I’ve known Marko Kloos on the internet for a long time. We were moderators on THR together. About three years ago he wrote this science fiction novel, I read the rough draft, and it was really solid. I thought it was a really good military sci-fi. Then he spent the next few years trying to sell it to a publisher with no luck. (believe me, I know EXACTLY how that feels). So now Marko has gone ahead and decided to stick it on Amazon himself.
I really enjoyed this one. Marko was in the German army, then emigrated to America. The thing that I enjoyed about ToE was that it was this really cool mil-sf, from the grunt’s perspective. Personally, my favorite parts where in the main character’s backstory, about his crappy upbringing, his enlistment, and the basic training. The character has a good evolution, and then we’ve got war, and space aliens. So what’s not to love? Check it out.
Bought my copy yesterday.
The review I left at Amazon:
4 out of 5 stars
Good coming-of-age mil-SF for a new century
I’m only 30 pages in but the book is reminding me strongly of _Putting Up Roots_ by Charles Sheffield and _Starship Troopers_ by Robert Heinlein. The portrait of near future Boston under an oppressive cradle-to-grave welfare state (which provides the proles everything they need…at least if everything they need includes dangerous housing projects, weekly soy rations, and invasive War on Drugs / War on Guns police sweeps) rang true, as did the broken families and dysfunctional memes of the government-created poverty class.
Looking forward to reading the rest of the book and seeing the protagonist learn who he is and develop into a better person.
Bought it when Tamara mentioned it.
Done, thanks for letting us know; I missed it when VFTP mentioned it.
Definitely willing to support an author who writes well but can’t get published!
Marko’s a jarhead??? HOLY CRAP!
No that was my mistake. I remembered him enlisting in the Marines after 9/11, but he just emailed and told me that he’d been unable to get an age waiver because of having dependants.
Bummer. 🙁 he would have made a damn fine one.
Wow, This is where is sits after I bought my copy, where was it this morning?
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,549 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
#9 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction > Science Fiction > Military
#29 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction > Science Fiction > Adventure
#39 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Adventure
i ordered this one. thank you for the prompt.
Downloaded the sample….Thanks for sharing and supporting all the authors out there!
Dangit…another book to keep me up reading late at night! Sample chapters got me hooked…
I just finished the book, and the ending sort of comes out of left field for me but it’s a good read nonetheless. But it’s well written and Kloos actually uses the words he has, he doesn’t just slap words around which is really refreshing to read.
Pick it up, definitely worth $2.99 – and I hope he writes a sequel.
On his blog he said the sequel is already written and it be out this summer. I finished this book at the same pace I read MHI.
Thanks for the recommendation. I’ll read it ASAP.
Wow, from the looks of things your recommendation had the effect of a minor book bomb.
Picked it up on your recommendation, read it while in an airport and on a plane. Fine read, thanks for the tip!
Also, nice to have another sequal to look forward to in the summertime.
It’s about time he went to Amazon.
Paper publishing is too 20th Century. They only re-publish successful e-books these days.
“They only re-publish successful e-books these days.”
Heh. 😀
Bought it and read it late into the night. Anxiously awaiting the sequel 😉
Kindle? Bah. I’d rather send Marko $5 directly for an EPub version.
Bought it last night, read half of it an then had to go to sleep so I could work today! REALLY wishing I could bring my kindle/i-phone to work with me. Great book, hope he writes many more and charges full price! Will definitely be a customer in the future.
Thank you for the recommendation – I really enjoyed it! I like to support new authors – can never have too many. I’ll prep an Amazon review – wonder if this shows up on Goodreads? Rat
Good recommendation, I saw a bunch of Facebook friends buying it and decided Marko could use another couple bucks so I bought a copy too, very glad I did. He has a spare writing style and nails the tone of basic training pretty well although I seem to remember a fair bit of colorful language when I was in.I left a review on Amazon even which I never do. I am mildly annoyed you and he don’t write faster. The plus side of that is I found a new author that gets gun stuff right in the urban fantasy genre named John Conroe with his Demon Accords series. So since Saturday I’ve burned through four books and all four have had me staying up past my bedtime because I couldn’t put them down.
I just finished Terms and was looking into Mark….and realized I’ve been reading him for years as the Munchkin Wrangler. Good author, good blogger…