This is not a military science fiction book or at least not the kind I like to read. It’s also very long and drawn-out. The story follows a former Harmony “Reaper” soldier/ Marine as he struggles with the after effects of war. Not only is he dealing with the PTSD that his war-fighting left him with, but also with the addiction Harmony forced upon him! Yes, he was one of those soldiers that was made stronger, faster and smarter than normal soldiers so he could defeat the enemy and win the war. He did just that but the peace he now has might be worse!
Vakov Fukasawa was from New Vladivostok where he, his younger brother (Artyium) and his sister (Kasia) grew up under a horrible father who wound up killing their sister! You’ll hear about this terrible upbringing a little too much for my liking. Yeah, it was a terrible childhood, but Vakov made it worse by leaving. He left his little brother to fend for himself when Vakov joined the Harmony military. Artyuim also tried to join, but they found out that he was incompatible with stormtech. Vakov still volunteered to undergo the treatment that injected certain Reaper soldiers with stormtech making them super soldiers fighting against Harvest.
Of course Vakov felt bad about leaving his brother behind, but that’s not anywhere near the bad feeling his brother Artyium had towards Vakov. They hadn’t seen each other for a long time, but he knew that Artyium was now on Compass, a colossal, hollowed out asteroid. Vakov was now kind of freelancing his way around Compass with his best buddy, Grim. Grim was an outstanding hacker and just the person Vakov needed to help him get inside places that he shouldn’t go by disabling alarms, cameras and other security devices. Of course Vakov still had some stormtech coursing through his body, but he fought it every day to keep it from turning him into a homicidal maniac.
The Harmony, of all things, asked him to come work for them. They were facing a wide spreading epidemic of stormtech flooding the civilian population. It was made to appear that Harmony was releasing stormtech to these civilians and they were going crazy causing death and destruction among the people. So, Vakov agrees to help them find the drug dealers and attempt to stop the flow of stormtech. He also want’s Harmony’s help in locating his little brother. This now turns into pretty much a detective story hunting down drug dealing scum. Oh, there is a lot of fighting, but let me tell you, Vakov isn’t very bright. He seems to always get captured alone by the bad guys and then has to survive through some very rough torture. He gets injected with more stormtech since they want to see how much he can handle before he goes berserk!
The author is very descriptive in his scenes. He paints very vivid pictures of different parts to the story both while Vakov was in fierce battles fighting for his life and where he’s trying to live a normal life inCompass. Some of his descriptions do not necessarily add to the story, in my opinion, but just seem to drag things out way beyond being interesting. We know that war and war fighting can be terrible and that most veterans of any war have some PTSD to some degree. But, it’s not necessary for the author to carry on and on about Vakov’s military battles since they have nothing to do with the story other than explain that he survived by using stormtech. It’s obvious that he survived and many of his brothers-in-arms did not, but he’s not now fighting Harmony but looking for drug dealers.
I found the book very tedious to get through mostly because of Vakov always whining about leaving his brother behind when he went to war. Well, his brother was just only a year younger and could have done something other than go into the military if he really wanted to get away from New Vladivostok. It seems he did eventually and Vakov does find him but not in the place or in the situation he expected. His younger brother had made his own choices and probably would have done so even if Vakov had been around. Vakov just seems to dwell on this a little too much for my taste.
There are two more books that follows “Stormblood”. Book 2, “Blindspace” and “Wolfskin” are both on Amazon with the latter not due out until 5 March 2026. I don’t believe I’ll be reading this series any further.
==[Note: As of 12/03/2023, this will not be published on Amazon since I have been banned from posting reviews for some unknown reason. Once the ban is lifted, assuming it does get lifted, I’ll go back and post this to Amazon.]==