Furious Heaven

Space opera on a grand scale, with an Alexander-like hero in Sun, who is still fighting palace politics to ensure her place as heir while preparing for a war against the Phene Empire. Elliott has thought of an interesting way to use physical limitations to get the commander on the front lines, which is otherwise a really dumb thing for a mechanized army that doesn’t work by hand signals. No one is particularly good, and luck plays an important role, but it is still epic.

The fast moving, action packed and intensely personal set of adventures follows Sun and her increased band of companions as they move to the forefront of the Republic of Chaonia military advances against the Phene Empire. We get a sympathetic view from within the Empire as well. If there is survival and success of viewpoint characters beyond any believable limits, well that's a tradition of action adventure.

Again it took me a while to get into this and there were a lot of character viewpoints in this story, all relevant but it took effort to follow what was going on and in a book of 700+ pages sometimes I found my attention wandering, which is more a function of my attention than the book itself. This is a galaxy spanning story with a lot of wheels moving to make things work for Sun. Sometimes they do and sometimes they don't and the journey is interesting.
Next year to see how it all turns out. It will be an interesting ride.

Another hefty volume in the saga of gender-swapped Alexander the Great in space. Plenty of military action, plus political and diplomatic maneuvering and the personal stories of people large and small on both sides of the conflict. The story isn't over, but it stops at a good place for now.