Pros
- Exciting story filled with action and adventure
- Connection to main series with the plot of the story
- Mechs
Cons
- Brown feels a little too much like his father
Heavy Metal Review
Heavy Metal by Joshua Dalzelle delivers more of the action-packed adventure fans of the Omega Force universe have come to expect and love. Now Captain Jacob Brown leads his Team Obsidian to recover a war machine developed with Earth and its proprietary technology that is stolen by unknown perpetrators.
As Brown and his team hunt down the machine, they learn of the secrets of what that machine holds–and one of those secrets shouldn’t surprise readers given the hefty number of clues provided by the author.
As they track down this secret weapon, they learn of its whereabouts through the amount of destruction it leaves in its tail on a fringe planet. Jacob, who isn’t so different from his father, contributes to this destruction in the way that only the Burkes can contribute: with more violence and destruction.
As the investigation into the theft of this weapon progresses, more and more is revealed about Earth and its growing role in galaxy that is becoming more and more unstable. This weapon represents the epitome of Earth’s technological prowess despite the planet’s relatively recent entrance on the galactic stage. And it’s just in time since the galaxy is becoming more unstable as long-standing alliances begin to fracture.
That’s perhaps one weakness the Terran Scout Fleet series has with its parent Omega Force series: Jacob Brown and Jason Burke are too similar. While that may be intentional on the part of the author–both characters are father and son, their names and initials are the same, and their physiologies are similar–Jacob isn’t really distinguished enough from Jason to be unique.
In a sense, Jacob is who Jason could have been had Jason returned to Earth and its military force, making the spin-off series seem almost like an alternate or parallel story: what could have been had Jason chosen humanity instead of striking out in the galaxy on his own.
It shouldn’t surprise readers to learn that Brown is victorious in his mission, but he doesn’t come out of the encounter unscathed. What scars this mission will leave remains unseen, but it’s clear that regardless of the physical repair, there are some psychological scars that remain. How this scars will manifest in future stories remains unseen, but it’s likely that such injuries will temper Jacob’s rash behavior.
Heavy Metal by Joshua Dalzelle is an action-packed story that is sure to entertain fans of the series and provide readers a glimpse into the ever-changing universe that is Omega Force. Earth is growing to become a major player in the galaxy thanks to Jason’s gift of the ancient artificial intelligence and repository, and what lies ahead for Earth–and for the story–is both exciting and scary.
Read reviews of other exciting military science fiction books about the Omega Force universe below.
