Ten years ago, the alien Creepers descended on an unsuspecting Earth with a genocidal onslaught of asteroid bombardments, nuclear detonations and a fleet of stealth satellites that destroyed all technology more advanced than a steam engine. Overnight, mankind was thrust back into the 19th century. Then the insectoid Creepers landed, roaming the wasted countryside in their near-invulnerable exoskeleton suits with claws spewing lasers and fire. But humanity fought back. Refugees from flooded cities and survivors of shattered military units, with the help of chemical weapons, kept the Creepers in check. At great cost, human civilization adapted to a new status quo of primitive technology and the constant threat of Creeper attacks.
At the beginning of Dark Victory, the end of the Creeper occupation seems imminent. A suicide attack has just destroyed the aliens' orbital base, and National Guard Recon Ranger Randy Knox prays for a world without war, a world he remembers only through a single photograph of his long-dead mother and sister. But despite the sudden talk of victory, the teenaged Ranger, along with his K-9 companion, Thor, is still responding to Creeper attacks in the countryside, and no one has figured out how to counter their fleet of weaponized satellites. In the midst of this hopeful uncertainty, Knox is assigned a mission that may determine if the war is really over or simply entering a new phase. In Dark Victory, Brendan DuBois (the Lewis Cole mystery series) crafts a dark sci-fi adventure sure to appeal to genre fans. --Tobias Mutter, freelance reviewer