Awesome science-fiction military battle story. Tchaikovsky makes this story roar right from the first page with a superb narrative voice. Told in a vernacular all its own, that voice tells the tale, sounding for all the world like an Army grunt of the future relating his good buddy Sturgeon's sayings and theories. It's just an ordinary guy telling a story from his point of view.

But, wow, what a story! A future where there is a constant war being fought and the rich elites are in giant armored suits of near-invincibility and the grunts are just cannon fodder. There are cyber-beings and underground forces. And half-human and half something else things. The whole book is one secret mission behind enemy lines and the battle scenes are vivid, stark, and brutal.