Story Review: Change of Command by Thomas A. Mays, From For a Few Credits More Anthology

[image error]Hello everyone! As promised, we’re back to the anthology reviews. Thank you for being patient!

Spoiler Free Summary: Change of Command by Thomas A. Mays is the ninth story in the Four Horsemen anthology, For a Few Credits More.  Sheila’s company commanders have a terrible habit of dying on her. Zuul keep killing them, and they keep putting themselves in perfect position to be killed.  Sheila is just trying to keep her unit alive. How many COs will it take before they find a way to survive?

 

Character:  Shelia is a perfect character for a story like this. She had layers of conflict that made her compelling. She may have resonated with me a bit more than some. Rather, she might resonate with any enlisted person who’s been a bit peeved at an overzealous or undertrained officer.

Exposition: The pace of this story was solid. It helps that this story had a degree of snark that I personally appreciate.  When you can feel the emotions of the main character, you tend to gloss over a pretty significant amount of exposition.

World building:  This story felt pretty independent. I’m pretty sure the tech from the main universe was the common thread, but the details were woven pretty seamlessly, so I didn’t feel lost. A few of the terms and proper nouns might have given me some trouble (it has been a while), but I was able to grasp most of what was happening.

[image error]Image of Mays taken from his Amazon Author page for review purposes under fair use doctrine.

Dialogue: This was sneaky good. It’s easy to have snark or banter in a conversation. It’s a lot harder to express conflict and professionalism. Shelia’s conversations resonated with me because I’ve felt like her sometimes. No, I’ve never been in any remote sort of danger in my career in the Navy, and I’d never want to make it seem that way, but as a communication specialist, I’ve had my share of conversations with people who had one idea about what I should be doing while I had another. He expressed this well.

Description: Mays has a lot of action. I have to admit, his opening line was one of the best in the anthology, if not the best! He’s at his best in action sequences, but I was pretty happy with the visual cues in this story.

Overall: This story has a ton of cool action with some sneaky good military drama sprinkled in.  No, it’s not as memorable as some of the other stories, but if you want a nice, quick thrill ride before the plane lands, I’d recommend this story.

Thanks for reading,

Matt