The Last Charge – Great book but the end begs for another trilogy

The Last Charge (The Nameless War Trilogy #3) by Edmond Barrett
My rating: 9 out of 10 stars

We cannot run
We cannot hide
We will not beg

For two bloody years Battle Fleet has fought to hold back the Nameless… and failed. Assault upon Earth is now inevitable. The men and women of Battle Fleet must ready weapons that have fallen short so many times before and prepare for a last defence of their homes.

Only one thing is now certain, from this battle there will be no retreat, for this time, there is nowhere left to retreat to.

The last book in The Nameless Trilogy is as good as the previous books. Well, at least that is my opinion. Also, in my opinion, the book blurb is slightly misleading. It makes the potential reader believe that the main story element in this book would be the assault on Earth. Well, it is A main story element that has to be said. It is not THE main story element though. It is “only” the first part of the book.

As usual the book is filled with action. This is military science fiction and it is mostly very well done. We continue to follow our friends both in space and on the ground. Even though the focus are on the defense of Earth and the events following it the surviving people on Landfall are not forgotten. Personally I liked the fleet action the best but that is not really much of a surprise for those who know me.

One thing that did irk me a bit though was the fact that the humans managed to come up with all kinds of quite effective anti-missile defenses but they never managed to extend the range of their own fighting capability. The fighting was almost always some variant of getting in range before being blown up. After all, in any realistic war extending over several years you would eventually get hold of some scrap of enemy equipment that you could analyze and even without it once the need becomes apparent scientists usually find a way, at least in wartime. A very minor “irk” though.

On the whole I really liked the book. It is fairly realistic in both the science and the military department. Well written, well balanced and with plenty of likable characters. My cup of tea.

The book is the last book in the trilogy and as such it concludes the current story arc. It is a decent enough conclusion although I have to say that I was kind of expecting some last twist to the story. Instead things kind of fizzled out at the end without much fanfare. Having said that it is a very realistic ending so in some sense I am happy that the author did not throw in some bizarre plot twist. Naturally the humans suffered some regrettable losses and the epilogue wrote off one or two more people from any future active duty I would say.

Speaking of the future, the book may have ended the trilogy but it definitely did not end the overall story. The Nameless are still there, far from finished. This book really begs for a second trilogy. Personally I will be rather disappointed if we do not get a continuation of this universe.