Forever Faithful - Thoughts and Review

     Battletech print fiction is back! When I heard that, I immediately pre-ordered Forever Faithful by Blaine Lee Pardoe, the first "new" Battletech novel in what seems like forever. As I read more of the teaser material I shrugged, as the Twilight of the Clans was not exactly my favorite story arc from a consumer standpoint, but the excitement of having new, novel length fiction got the better of me. Well, that and the fact that I'm a Battletech junkie who orders even the pdf-only supplements that CGL puts out periodically. If it's been published anywhere about Battletech, yes, I've read it.

     Let me get some basics out of the way. If you're on the fence about ordering Forever Faithful, don't be. Get off the fence and order. It's a great read, and easily in the top 10% of Battletech novels, it's well written, well paced, and just a plain good read. It splices together the Twlight of the Clans and Dark Age eras quite well, while taking place almost exclusively in the TOTC era. If you like any previous Battletech fiction, you will absolutely find this one a great read.

     Now, on to the spoiler-y review territory. I'll start with what I loved, and that's the character development we get to see in this novel. When I first heard that the new novel was going to focus largely on Trent, I admit, I rolled my eyes a little. I never liked Trent as a character. I don't just mean that I didn't find him likable, I mean that I didn't like his arc much at all. I never felt invested in his motivations, I never really understood why he was doing what he was doing. Yes, I realize that he was a plot device to get the story line where it needed to be, but I never felt like he was a believable one. Much like Paul Moon, I found myself just by default assuming that Trent betrayed the exodus road for revenge. His society failed him, his world wasn't what it was made out to be, and he lashed out at it in his failure. I could understand it, but it seemed shallow. I generally just glossed over it and got to the Inner Sphere parts of the annihilation of the Smoke Jaguars and went from there.

     Forever Faithful doesn't simply change that, it does so by re-framing the story. As readers, we really only ever got half of Trent's arc, and we were simply left with that and a few lines about his death. Here we get the other half of the arc, we get the meaty bits, we get to see how Trent reacts to and lives with the choices he has made. In seeing his reaction to the destruction of the Smoke Jaguars, we are finally able to really understand his motivations for betraying his former clan in the first place.

    What we get is not so much a redemption story, as it is the story of a man learning to live with the choices he has made, and taking an active role in guiding the events as they unfold. Where before we had Trent simply as a passive participant, basically handing over the keys and expecting things to just happen around him and be set right, now we have a man who realizes that handing over the Exodus Road was just a mere part of his role in events. He has a much larger role to play in things to come, and rather than simply handing over his former clan for destruction, he takes the reins in reshaping it.

     There are two small issues I have with the book, and neither significantly impact it's value to the Battletech universe, but hey, this is my place for bringing things up, so why not. My first issue is the treatment of the SLDF. These are the guys that we invested so much emotion in during Operations Bulldog and Serpent, and the Great Refusal, and in this book, they're kind of relegated to the role of carpetbaggers and keystone cops. They're generally portrayed one dimensionally, and display all kinds of ineptitude. Yes, I understand that this is the sort of thing that goes on in wars and politics, but from a storytelling point of view, it seemed a little cheap.

     The second point I have is slightly more controversial. I don't like to use the term "bias" when it comes to authors of fiction, because, let's face it, that's what we're paying for, an author's creativity, biases, past experiences, the whole package. I think perhaps a better way of stating it is that at times in the book, the author gets overtly preachy in regards to the destruction of symbols of the Smoke Jaguars history. It's a minor point, but it comes up often enough, and in such a way that it is jarringly out of character.  You reach the parts where mention of the erasure of the Smoke Jaguars is made, and you clearly hearing the author lecture you on the dangers of forgetting history. There might as well be the obligatory mis-quote "Those who ignore the past are doomed to repeat it" plastered in graffiti by some Smoke Jag sibko brat. In a way, this almost links with my first point. There are a few jarring places where you are brought to envision Mr. Pardoe writing about the blundering Yankees and carpetbaggers coming to ruin the town while he sips a mint julep and pines over the moving of a statue of ole' Marse Robert out of the town square.

     Overall, these points are minor however, and probably be missed by most people. Certainly they do not take away in any great way from the enjoyment of the story. I read this one in e-format, and I will most definitely be purchasing a paper copy for my nerd bookshelf.

You can order it from Amazon and I would highly recommend it.