Audiobook Review: Governor by Richard Fox and David Weber

Governor
Author: Richard Fox and David Weber
Narrator: Jonathan Davis
Series: Ascent to Empire (Book 1)
Publication: Podium Audio (January 16, 2024)
Length: 20 hours and 36 minutes

Description: For more than fifty years, the Terran Republic and the Terran League have been killing one another.

The death toll has climbed ever higher, year after year, with no end in sight. But the members of the Five Hundred, the social elite of the Republic's Heart Worlds, don't care.

Rear Admiral Terrence Murphy is a Heart Worlder. His family is part of the Five Hundred. His wife is the daughter of one of the Five Hundred's wealthiest, most powerful industrialists. His sons and his daughter can easily avoid military service, and political power is his for the taking. There is no end to how high he can rise in the Republic's power structure.

All he has to do is successfully complete a risk-free military "governorship" in the backwater Fringe System of New Dublin without rocking the boat. But the people sending him to New Dublin have miscalculated because Terrence Murphy is a man who believes in honor. He believes in duty—in common decency and responsibility. He believes there are dark and dangerous secrets behind the façade of what "everyone knows."

Terrence Murphy intends to meet those responsibilities, to unearth those secrets, and he doesn't much care what the Five Hundred want. He intends to put a stop to the killing.

Terrence Murphy is coming for whoever has orchestrated fifty-six years of bloodshed and slaughter, and Hell itself is coming with him.

My Thoughts: This space opera begins in new series in the same universe as the Honor Harrington series. Its star is Admiral Terence Murphy. He's from a military family and he is a member of the Five Hundred - the most powerful families in Terran Republic.

According to his father-in-law, one of the wealthiest industrialists of the Five Hundred, Terrence is a sure bet for a life in politics. He's presentable, has a useful heritage, and he's something of a fop who will surely follow the guidance of more capable men.

However, the Five Hundred has severely underestimated Terrence Murphy. His assignment to be the governor of New Dublin, a fringe world, is supposed to give him some experience and built some political points. But when he runs a rescue operation to Inverness, another fringe world, which has been attacked by the Terran League, his priorities change. 

The Terran Republic and the Terran League have been at war for more than fifty years. The Five Hundred has found multiple ways to profit from the war and it isn't bad for them. The taxes and soldiers commandeered from the fringe worlds have both paid for it and staffed the spaceships that are fighting it. New Dublin is sick of it and on the verge of declaring independence from the Terran Republic. And they are not alone. 

The Terran League has plans, a secret alliance with the alien Rish, and a secret base building a massive fleet. They also have plans to change the war by moving the fight deep into the Terran Republic's planets. But Terrence Murphy finds out about the plans. Now all he has to do is convince the Five Hundred what is happening which is against all their entrenched beliefs and profit margins. 

This was an excellent space opera. I am looking forward to more of this series. 

I bought this one December 8, 2023. You can buy your copy here.