The Ember War: Publisher's Pack, Books 1-2
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The Ember War: Publisher's Pack, Books 1-2 Audible Audiobook – Unabridged

Richard Fox (Author), Luke Daniels (Narrator), Podium Audio (Publisher)
4.5 4.5 out of 5 stars 37 ratings
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The Ember War, book 1: The Earth is doomed. Humanity has a chance.

In the near future, an alien probe arrives on Earth with a pivotal mission: to determine if humanity has what it takes to survive the impending invasion by a merciless armada. The probe discovers Marc Ibarra, a young inventor who holds the key to a daring gambit that could save a fraction of Earth's population. Humanity's only chance lies with Ibarra's ability to keep a terrible secret and engineer the planet down the narrow path to survival. Earth will need a fleet. One with a hidden purpose. One strong enough to fight a battle against annihilation.

The Ember War is the first installment in an epic military sci-fi series. If you enjoyed A Hymn Before Battle by John Ringo and The Last Starship by Vaughn Heppner, then you'll love this explosive adventure with constant thrills and high stakes from beginning to end.

The Ruins of Anthalas, book 2: An ancient holocaust holds the key to humanity's survival.

Only a sliver of mankind survived the Xaros invasion. With Earth's defenses in ashes, nothing can stop the aliens' inevitable return. Hope arrives through a cryptic message from a long-lost alien race, promising the means to rebuild the shattered space fleet. Captain Valdar takes one of the last strike carriers, the Breitenfeld, and his shell-shocked crew on a desperate mission to the dead world. Unfortunately humans aren't the only power that received the ancient message....

The Ruins of Anthalas is the second book in The Ember War Saga, a military sci-fi space opera. If you like David Weber and John Ringo with a touch of Isaac Asimov, then you'll love this fast-paced and captivating adventure where humanity survives at the edge of a knife.

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  1. Listening Length
    15 hours and 37 minutes
  2. Author
    Richard Fox
  3. Narrator
    Luke Daniels
  4. Audible release date
    February 23, 2016
  5. Language
    English
  6. Publisher
    Podium Audio
  7. ASIN
    B01BFJ8EPM
  8. Version
    Unabridged
  9. Program Type
    Audiobook
  10. See all details
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Product details

Listening Length 15 hours and 37 minutes
Author Richard Fox
Narrator Luke Daniels
Audible.com Release Date February 23, 2016
Publisher Podium Audio
Program Type Audiobook
Version Unabridged
Language English
ASIN B01BFJ8EPM
Best Sellers Rank #17,490 in Audible Books & Originals (See Top 100 in Audible Books & Originals)
#361 in Military Science Fiction (Audible Books & Originals)
#425 in Space Opera Science Fiction (Audible Books & Originals)
#1,230 in Military Science Fiction (Books)

Customer reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5 out of 5
37 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

JediMack
5.0 out of 5 stars Humanity is in a fight for the survival of the species, interesting, quick paced action
Reviewed in the United States on July 25, 2018
This is a review of the audiobook, 2 pack of book 1 and 2, and may have misspellings. Grad student Mark Ibarra gets a visit from an alien probe because of a paper Ibarra had just written that evening. The probe warns of Xaros who are coming, and that Earth must prepare, but they only have 60 years to do it. Just as a colony fleet is about to leave two things happen. China attacks the fleet and Earth gets destroyed. Ibarra’s grand-daughter is on the battleship Breitenfeld, commanded by Captain Valdar, and she is very special. Her grandfather, Mark has made her special.

So the colony fleet needs to figure out how to survive and defeat the Xaros. The books are full of mystery and action, with a small touch of humor. I just finished a few Jay Allan books, which have very little humor and lots of mental hand ringing and regret. Embers compares in that the action is also excellent, like Jay Allan, but with a bit more humor and less remorse. Odd in that humanity has gone from billions to 100,000ish survivors.

Humanity is equipped with an Ibarra weapons called a Gaus (Gnause?) rail gun, which is very effective against Xaros weapons.

The beginning of the book is concise and clear. The story moves along quickly. I got a little lost concerning the details of the granddaughter, so I am listening to book 1 again. I am liking it better the second time through, so I’ll give it 5 stars. The suspense-and mystery is well done and book two ends in a cliff hanger. Humanity will need allies to win.
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mike p
4.0 out of 5 stars A good read.Waiting for the next in series.
Reviewed in the United States on February 5, 2016
A good read.Waiting for the next in series.
A little to often goes of on tangents that are fun but to in depth about politics/social conventions, but i like the story line. One of the prompts when rating the books id the depth of characters, which doesn't truly apply here. The character are well developed but this type of book has follows multiple main characters so the story is spread out.
Would be nice
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MaCayla Flategraff
5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic book for sci-fi/ end of the world style books
Reviewed in the United States on April 2, 2021
Arguably part of my favorite book series even though it is not realistic in a lot of ways it is a great sci-fi book. I listen to it on audible and it is finally out in book form.
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Phillip
5.0 out of 5 stars Great new series
Reviewed in the United States on January 26, 2019
Best new series Ive found in a while. I like Luke Daniels as a narrator. He may, on occasion, rush but that is the only negative against a huge list of positives. His voice for Ken Hale sounds exactly like one from Star Blazers 2199. The content is great. I tend to read established series mostly but ran out of Halo, Star Trek, and Star Wars. I got this and read all 9 in q row. Its not been since i found The Dark Tower series I went through them without an interuption by another titke. I really enjoyed rbe series. I cant wait to continue their spin offs.
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Bibliovino
4.0 out of 5 stars Wild but balanced ride
Reviewed in the United States on December 31, 2015
Really enjoyed this series, all the way through the first three and anxious for the fourth to come out IBM February. The only scenes I had trouble visualizing were the void flight battles, otherwise great action with just the right balance of tech speak and human pathos.
One person found this helpful
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Angelo G.
5.0 out of 5 stars Benchmark Military Sci-fi!
Reviewed in the United States on July 8, 2018
The Ember War series is an engrossing epic scale story that doesn't lose sight of the human aspect. The story is mostly told through the eyes of the last remnant of humanity. From strike marines to admirals the story is told from many perspectives but mostly through the main character a strike marine.

I'm a huge fan of the emberverse but what first drew me in was the fact that the technology and science seem like an organic growth from today's level of technology making it seem more real and relatable for me. It's the a bench mark series for all sci-fi genre media, books and film.

No political undertones, nothing preachy...just a great story with great characters.
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K. Page
3.0 out of 5 stars The audiobook performer made this *series* tolerable
Reviewed in the United States on July 13, 2020
This is a review of the entire nine-book series. I probably would not have gone beyond book one (in book form), but the audiobook performer made it far more entertaining, and it was something to have playing in the background while I was performing manual labor. The three stars are mostly for the performance and the promising start, which was not fulfilled in the end. Be forewarned: If you get angry at being let down by slapdash endings to long series, this is not the series you're looking for.

I needed something to listen to while refinishing cabinets during the coronavirus lockdown, meaning something not too deep...and that is exactly what this series is. As other reviewers have already noted, there is little in the way of scientific plausibility for far too many of the author's concepts. His pro-USA, anti-Chinese, anti-Islamist rhetoric is off-putting, as is the 'humanity saves the universe just because we're humans' concept--not because we have the best tech (we don't) or because we're the smartest (we aren't), but because (apparently) we're better tricksters and cheaters than most other races. I mean, humans are pitted against what might as well be gods, and we manage to get the better of them when the probability is practically 0%.

There is absolutely nothing in the way of character development, so don't expect any of that. It is highly unfortunate that the author cannot write female characters. Even the supposedly smartest woman ever (biologically adapted to be our ambassador to the stars) has the vocabulary of a middle-schooler and the emotional maturity to match. But then, so do most of the other characters who operate in extremely narrow bands of predictable behavior that never change.

As the story progresses, there are two or three books where it's just 'same story, different planet'. As some have suggested, you get the feeling that the author is just writing for the money and not to forward the story. You could skip those books and have little trouble catching up later.

That is what makes the wrap-up so much of a let-down. After wheel-spinning for several books, (no plot spoilers ahead) book nine brings the final conflict with the ultimate bad guys to an end in a way that makes you wonder what all the fuss was about beyond their being able to construct billions and billions of drones. That conflict (toward which we've been heading for eight books) doesn't even take up the whole of book nine.

Afterward, the author goes down a checklist of plotlines that need to be wrapped up and he does so in a way that betrays most of the buildup during the previous story. In fact, the characters who get the plot rolling in the very beginning are given the shortest shrift of all. And almost everything we hear about what happened after the war is over is via brief, bland, second-hand commentary about events that could have been fascinating. In short, the events in the last book could (and should) have been fleshed out during the two or three installments that were relatively pointless where the plot is concerned. After such a letdown, I have no interest in moving on to the next series (Terra Nova) and will be sampling another author in the same genre.

And just one final quibble...please Mr. Fox, I beg of you, drop the words 'slight/slightly' and 'atavistic' from your descriptive vocabulary. It was long before the 400th time somebody nodded (or did anything else) 'slightly' when I was tempted to throw my own phone across the room with wood-stain coated hands. Regarding 'atavistic', Thesaurus.com is a good source of other ways to describe something that is instinctual, primal, primitive, etc. so that it doesn't feel like you've discovered a $5 word and want to get your money's worth out of it. But then, liking a little change-up in descriptive vocabulary might just be me.
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Andrew Freeman
5.0 out of 5 stars Highly Recommend
Reviewed in the United States on August 1, 2019
I loved this series. Each book followed a pretty similar arc, but it kept a great pace, and I couldn't put it down. Really loved the characters in this series, and became a very rich universe built. I look forward to reading more books built into this world. If you like long space sagas/operas, then this book is for you. Might need to suspend disbelief a bit, but it's worth it.
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