A Sword Into Darkness

By: Thomas A. Mays

Narrated by: Liam Owen

Humanity is no longer alone in the universe. An unknowable threat approaches Earth - and we are completely unprepared to face what's coming.

Aerospace tycoon Gordon Elliot Lee cannot stand idly by while a mysterious alien presence from Delta Pavonis bears down upon mankind's only home. Shut out from NASA and military support, Gordon is forced to go it alone, to sow the seeds for an entirely new sort of planetary defense: a space-based naval force.

Joined by Nathan Kelley - a bloodied naval warrior, scarred by his own actions in the waters off North Korea - and Kris Munoz - an avant garde scientific genius with more ideas than sense - these three will scour the very edges of fringe science and engineering to attempt development of Earth's first space navy in time to oppose the Deltan invasion.

Beset by ridicule, government obstruction, industrial espionage, and their own personal demons, it will take a miracle just to get off the ground. But the challenges on Earth are nothing compared to what awaits them in space. Against an unknown alien enemy with vastly superior technology, a handful of human scientists and warriors must become the sword that holds the darkness at bay.

Missiles will flash, railguns will rumble, lasers will burn, and defenders will die. If they fail, our end is at hand.

©2013 Thomas A. Mays (P)2014 Thomas A. Mays

Critic reviews

"Solid adventure, intrigue, and speculative space-tech, from a rising star in military science fiction." (David Brin, Hugo and Nebula Award-winning author of Existence)

"There are brilliant first contact stories, great space combat stories, and amazing stories of technological discovery. Rarely do you find all three in the same novel. Remember the name Thomas A. Mays. You're going to be seeing it on the best-seller list." (Jeff Edwards, award-winning author of Sea of Shadows and The Seventh Angel)

"Sharply written, suspenseful, and tightly plotted, A Sword Into Darkness reads like the best Tom Clancy novels, with a science fiction heart provided by Arthur C. Clark. Can't wait to read more from Thomas Mays!" (Graham Brown, #1 New York Times best-selling author of Zero Hour)

Great Audio Rendition of Military Sci-Fi

What did you love best about A Sword Into Darkness?

The concept of humanity having two decades to prepare for first contact, the vivid description of the technology, and the high-stakes plot were awesome.

Who was your favorite character and why?

My favorite character was the brilliant girl who blew up her developing the futuristic propulsion system. Who doesn't like a girl like that?

Which scene was your favorite?

Describing my favorite scene would be a spoiler because my favorite scene was near the end. Suffice to say, it was the final battle scene.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

The launch of the Sword was a pivotal moment that moved me.

Any additional comments?

I gave this four stars in its Kindle format, really 4.5. I gave 5 stars to the audio version because it felt more real and alive hearing it. The reasons I withheld the 5th star in the written version were washed away by the audio.

exciting story

Exciting story. Hated getting out of the following commute to and from work.

Good story, good humor. Horrible reader!!!!

Is there anything you would change about this book?

Narrator

What did you like best about this story?

good science fiction story

How did the narrator detract from the book?

Can't pronounce technical vocabulary correctly. He sounds like an effeminate James T. Kirk reading the story.

If this book were a movie would you go see it?

yes

Tight story

I don't actually buy into some of the premises of the story but it is never the less well crafted and enjoyable.

Indulge in some war sci-fi

It's not a complex story or full of mind bending ideas, but is instead a classic story about human pererverance, ingenuity and blowing shit up. Take a break from the brainy stuff and indulge in some unadulterated space war.

Not the best

In this audiobook, a rich businessman named Gordon Lee has detected an alien ship approaching Earth from a nearby star. NASA believes it to only be a solar fragment ejected from the star, and thus refuses to entertain the idea of aliens. Gordon takes it upon himself to invent and acquire technology to help Earth defend against the aliens should they be hostile. Thus he hires Nathan to lead up this endeavor. The book follows this process all the way through to first contact and shortly beyond that.

Overall I found the beginning of the book to be entertaining and imaginative. Eventually though the constant success after success and mere good luck really takes a bit away from the realism here. They don't really encounter many setbacks or challenges..it just all happens easily for them. And this continues throughout the entire novel. Most of them just skate through the whole novel without too much of a scratch.

Another issue is the romance between Nathan and Kris. It just felt completely fake and ultimately whenever they were together in romantic mode, the book just ground to a halt.

And lastly, the aliens theirselves... they could have been much more mysterious, intimidating, and ALIEN, but ultimately they just throw out a completely ridiculous reason for coming to Earth and it really ruins the whole thing.

Overall its not a terrible story, but its not great either. A solid 3.

NOTE: I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review.

Decent story, nearly unbearable narration

Any additional comments?

The story has some problems, straining credulity now and again, and there are a couple of threads that never really get resolved, but it's pretty minor stuff. The characters are a little flat, but the story isn't really character-centric so that doesn't impede things too much. Overall, it's not bad if you like military/space sci-fi, but there are better titles out there. I don't regret the purchase, but I don't imagine this will be one of the books I listen to more than once.

Which brings up the real issue I had with this title. The narrator is awful; not just sub-par, but actively distracting and damaging to the enjoyability of the book. I will make a point to avoid anything narrated by Liam Owen in the future.

He has this really cheesy, oddly enunciated delivery, like he's doing a higher-pitched impression of the "movie trailer guy" schtick as interpreted by "sports radio voice guy," always putting weird, awkward emphasis on words where it has no place. I felt like he was waving his hands around in my face to make sure I noticed his delivery instead of just letting me get absorbed in the story being told.

On top of that, he consistently mispronounces certain words. Luckily, these words do not appear so often that you end up crawling the walls, but I flinched every time he pronounced with the word "gantry" with a hard J sound. Add in the fact that he has almost no ability to make character voices distinct from one another (apart from a few really bad accents), and his narration all but ruined the listening experience for me. I had to stop listening a few times out of annoyance with him, and had the book been much longer I doubt I would have made it to the end.

Fantastic!

Easily the best space combat novel I've read ( and listened to) in years. Smart physics, badass space battles, and cool technology.

Solid Summer Scifi Fun!

Great story about a wealthy visionary who sees an upcoming alien threat years before the government. He assembles a great team to develop technology to confront an alien warship. Solid believable tech. Love how the story evolves over the years.

You can tell how the author's personal military life gave this a great realistic feel.

Thought the voices here sounded very good as well!

Overall a rare find!

Man, THAT Fell Apart!

OK, First off, upon reflection, I'm left with a slight feeling of "I kinda enjoyed this book", however, there seems to be one of those "Good Book Slumps" going on currently, so thinking I MAY have slightly enjoyed this book MAY be due to desperation from a recent lack of GOOD Sci-Fi Books... Have I lost you yet? If not, You're doing better than I am!

In the Sci-Fi Genre I have come to EXPECT that the Earth Encounters Aliens who are almost always technically superior to us, yet somehow we always seem to pull some stunning Victory out of the jaws of defeat by doing the best we can with what we have... This ain't that kinda book...

In this book, the Aliens are THOUSANDS OF YEARS ahead of us technologically, yet in nearly no time, a few people, hampered (as usual in books) by "Big Evil Governments and Big Evil Corporations", defy ALL odds and forces arrayed against them, and suddenly advance Physics, and our Technology, about 500+ years. I started to feel disconnected at that point by the GIGANTIC sudden LEAP in technology, and then everyone acting like they've understood it all for a 100 years or so.

But when we DO use this new Technology to build HIGHLY ADVANCED Star-Battle-Ships (In less time than you could build a canoe), we race out to confront the coming threat! What could the MASSIVE Alien Threat want from us that they couldn't obtain MUCH easier from the MANY other Planets and Asteroids they've zipped by? What do WE have that they can't get anywhere else??? When THAT question was answered, I literally laughed out loud and just began TRYING to suspend ALL belief in reality and just enjoy SOME PARTS of the rest of the story...

...but THEN things go downhill from there... To *ME* (And you may feel differently about it), It just felt like the Author couldn't think of a way to make advances and "threats" at least "SEEM Possible", so he kinda resorted to the old "We can do these impossible, unbelievable, things because... well... BECAUSE I SAID WE COULD!" The action scenes seem to be tossed in at random and forced into place, like someone said "There should be some Action here".. and the daring hero buckles under immediately after the appropriate amount of "Action" is finished.

I dunno... just seemed really "Jumpy", "Forced", and the plot seems to often depend on "And Then A Miracle Happens"...