Battleship: Leviathan

Battleship Leviathan Series, Book 1

By: Craig Martelle

Narrated by: Shawn Compton

A derelict warship, ancient but still alive. A small team of humans fighting for all humanity.

Built for a time when the races were just finding their way to the stars, finding that they could dominate others. The galactic conquests created the arms race and the ancients, the Progenitors had to protect their own. They built a ship to drive the others away.

It worked. And it didn't. The Progenitors abandoned the galaxy to the newcomers, leaving relics behind as monuments to their failure.

Humanity spread to the stars and ran headlong into the established races. A new war begins, and no one conducts war better than humanity except for the Blaze Collective.

The two go head-to-head while humanity frantically searches for something to give them an advantage. Ancient technology. The derelicts scattered across the galaxy. Gutted and useless.

Except for one, hidden in plain sight, close to Earth. Major Declan Payne takes his team aboard to find that the ship is no derelict, and it needs him as much as humanity needs it.

Battleship: Leviathan. A Doomsday Weapon whose only goal is peace.

©2021 Craig Martelle (P)2021 Tantor

Great start to this series!

I tried reading Craigs earlier book but haven’t liked them that much. But this was really good and I guess Craigs storytelling and characters has become great. It has the humor and great action a great series needs and I’m looking forward to the next book. Buy the way I really like Shawn Comptons as a narrator.

Great story, great presentation.

If you like space operas, and who the hell doesn't? Good story, fast paced, leading to a awesome series.

What a pleasure to listen to.

Great story, great characters,and great narration.. I listen to a lot of space military books and this was one of the best. Way to go Craig Martelle.

I like the storyline

So far, so good. There hasn't been a lot of backstory y6ou any of the characters, which is fine by me. I am having some difficulty distinguishing the characters based on the narrator's change in voices, and someone's I've been completely wrong as to who is talking.

There has been a number of funny quips between characters which keeps the storyline fresh and enjoyable.

Excellent Military-scifi story.

Excellent story and performance. I found the second book on Audible. Looking forward to continuing the story.

Good listen good book

I enjoyed this book and am looking forward to the next one. The book moved well and the story was interesting. It’s similar to some other books I’ve read, but unique.

Jewel 💎

Good story except for juvenile banter

This was a very good story that was ruined by the continuing juvenile banter of the suppressed military officers in the story. I listened to about half of it but then gave up on it. Don’t waste a credit.

An oxymoron.

Another entry in the "We were doomed, but then we found this warship with an AI" genre, except in this case it is a pacifist warship. A pacifist warship? Isn't that an oxymoron?

I suppose the author was looking for something to set this book apart from all of the other books in this sub-category of sci-fi space operas, but it feels as though he forgot to look at the definition of "pacifist" in the dictionary, so we have an AI that claims it will not fight, but is perfectly willing to not only equip others to do the work, but also to help them by whatever means are necessary, including launching missiles. Oh well. I suppose not every AI in every book can have the character or idiosyncrasies of Skippy The Magnificent.

The story itself is OK once you get past the basic inconsistency here. It is pretty standard stuff, without anything to really set it apart and nothing that would make me want to buy the next book in the series. There is little character development and even less to make me want to read more about them, but the story is OK and the narration is pretty good.

Rather below the standard

Although I didn’t return it, I came really close. It seems the author tries to pull in different successful characters like Bob and Skippy. It’s just really not great, but if it falls into your lap and you need distraction while you do something it’s acceptable.

Weak Story and Performance

The story was somewhat weak and the narrator did not inject much feeling into the performance.