Fiction Analysis - 'Reavers of the Void' by Bradford C. Walker
Star Wars Christendom
Author’s Note: It has been a while since I’ve done a Fiction Analysis. This one’s been in my mind for some time, but for one reason or another I kept putting it off. I figured that I should do it before it becomes the proverbial can that keeps getting kicked down the road.
Warning: There will be spoilers. Though I will keep it to a minimum.
Introduction
For the latest episode of Fiction Analysis, I want to look at a book written by Minnesotan science fiction author Bradford C. Walker. Mr. Walker was (is?) part of the Pulp Revolution, or PulpRev, an indie literary movement aimed to “make science fiction and fantasy … fun, heroic, and truly romantic again.”1
If you want to know more about the PulpRev (as well as its close cousin the Superversive Movement), I suggest you read the cited article.
While the indie book scene makes for an interesting story in and of itself, I’m more interested in talking about one particular product of this movement, Mr. Walker’s Reavers of the Void. This book is to be the first of a space opera series known as the Star Knight Saga, but I’ll get into that much later into this analysis.
For now, I will be looking at this book from three angles: the setting, the characters, and the story.
Setting
Reavers of the Void takes place in AD 3001. In the 31st century, the ruling power of the galaxy is known as the Galactic Christendom. Galactic Christendom is an alliance of interstellar nations under the banner of the Church in Earth’s very own Rome, specifically the Vatican City. Meanwhile, Earth itself had become a planet-sized Papal States.
To learn more about the setting of the Star Knight Saga at large, check out Mr. Walker’s blog.
What I described above is the general setting of the series. But in terms of Reavers of the Void itself, the story takes place in the frontier region known as the Dire March; the capital world of which is New Edinburgh. However, there are scenes that takes place on Earth. The point is that the book in general takes place somewhere in which the space pirates are a legitimate threat.
What can I say? I love this setting. It’s like Star Wars, but with the Crusaders instead of Jedi Knights and the Galactic Christendom instead of the Galactic Republic. There’s even a Palpatine-esque figure, though I’ll leave it at that to prevent spoilers.
As a Catholic who loves space opera, this is awesome!
Characters
Now we move on to the characters. Mr. Walker’s book has a colorful cast of characters that can generally be described as fun. There are quite a bit of significant characters in this relatively short book, so I will categorize them as either one of the good guys or the bad guys. I will analyze the good guys first.
First, we have the protagonist of the story: Sir Ramsey Hennepin, the Lord Roland. The star knight Ramsey is a classic heroic figure who is a man of action through and through. I like how he is portrayed as a paragon without any hint of irony or some sort of ‘hidden dark side’. He is shown to be a gentleman, though he can be stern when he needed to be; this was shown in his earlier dealings with the main girl.
Which brings me to…
Countess Gabriela Robin is the lead girl of the book. The beautiful Gabriela is also the love interest to Ramsey though she’s not in the book just to look pretty. In fact, she is the main prize of the villain thanks to her lineage. Personally, I like how Mr. Walker handled the romance in the book; Gabriela was actually the first to fall in love and the one who initiated the relationship, which is interesting. Anyways, it’s cool how she’s both spunky and feminine.
The next two characters I want to talk about are the father and son Sibley and Creton. The former is Ramsey’s sergeant-in-arms while the latter is a young kid who serves as the knight’s page. Sibley acts as the older and wiser figure, though still a warrior. Meanwhile, young Creton is the opposite. Throughout most of the book, he was portrayed as a helpless kid though that changed somewhat in the later parts of the story.
Now, we’ll get to the bad guys.
The space pirate Red Eyes is the main antagonist of Reavers of the Void. But strangely enough, he did little of his own dirty work in this book. Instead, those were left to his two underlings: Zuzu the Painbringer and Dashing Jack.
Zuzu is the sister of Red Eyes and a particularly tall woman. This giantess of an amazon is a stereotypical ‘strong female character’ but villainous. She is as unfeminine as you can get, a contrast to Gabriela. I dislike her pretty quickly, so props to Mr. Walker for making a villain that’s easy to root against.
On the other hand, I found Jack to be more endearing. He’s not a good guy by any means, though he has some fun lines that made him likable. It also helped that he’s a mercenary figure who’s not all that dedicated to Red Eyes.
The last significant character in the book is the aforementioned Palpatine figure. I won’t name him to prevent spoilers, though his villainy was made clear early in the book. This was a contrast to how the actual Palpatine in the Star Wars prequels was portrayed. This is a good move by Mr. Walker because he doesn’t have to waste time with the suspense regarding the identity of this shadowy figure. Instead, we get to see his political machinations at play.
The characters are easily the strongest part of Reavers of the Void. The heroes are heroic, and the villains are villainous — just the way it should be.
Story
Having discussed the characters, I now wish to talk about the story. Given that this book is the first of a series, the conflict started out relatively small. A group of space pirates led by the aforementioned Red Eyes aimed to kidnap Countess Gabriela Robin. Sent to protect her was our hero the Lord Roland himself.
This is a pretty simple setup, and one that was pulled off well. Later in the story we learned about why Gabriela was the target of the space pirates (which has something to do with the Nephilim).
The result was duels, firefights, Gundam combat, and space battles. And some political machinations, too. Yes, it’s as cool as it sounds.
As an aside, this book actually made me consider the mecha genre. I never cared too much about it, even though I was well aware of what Gundam is – I even have a cousin who was really big into it. After reading this book, I can see the appeal now.
I’ll leave the story at that because I don’t want to spoil the book.
Conclusion
That was Reavers of the Void by Bradford C. Walker. It’s an all-around fun book; the setting is cool, the characters are fun, and the story is engaging.
As readers can see, I love this book. But I do have one concern, something that I cannot in good conscience ignore. This brings me to the fact that Reavers of the Void is supposed to be ‘Book One’ of a series. Where’s the sequel then? Even though the book came out in September 2019, almost four years ago, the sequel had not come out yet. Nor is there any release date for it. And believe me, I looked.
That being said, it’s important for readers to know that Mr. Walker has some medical issues that delayed his work on this series.
I didn’t mention this issue to rag on the author. Instead, this is something that prospective readers need to know. Yes, this book is awesome. However, it’s also part of a series in which its continuation I cannot guarantee.
But I don’t want to end this analysis on a negative, so I’ll say that I love the trend that this book had set. This book is the first explicitly Christian future I’ve seen in science fiction. I call this a trend because I can’t help but think of Carlos Carrasco’s Holy Terran Empire series2. However, I don’t know if this ‘Star Wars Christendom’ setting is an actual trend or if it’s simply a case of ‘great minds think alike’. Regardless, I honestly want to see more Galactic Christendom and less United Federation of Planets.
Please, make it happen!
Niemeier, B. (2017, July 31) Superversive vs. PulpRev. https://brianniemeier.com/2017/07/superversive-pulprev/
I did a review of the first book of this series as well, click on this link to check it out.
Your review is better organised than mine, sir, but I like my way better :)