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    Lines of Departure
    Lines of Departure
    Lines of Departure
    Audiobook9 hours

    Lines of Departure

    Written by Marko Kloos

    Narrated by Luke Daniels

    4.5/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Vicious interstellar conflict with an indestructible alien species. Bloody civil war over the last habitable zones of the cosmos. Political unrest, militaristic police forces, dire threats to the Solar System…

    Humanity is on the ropes, and after years of fighting a two-front war with losing odds, so is North American Defense Corps officer Andrew Grayson. He dreams of dropping out of the service one day, alongside his pilot girlfriend, but as warfare consumes entire planets and conditions on Earth deteriorate, he wonders if there will be anywhere left for them to go.

    After surviving a disastrous space-borne assault, Grayson is reassigned to a ship bound for a distant colony—and packed with malcontents and troublemakers. His most dangerous battle has just begun.

    In this sequel to the bestselling Terms of Enlistment, a weary soldier must fight to prevent the downfall of his species…or bear witness to humanity’s last, fleeting breaths.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBrilliance Audio
    Release dateJan 28, 2014
    ISBN9781480578128
    Lines of Departure
    Author

    Marko Kloos

    Marko Kloos is the author of two series of military science fiction, the Palladium Wars and the Frontlines, and is a member of George R. R. Martin’s Wild Cards consortium. Born in Germany and raised in and around the city of Münster, Marko was previously a soldier, bookseller, freight dockworker, and corporate IT administrator before deciding that he wasn’t cut out for anything except making stuff up for fun and profit. Marko writes primarily science fiction and fantasy—his first genre love ever since his youth, when he spent his allowance on German SF pulp serials. He likes bookstores, kind people, October in New England, fountain pens, and wristwatches. Marko resides at “Castle Frostbite” in New Hampshire with his wife, two children, and roving pack of voracious dachshunds. For more information, visit www.markokloos.com.

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    Reviews for Lines of Departure

    4.5/5

    471 ratings23 reviews

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    • 5/5
      I think it is the best series I have read in years. A cross between Starship Troopers and Black Hawk Down and has a reader that can keep you involved.
    • 5/5
      Thank God Luke Daniels is back as the narrator. Book two and three are irrelevant to the series. Book three picks up where one left of.
    • 5/5
      Ending chapter and that single line made the whole book. Going straight to the third book asap.
    • 5/5
      I loved it, it just keeps on getting better! Everyone should read it!
    • 5/5
      Excellent Book in series. Kloos continues to paint an unpleasant picture a broken future world that needs fixing. And we hope the central characters are just the people to do the repairs.
    • 4/5
      Really enjoyed the story. Lots of action and easy to follow.
    • 5/5
      The second book does not disappoint. Great book all the way through.
    • 4/5
      I just love how this series is so grey. There is no real right or wrong. Humans fighting among themselves even when their very species is at risk. Even with an alien species destroying lives, humans still fight each other. It’s so real to human nature.

      Was great to see returning characters from the first book, always great to see the badasses coming back to wipe some more butts.
    • 4/5
      Honestly not that good. I hope it gets better soon.
    • 4/5
      3.5 rounded up. Solid mil-SF, well written and reliably entertaining.
    • 5/5
      Again a gutsy read. like the story line, want more.
    • 5/5
      Like many sci-fi novels today, the ending, while complete, is definitely not a conclusion.
    • 5/5
      I am rather late to the party on this series. I just happened to stumble onto it by accident. A happy accident, I might add. I am not normally into military Sci-Fi because all the battle scenes I don't find interesting regardless of how well written. However, the plot is just so good and the characters so relatable I have totally fallen in love. Thankfully the battle scenes are not overly long and drawn out. The author did a wonderful job of providing well written, suspenseful conflict without boring me. Kudos there. I also appreciated the attention given to the subplots. It gave the story dimension and the overall movement of the story was better for it. Throw in a fabulous main character and you can't help but enjoy. Excited to read the next book.
    • 3/5
      Truth to be told, I was expecting the usual fodder when I started reading Kloos’ MilSF novel. But I got something unexpected instead. What made “Lines of Departure” interesting by the standards of most MilSF is its very systematic subversion of the tropes of military SF. What starts out as a war story becomes political dissection of liberalism. Admittedly, it was even better than "The Forever War", but almost all of SF is so no biggie there. MilSF has a certain concern, and that isn't to show war in its grand scale and all its effects, but to show it from the perspective, normally, of the troops. Dan Abnett's “Gaunt's Ghosts” is a great example of a series that does this - a Warhammer 40k spinoff series, I might add - without glorifying war as a whole, beyond the fact that certain characters believe in the glory of war; to deny that soldiers may think war is glorious is to simplify it in the exact opposite way that some SF reader accuse milSF of doing, but is just as problematic and perilous. That's all just scratching the surface, without looking at the glorification of war in fantasy such as Terry Brooks' “Sword of Shannara” and Markus Heitz' “The Dwarves”, either. War and MilSF are not the same. War has been a topic for story since forever but the MilSF tends to have more weapon, tactics, etc., stuff, I guess. But the way that conflict is treated in a lot of it varies a lot and is more complex than it's been given credit for.I'm actually struggling to think of MilSF that does not portray war as the dirty and dehumanising activity that is. Actually it’s probably normal show that characters that think / declare that war is glorious are either a) nuts b) ignorant or c) being exceptionally sarcastic. None of that in Kloos’ novel. And also there’s NOT a hot intelligent chick with big tits and tight clothing in there somewhere protesting about how bad it all is…I’ll keep on reading the series just for the sheer fun of it although that final plot line left a lot to be desired... fill a spaceship with water and use its abacadabra-require-no-fuel-engine to attain 1% of c, and use it to hammer the Lanky spaceship to smithereens...FFS!
    • 4/5
      In this return to Kloos' dystopian space-war procedural the arrival of an alien race quite capable of kicking Humanity's collective butts three ways until Sunday has not really sunk into said Humanity's collective consciousness, doing nothing to ding the suspicion of protagonist Andrew Grayson that Humanity IS too stupid to live. What makes this series work so far is that Kloos does a good job of capturing the voice of actual soldiers I've known and I look forward to continuing with these books.
    • 4/5
      This series' storyline is expanding and developing nicely as NAC sends their malcontents into isolation around Fomalhaut. Mutiny occurs, when the reserve general, in command, tries to commandeer and control all the colony's resources. The mutiny becomes moot as an alien seed ship pursues and destroys an RSA cruiser entering this sector of space. A scientific rather than militaristic solution is proposed and set in motion. Stayed tuned as this series continues to sustain interest.
    • 4/5
      Pretty good space opera. Fairly predictable, but enjoyable and fast paced nonetheless. I especially like Fallon. She's exactly how I expect hardened soldiers to be!
    • 4/5
      Looks like at least one previous reviewer got up on the wrong side of the bed. My suggestion to the world in general is that: if you think you can write better military sci-fi, go write it and don't waste our time complaining that another author didn't write something the way you would have. It's Kloos' book... if he wants to have giant aliens, why the hell not? ... go for itIf you liked book one, you will like this one just as much - it's the same tone and characters, just embarked on a different mission.I really enjoyed it (and bought the next book too)... it's a clear-cut military sci-fi that does not become right-wing preachy or left-wing lecturey, although there is a little bit of social commentary that forms the premise of the storyline.
    • 5/5
      As soon as I finished the first novel, Terms of Enlistment, I was looking for a second. Marko Kloos didn't disappoint. This is future militaristic, or future military sci-fi. Great writing style, excellent storyline! Finished this one in just a couple of days, only to find out that Book 3 is not yet available! I'll be waiting for it...
    • 4/5
      The second book in a series, this one does not slump like most.It explodes. While following our hero, some familiar characters emerge and blossom. The book depicts an earth on the edge of ruin and an interstellar threat looming while humans carry on an intramural squabble. All from the tactical perspective of a soldier. Book #3 has yet to be written, but I can't wait.
    • 5/5
      This is not your typical military science fiction story. Typically a united and peaceful faces an unbeatable and unexpected foe. In this story Earth is not perfect nor united. There are food riots in the slums of the North American Commonwealth. Home Defense units are in mutiny against their commanders, The Territorial Army uses live ammo against the civilians they are supposed to protect. In space there is an interstellar war being waged against colonies of Sino Russian Alliance. Neither side is morally pure.This book is the second in a trilogy of books whose only fault is that the third book has yet to be written.
    • 4/5
      I quite like the complexity built into the social structure of the universe. Kloos does a great job of immersing me in combat and in the horror of a possible future.
    • 5/5
      It’s always great to find a new author. I hadn’t heard of Kloos until the Amazon Vine program offered me a copy to review. If you like military SF, this is for you.There’s no reason to summarize the plot and distract from the enjoyment of reading it without expectation. The political environment, technology, and hostile aliens are very interesting and well-thought out. The characters are realistic, and so is the dialogue. Again, if you like military science fiction, give Kloos a try.Lines of Departure is the second novel in a series. it read fine as a stand-alone. The first novel is Terms of Enlistment.