The Eternity Soldier

Written by Eric Warren

Narrated by Corinne Davies

The war began six hundred years after she died…and five years before she came back.

In the far-flung future, an unknown alien species appears, determined to wipe out humanity. The Solar Union, in making a last-ditch effort to save billions of lives on dozens of different planets, retrieves the soldiers they need from those who’ve died over the past six hundred years.

Lilah is no soldier. In fact, she hates the concept of war. But it’s either fight, or go back into storage and never wake up again. She and her fellow conscripts from the past five centuries are the last line of defense against a species they don't understand. And if they fail, humanity won't have a future to defend.

THE ETERNITY SOLDIER is a fast-paced, humorous Space Marine adventure, in the tradition of Old Man’s War and Starship Troopers. Grab yours today!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Eric Warren Author, LLC
• Release date: May 11, 2022
• ISBN: 9781669675334

Reviews for The Eternity Soldier

[Jason Pennock · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This story follows Lilah Barrows, a woman who is definitely out of time, when she is woken up by a strange “Nun” who whilst appears kindly, most definitely has agenda. Lilah finds out that she is actually dead, and has been for well over 500 years (eat your heart out Ripley), only to be revived by a program that she had signed up for that would store her consciousness until the technology existed to restore her.
Lilah finds out that she is actually in a new body, with some surprising new abilities (I’ll let you read about those and not spoil the fun). She has been brought back, of course, not to live a fun, happy life, but to fight in a war for a group called the ‘Solar Union’, an alliance of planets that has come together for trade, defence, galactic exploration etc.
However, as they have expanded, moving out in the galaxy, they have come across an alien race called the Dvorak.
The Dvorak are one of those races that don’t play nicely with others, each time they encounter a ship or a planet that belongs to humanity, they decimate it.
As a result of the Dvorak incursion, the Solar Union has taken to ‘reviving’ people who have had their consciousness stored in a long-term facility (and this is where we get to see Warren’s amazing proclivity for creating not only some exceptional back stories, but just outstanding technology). We learn that Lilah is one of the furthest back that has been revived, mainly because the technology to store a conscious was not around before then, and world events saw the loss of many after.
Warren has created a detailed and rather intricate world in which his main characters tell this tale, and as Lilah expands out into her world, and learns more about the universe she is in, we get a very in-depth description of what has happened from 2041 (the time Lilah was ‘frozen’) to the time when she was awoken, via each of the other members in her team. Her team is made up of 6, with her and 5 others, all spaced throughout the 500+ years, allowing for Warren to use each of his Characters to fill in their section of the timeline.
This story (I don’t want to give too much away, is really exceptionally well done, and you should read it), is a mix of John Scalzi’s ‘Old Man’s War’, (similar concept, you reach an age, and get to go to war in a new body), combined with a ‘Boot Camp’ scenario, in which Lilah and her crew have to go through a training camp, along with a couple of other squads, meeting various criteria to be allowed to pass. The ‘Boot Camp’ scenario, although it is ‘similar’ to others in this genre, has a very unique feel, as most of Warren’s work in field.
There are some really interesting aspects to the story, first obviously is that Lilah is very much out of her element, and it is rather fascinating watching how she acclimates to this new environment, not only when she first wakes up, but as she progresses through training, and later stages of the story. She is a really different character, not the normal hero you expect in a story, in that she is very opinionated, and always thinks she is right, with this impression that she is better than most people, certainly those in her team.
It is an interesting point of view really, considering that everyone is at minimum at least a 100years more technologically advanced than her, and at the end of the day, she was an event organiser, whereas the people she is with have skill sets that could be seen as being a lot more useful in these circumstances, such as a Soldier, or a Biologist.
Warren’s Character writing is just outstanding, as Lilah’s character is at the same time, utterly annoying with her behaviours, and yet, she is totally likeable in a lot of ways, and you find yourself actually liking her, even though she is so full of herself. It is a real testament to Warren’s skill as a writer to have you really liking this Character that for the most of the story is so arrogant. There are some other very interesting people with Lilah, Min, who is just a total oddball, and one of the most loveable characters in the story (I will let you discover Min, she is great). Coss is quite a difficult character, you will see why, but again, he is so well done, as he is such a believable person, when you think about it, there are people that you know in the world that are so like him.
There are multiple other characters in the story that I can’t really discuss without giving the story away, but needless to say, they are not only really well done, but they bring the story to life, making it both real and believable, something that always makes a story just that much better when you read it.
Ultimately, this is a story of the human spirit overcoming the impossible, and it is really well done, with some extraordinary character writing, and the technology is brilliant. Bringing the story together is Warren’s incredible skill at world building, creating an in-depth and comprehensive set of locations, both in space and time. Underlying the story is a multi-faceted and very complex bit of world/galaxy building that is truly captivating. It not only allows for Lilah to tell her story, but creates comprehensive worlds for each of the other characters in their own timelines when they were ‘Originally’ alive.
This is a really intriguing, fast paced story, with elements of Mil Sci-Fi, Alien Invasion, First Contact, and many other sub-genres, all wrapped into a extraordinary tale of a Woman, brought into the future to help Humanity fight against an unstoppable foe. As the story progresses, there are just so many twists and turns, so much intrigue, you will be glued to the book, not to mention, the remarkable character work – this is a story that just can’t be missed!!