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The Ember War

The Ember War, Book 1, 2

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The Ember War

By: Richard Fox
Narrated by: Luke Daniels
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About this listen

The Ember War, book 1: The Earth is doomed. Humanity has a chance.

In the near future, an alien probe arrives on Earth with a pivotal mission: to determine if humanity has what it takes to survive the impending invasion by a merciless armada. The probe discovers Marc Ibarra, a young inventor who holds the key to a daring gambit that could save a fraction of Earth's population. Humanity's only chance lies with Ibarra's ability to keep a terrible secret and engineer the planet down the narrow path to survival. Earth will need a fleet. One with a hidden purpose. One strong enough to fight a battle against annihilation.

The Ember War is the first installment in an epic military sci-fi series. If you enjoyed A Hymn Before Battle by John Ringo and The Last Starship by Vaughn Heppner, then you'll love this explosive adventure with constant thrills and high stakes from beginning to end.

The Ruins of Anthalas, book 2: An ancient holocaust holds the key to humanity's survival.

Only a sliver of mankind survived the Xaros invasion. With Earth's defenses in ashes, nothing can stop the aliens' inevitable return. Hope arrives through a cryptic message from a long-lost alien race, promising the means to rebuild the shattered space fleet. Captain Valdar takes one of the last strike carriers, the Breitenfeld, and his shell-shocked crew on a desperate mission to the dead world. Unfortunately humans aren't the only power that received the ancient message....

The Ruins of Anthalas is the second book in The Ember War Saga, a military sci-fi space opera. If you like David Weber and John Ringo with a touch of Isaac Asimov, then you'll love this fast-paced and captivating adventure where humanity survives at the edge of a knife.

©2016 Richard Fox (P)2016 Podium Audio Military Science Fiction Space Opera Military Fiction
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Rough start for me but improved along the way. The attempts at Australian accents and women's voices are cringe worthy. I'll probably get the sequel.

Started 'meh' then got better.

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loved this book a lot. Great story and excellent narration. on to blood of heroes!

excellent sci fi

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Almost all the voices are unrealistic. Sounds like he's squeezing out the voice.
IDK, but it's really distracting.

Narrator Squeezing out voices

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My most favourite space series on Audible. Must have gone over the entire series several times at least over the years. The narrator is perfect, could not imagine anyone else to voice the characters especially the Armor.

Best action space opera series

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This story is a great original and simple take on the sci-fi realm. It's a simple story written with everything simplified as much as possible, which makes it incredibly easy to follow and digest, although, for me, this had the side effect of making some points feel shallow.

The only two characters I really sympathised with and felt much for were Ibarra and Valdor, and to a slightly lesser extent Elias, but neither of them felt like they got the character exposition that they deserved, considering their sheer importance to the story and their own heft of power within the story.
And I get the impression that the full jist of what Stacey truly is will be explained in future books, but the hints at her biological makeup felt both underdone and overdone, considering the lack of an immediate answer to them within these two first books.

Some of the story -again just my perspective not quite an objective observation- felt rushed, or oversimplified.
Just like it's great simplifying sci-fi technical talk to make it easy to follow, it's also important to have just enough meat and potatoes behind it to make you feel that the characters are impassioned about it and give it a heavier importance to the story.

Before listening to the story, I was convinced to purchase based on a QA with Richard Fox I read. He mentioned those points I did above from a positive light, and my criticisms of them is purely from how I like to enjoy a sci-fi. The story itself seems to be very well written and delivered.
But one point in the QA which I did find very contradictory was the question and answer regarding why Humanity (modern day?) haven't heard from an alien civilization yet.
I believe that RF gave three possible explanations and used the third (There's something out there silencing civilizations before they can begin to use interstellar communication) to explain the why in this story.
And yet there is initial contact with the Alliance probe which propels the story forward. This point is in line with RF's answer, and the probe even explains why it decides to make contact considering Ibarra's discovery and how it can be used to propel Humanity forward.
Later, it's revealed that the probe is from an Alliance of alien species, which again feels in line with that answer, giving the impression that they were only perhaps a dozen or so different races.
But in the 2nd book, it's revealed that there are (perhaps) hundreds of races in the Alliance. And that many of them were already capable of advanced space flight and interstellar contact prior to the Xaros and the Alliance contact, contradicting the why for why the stars are so silent.
This point stood out to me and really knocked me off track on enjoying the story as much and I felt shook the core motivation of the story.

My next point that reeeeaaaallllyyyy bothered me was the Australian character. I am Australian, partly raised in US as well so I personally have a very in-between accent. But NEVER have I heard an accent as stereotypically atrocious as the one delivered in this narration.
Upon hearing it and realizing it was meant to be Australian, I tried to focus on the dialogue rather than how it was spoken and found that the "Australianisms" used were, likewise to the narration, stereotypically atrocious.
The most "Australian'ish" accents and speaking I've ever heard have been in Darwin, and they didn't hold a candle to the Australian in this.

My negative points aside, for the most parts, the narration was well done, but how bad the Australian part was put me off so much that I couldn't give that more than a 2-star rating.

The story is well written and brings a new take to Humanity expanding into the stars and contesting with peaceful and waring alien races in an easy to follow and enjoyable fashion.

The characters, whilst I felt were overly simplified, were still solid characters and were shown in a way that can make you understand their motivations and views.

I will most certainly be working my way through the rest of the novels over time.

And I thank the author for putting the work into making this.

I would definitely suggest this story to any sci-fi lover out there.

Great original sci-fi delivered well!

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great voice acting, making each character stand out.
story was entertaining with moderate leaning on tropes

enjoyable

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Loved going back to this book over and over ahain. the performance is outstanding!!!! keep up the good work!

loved it!

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Would you consider the audio edition of The Ember War to be better than the print version?

The audio book is exceptionally enjoyable and accessible when driving or relaxing while working around the house. With 2 Children it is not always easy to devote time a print version.

What does Luke Daniels bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you had only read the book?

The narration was excellent overall with good character vocal inflection. The only grating aspect is the Australian accent. As an Australian myself I find it over acted and hope I don't sound like that to others.

If you made a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?

Phoenix from the embers

Any additional comments?

This is a great story without some of the over hyped military macho ism. The characters have more depth and frailty than is generally seen is this genre. All up a great plot, well executed. I will definitely work through the series.

Enjoyable and gripping

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This story has modern tec, ideas. when u think you coming to the story peak a new level kicks in. love to see this in a movie.

Want modern gripping Sci fi this story is the one.

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This audiobook gets better each time I listen to it. I am carried away to another time and place.

Great experience.

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