Starship Troopers (the book not the lame ass movie) and even Star Trek.

Can't wait to start on the second book which I'm told has a lot more action than the first.

The characters are all very well rounded out - very real. When people start dying, you really feel bad for the people you've gotten to know well.

I'm listening to the audiobook version (downloaded from iTunes so I suppose it's from Audible). The reader is very good. Took a few chapters to get comfortable with her - I was a bit skeptical of a female reader, but she is actually very good and I suspect she was chosen for sounding like what the producers and author thought Harrington should sound like. By the end of the book I couldn't imagine having anyone else read it.

It's also available on Kindle.

http://www.amazon.com/Basilisk-Station- ... 522&sr=8-1

There are also legally free copies available in a variety of formats (HTML, LIT, MOBI, RTF) here:

http://baencd.thefifthimperium.com/01-H ... orverseCD/

I can see where some people might find the first 1/3 of the book a little slow. There's a lot of interesting things happening, but there's a lot of background politics going on back at home and afar that sets the stage for the cold war (like the first 1/4 of Clancy's Red Storm Rising).

Meanwhile Harrington has to settle into her new command and earn the respect of her crew. Things REALLY start getting fun for the remaining 2/3 of the book when her ship is assigned to picket duty on Basilisk station.
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Post by normalicy »

Hmmm, I eyeballed that one, but passed it by. May try it out.
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Post by FlyingPenguin »

FYI: I just finished book 3. Each book just gets better. Book 3 "The Short Victorious War" has one of the best descriptions of a large scale space battle that I've ever read.
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Post by normalicy »

Jeez, I was just checking into the series & there's 10 books not counting extras! Think I might avoid it just so I don't have another year lost to a series. It is pretty freely available online, so I guess I'll check it out when I'm done with the other 20 books that I'm working on.
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Post by FlyingPenguin »

Each book stands on it's own, so it's not like you feel compelled to read the next one. Whatever the main issue is in each book, it's always resolved at the end.
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Post by normalicy »

My problem is that if I start a series, I wanna keep reading it so that I don't forget the characters or previous plot points. I had a big ol' gap when I read the first few Dune books & then they started releasing newer ones. Couldn't remember all the details to catch the references.
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Post by wvjohn »

Ill have to check this out - web page dedicates the series to Horatio Hornblower so I know it's up my alley!
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