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"Wonderful followup to Crider Chronicles"
Anderson Gentry has hit another homerun! This short book (154 pages) follows Jean Barrett and the crew of her ship, Shade Tree, on two adventures. The captain and her ship were first seen in the third book of the fantastic Crider Chronicles from two years ago, and these two new stories take place a few years after the events of that book. This isn't a sequel to the Chronicles (we hope to see that soon) but more of a brief peek into one of the ships and crew from that novel.

The first story is entitled "Plague Ship" and involves cross-border smugglers, double-crosses and a deadly virus!

The second tale is called "Unrepentant... More > Sinner" and deals with the unsavory topic of slavery. Barrett and her crew break up a slave ring that's been kidnapping young women and selling them to miners out on the lawless frontier.

Once again the writing is silky smooth, drawing the reader into its embrace and not letting go easily. I love it when a book can grab me with the excitement of "oh, just more page and *then* I'll get some sleep." Next thing you know, a new day is dawning and you're just finishing the final page. At 154 pages, that's no big deal, but with Crider Chronicles' 600+ pages, I was in agony everytime I had to put the book down.

Like all good Sci-Fi, Mister Gentry focuses on the people in his story and let's the "science" part of his fiction just exist as a normal part of life, much as the laptop and internet connection I'm using now are fairly mundane. Gellar Faster-Than-Light drive? Tangler weapons? Pee-beam emitters? Toothbrushes that clean your teeth on their own? Static-jet showers? No highly technical descriptions are required for these items; they just exist, and no one gives a second thought to them.

I can't find any fault in his writing; just in his proofreader. Although there are only a few grammatical errors in this book (as opposed to the dozens in Chronicles) it's still a shame they exist to mar an otherwise great book. Other than that, I'm just upset the stories were too short! :D

If you're a fan of Science Fiction and haven't purchased these two books from Lulu.com or Amazon.com, you're missing out on some outstanding fiction. < Less