FORTRESS FRONTIER (SHADOW OPS, BOOK #2) BY MYKE COLE: BOOK REVIEW

Fortress Frontier
Shadow Ops, Book #2
By Myke Cole
ISBN# 9780425256367
Author’s Website:  http://mykecole.com/

Brought to you by OBS reviewer Sammy

Synopsis:

The Great Reawakening did not come quietly. Across the country and in every nation, people began to develop terrifying powers—summoning storms, raising the dead, and setting everything they touch ablaze. Overnight the rules changed…but not for everyone.

Colonel Alan Bookbinder is an army bureaucrat whose worst war wound is a paper-cut. But after he develops magical powers, he is torn from everything he knows and thrown onto the front-lines.

Drafted into the Supernatural Operations Corps in a new and dangerous world, Bookbinder finds himself in command of Forward Operating Base Frontier—cut off, surrounded by monsters, and on the brink of being overrun.

Now, he must find the will to lead the people of FOB Frontier out of hell, even if the one hope of salvation lies in teaming up with the man whose own magical powers put the base in such grave danger in the first place—Oscar Britton, public enemy number one… (Goodreads)

Review:

This is the second book in the series, I have not read the first one. When reading the synopsis it appears you can read this as a stand alone and you can. However, I would recommend reading the first book to have a better understanding of characters and how things started. Having said that, what an excellent book, the world this author builds is amazing his characters seem real with flaws and insights into themselves and others. I can’t wait for the next book to come out am hoping to read more about the wicked witch and what her plans are.

When starting a book I’m always looking for a sentence or idea that captures my attention and in this case it was on page 4.

” Julie murmured, her slim body gone to the padded comfort of middle age but still beautiful.” 

What a lovely way for the main character Bookbinder to describe his wife. He really loved and cared for his wife and kids in a wonderful way throughout the story. The other thing that I liked about Bookbinder was his insight into himself. 

” If you don’t like who you are, you have to change it.” 

A great line and he continues to do that until the end of the story, what an excellent hero.

The creatures and magic are fascinating, I found the goblins to be unique and the powers the characters had were wonderfully diverse and interesting. So many times when reading about magic and creatures it’s not fresh, in this case it’s very fresh and well thought out, with an added bonus of being very well written. What I really enjoyed about this story was that the main character was a “paper pusher” in the military, and the author was able to show how very important that aspect of running the military smoothly is. He had a lot of power but not something we are used to reading about in Military Sci-fi. But, when you think about it, what an important job!

I’m not sure if it was because I had not read the first book, but the names of everyone got to be a bit confusing, I know it’s part of the group thing, but there were so many and I think because several of the characters were in the first book that it wasn’t connected to something to hang on to as well. One of the reasons I personally would recommend to read in order. I highly recommend this book for young adults to adults who enjoy super well written Military Sci-fi.