The novel “Ballistic” by Marko Kloos was published for the first time in 2020. It’s the second book in The Palladium Wars series and follows “Aftershocks“.
Aden Robertson joined the crew of the merchant spaceship Zephyr but things get complicated when they agree to transport a cargo without knowing its nature. On the planet Gretia, Color Sergeant Idina Chaudhary must pay attention to new possible acts of terrorism, and finding a boy in possession of an army-issued gun opens a new front of investigation.
When Lieutenant Commander Dunstan Park discovers a spaceship far more powerful than the one he commands half-destroyed with no trace of survivors, he quickly realizes that he may face a battle with an unknown enemy. Solveig Ragnar is adapting to her new job but her relationship with her father is complicated and a trip to the planet Acheron for a very important business meeting offers her the opportunity to escape his control.
“Ballistic” continues the Palladium Wars series, which has an important military science fiction component that increases compared to “Aftershocks”. This is the second part of one great story, so you need to start from the first book, which offers the foundations of that fictional universe and begins the subplots that follow the protagonists.
The beginning of the series recounted, among other things, the first attacks by the forces that want to provoke a new war in the planetary system. Gretian fringes don’t accept the consequences of the defeat suffered in the war that the planet Gretia had started. Those are forces that operate covertly, even with terrorist acts whose effects include Gretian casualties.
Like in the first book, in “Ballistic” the pace is often slow following the protagonists’ activities that in several cases are routine. Sometimes, that normality turns out to be only apparent and the routine is suddenly broken, so there’s a point in that narrative choice. Overall, Marko Kloos includes many events in this book.
The tension already began to develop in the first book when the first crisis situations emerged and in this sequel, it grows considerably. The consequences of those situations are felt in various ways and others follow that show new facets of a strategy of tension.
This series is very character-oriented, which means among other things that important characters keep on being developed, also through their reactions to the growing crisis. However, it’s a series set in a planetary system and Marko Kloos continues to offer information on the various planets as well. A part of “Ballistic” is set on Acheron, a Venus-like planet where colonization was conducted by building cities in its atmosphere’s upper layers.
Marko Kloos’ idea is clearly to slowly build a sophisticated plot using the protagonists’ very different points of view. For this reason, in the second book, there are still more questions than answers. It’s a confirmation that this is not a series for readers who just want battles in which it’s clear who the contenders are and their positions. On the contrary, it’s a series in which there are many parties involved with facets that lead to surprises and revelations in a slow build-up of the story.
Like the first book, “Ballistic” is a novel without a real ending, as it ends with an event that will have strong consequences to be developed in the subsequent books. It’s a series I recommend to anyone who appreciates series with great stories that unfold across multiple novels and has the patience to read them all to reach its ending. It’s available on Amazon USA, UK, and Canada.
