Tuesday 25 March 2014

Review: A Game of Battleships, by Toby Frost

A Game of Battleships is the fourth Space Captain Smith adventure, and sees the eponymous hero once again accompanied by his lunatic friend Suruk the Slayer, cowardly alcohol-enthusiast pilot Polly Carveth and love interest space hippy Rhianna.

The British Space Empire is seeking to sign a treaty so that the civilised races of the galaxy can stand together against the deranged forces of Ghast, New Edenites and Lemming-men. Unfortunately, the enemy has a seemingly unstoppable new battleship and are rather keen to use it...

The style of comedy is, as you would expect, in line with the first three books, and has many nods to the past and British stereotypes. My favourite new addition was undoubtedly the fairly brief appearance of a Hellfire space fighter's autopilot, who has all the restraint and serenity of a Klingon on crack.

There are occasional formatting issues (new paragraphs not indented) but these are minor and infrequent.

Although the enemies are not new, there is some new mockery of the EU and French, which (as one might expect) I rather liked. The spawn of Suruk (check the cover's lower left corner) are also a nice little addition.

It's an enjoyable read, and if you liked the earlier instalments (reviews/interviews here) then you'll like this. There will be at least one more Space Captain Smith book.

Thaddeus




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