A Talent for War (Alex Benedict, #1)

by Jack McDevitt

[empressbrooke]

I was hesitant about trying McDevitt again after reading [b:Time Travelers Never Die|6352501|Time Travelers Never Die|Jack McDevitt|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1348716851s/6352501.jpg|6539089]. I'd described that book as "light and fluffy" and while I didn't think it was BAD, it wasn't the sort of thing I would purposely seek out.

However, I'm glad I gave A Talent for War a shot, because it was fabulous. It's basically a historical fiction mystery in a sci-fi setting. McDevitt has painted this really rich and captivating history about a war hero and the questions that main character Alex Benedict starts asking about these legendary heroics.

From nearly the first chapter I was dying to know more, and I actually dragged out finishing it a little bit just so I could get to enjoy it longer. One of the details I liked was that even though they had futuristic space travel capabilities, these capabilities are by no means perfect. They still have difficulty with extreme precision when jumping through space and sometimes eerie disasters strike when ships jump and never reappear. It made the world that McDevitt built less shiny and a little more real.