The Robotech Masters' war against Earth has become even more desperate: the Protoculture Matrix is now degenerating, transforming into the Flower of Life, which is sure to draw the savage, merciless Invid across the galaxy. Meanwhile, Dana Sterling, half-alien commander of an elite Hovertank unit, is waging a desperate personal war to uncover the meaning of her strange Visions, and the secrets of her alien heritage. Humans lock in mortal combat with the Masters' clone hordes in a clash of tremendous war machines. Zor Prime, reincarnation of the discoverer of Protoculture, struggles to regain his lost memories and unlock his tormented past. As the apocalyptic war comes to the final, decisive battle, Dana Sterling realizes to her horror that . . . EVEN VICTORY SPELLS UTTER DISASTER!!
Both sides of the conflict have its own struggles in leadership...
...Earth's Southern Cross has Supreme Commander Anatole Leonard, who is a unestable paranoid psychopath (mmh... where have I seen such kind of leader? Mmh...)...
...meanwhile the invaders have The Robotech Masters who have made risky calls in their obssession to get back the Protoculture Matrix.
It's clear that both armies have to make field decisions if they want to survive this war!
EVERYTHING IS BLOOMING
Everything is blooming...
...but it doesn't mean something good in each case.
Bowie Grant (Claudia Grant's nephew) is in love with Musica, one of the members in the civilian population aboard of The Robotech Masters, where everybody functions as triumvirates. They work in groups of three identical clones. However, Musica's love for Bowie is causing a turmoil not only in her personal triumvirate but in many civilian aliens.
Dana Sterling (Max Sterling & Miriya Parino-Sterling's daughter), fearless leader of the 15th ATAC battalion, is in love with Zor Prime, clone of the original Zor, infamous creator of the Protoculture Matrix. Zor Prime loves Dana too, however, he's a clone of the original Zor, and that one had a dark past history involving love and his hopelessness of not measuring the damage done not matter his best intentions...
...and clones seems to repeat history.
And one other dangerous thing is blooming too...
...the Flower of Life is blooming in Earth's surface...
...and The Robotech Masters are afraid, and if they're afraid, we should be afraid too!
Where the Flower of Life blooms...
...The Invid comes...
...and with that, all hope falls.
Will be possible to win the Second Robotech War? At what cost?
And if so, will it be only to suffer too soon a Third Robotech War?!
Will be the Earth capable to deal with a third one?!
So ends the 2nd robotech war. It's all very silly. The authors did as good a job as they could trying to follow the very silly plot of the TV show for the second generation. They downplay the anime silliness to a large degree. It's really funny to read how they play a situation versus how it played out on the show, especially with regard to Bowie who is absolutely one of the cheesiest characters I've ever seen. He's sensitive and deep in the books, and total goofball in the cartoon (I don't know what they were thinking with that voice actor). The action sequences are all pretty decent (really, it's the only reason to read ANY of the robotech books), but then they were the only good part about the cartoon too. The only serious misstep in my view was making General Emerson a total Mary Sue. Completely flawless in all respects, the ultimate father figure, dies heroically. I didn't realize it until the very end, but yeah. Unrealistically perfect.
Anyway, that's another one down. Only 5 more to go.
Great series of books for kids that enjoy or are interested in science fiction. I read these books in middle school (I'm now in my 30s) and loved each one. The stories are fun, engaging and relatively fast paced. I'd be tempted to reread them now just for old time's sake if I didn't have so many new books on my to-read list.
I knocked it down a peg because, in retrospect, there are some aspects that are a bit too cheesy. I'm sure when my kids are old enough, they'll get thier own copies.