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	Claws that Catch (Looking Glass, Book 4) John Ringo, Travis S Taylor Baen, 2008 - 352 pages average customer review:based on 2 reviews view larger image
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            Working off of a piece of intelligence from the alien Hexosehr, the Vorpal Blade is dispatched to investigate rumors of an ancient and powerful civilization that may have been the creators of the ?black box? that drives humanity's only space ship. Any remnant technology would be nice but what the Blade finds is much more than they bargained for. Worse, the ship is infested by an alien species of scorpion-like arachnoids that has the potential to wipe out a world. Worst of all, instead of being Astrogator, Captain William Weaver is now the XO and he is not getting along with the new commander. And the new commander does not get along with Weaver, the ship's female savant-linguist or most of the rest of the original crew. And what is that weird noise the ship makes every time it's in hard maneuvers?

            Leave it to the oddball geniuses of the Blade to sort it all out. And the Dreen are not going to like the answers.

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The Vorpal Blade Spaces Again

Claws That Catch (2008) is the fourth SF novel in the William Weaver series, following Manxome Foe. In the previous volume, the Vorpal Blade was damaged so severely that it was replaced. The casualty rate was not as bad as the first voyage, but the losses were still heavy. Most of the survivors were decorated and promoted. Two-Gun was sent to OCS by presidential order.

In this novel, Brooke Pierson marries Eric Bergstresser. He wears officer dress blues for the first time. He also has an enlisted dress uniform in his closet that has never been worn. Rapid promotion can be expensive.

Two-Gun discovers at almost the last minute that there will be a few special guests at the wedding. Of course, his former skipper -- Admiral Blankemeier -- is coming. The President was persuaded not to attend due to the publicity factor, but the Chief of Astronautic Operations and the Commandant of the Marine Corps are coming instead, along with assorted staff officers. The reception is going to be brass heavy.

After a short yet enthusiastic honeymoon, Lieutenant Bergstresser reports for duty and is handed a heavy load of auxiliary duties. The paperwork is going to seriously cut into his married life. Being an officer in the Space Marines is more work and less fun than being a junior sergeant.

The Vorpal Blade II is being readied for a new mission when the news hits the fan. The White House and Pentagon were preparing to announce the existence of a space navy in the very near future, but the Russians, Chinese and the media caught onto the information a bit sooner than expected. Various survivors of the second voyage -- including Two-Gun -- quickly become international news celebrities. Top Powell is a hit on the talk circuit.

In this story, the new Vorpal Blade is checking out an intelligence item received from their new allies. The Hexosehr had discovered an alien artifact of unknown origin in a retrograde orbit around a gas giant. They had tried to destroy it to keep its technology out of Dreen hands, but their best efforts failed to dent the skin. The Hexosehr finally deorbitted the artifact into the gas giant atmosphere.

The voyage out is flawed with minor problems. Captain Weaver is the new executive officer and is trying to break in the new commander. Unfortunately, Captain Prael is a former submariner and has problems adjusting to the Space Navy. He does accept the space tape, but refuses to let Miriam Moon provide assistance to engineering. So the linguist and technological genius is bored and depressed until the requests start trickling in despite the skipper's orders.

When the Vorpal Blade reaches its destination, the crew cannot find any other signs of the alien civilization in space and only some buried ruins on the surface of a terrestrial type planet. So the ship visits a blue giant in the vicinity. This sun has definite signs of alien civilization, including something huge that looks like a glass christmas tree.

After a frustrating time investigating the tree, the Vorpal Blade leaves a contingent on the artifact and travels to Runner's World to get some additional specialists from the Hexosehr. The XO is left in charge, so he decides that he can now play his guitar to relax his nerves. The crew complains about his volume and singing, but Weaver ignores them. They do find some fascinating and terrifying aspects of the artifact, but then a Dreen fleet arrives.

This tale puts Weaver and the away party in harm's way. So what else is new! Still, the Dreen fleet has sixty-one ships, including a very large brain-ship.

As with the previous stories, the casualty rate is high and the ship gets shot up. Yet an alien spider-like creature with a serious hunger for Dreen flesh provides some significant assistance. Enjoy!

Highly recommended for Ringo & Taylor fans and for anyone else who enjoys tales of space opera, naval and marine combat, and some very interesting characters.

-Arthur W. Jordin

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Military Science fiction

Cover to cover in one day. A very engrossing read, with non-stop action. Too bad the XO never did find his door.

Now for the bad news: You need to read the earlier books in the series to get up to speed. Most of the information is there, it just comes at you real fast.

The good news: the publisher has once again added a cd-rom to the book. This contains (unless I miss my guess) the earlier books in the series!! This is the kind of bargain that shouldn't be missed.

I haven't perused my cd because I already own most of Baen's backlist (everything by John and Doc).

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