BOOK REVIEW: "Zero" by J.S. Collyer

Kaleb Hugo is every­thing an offi­cer of the Ser­vice should be: loyal, expertly trained, unques­tion­ing. He has done every­thing ever ordered of him and has done so with a pride that comes from know­ing you are fight­ing for the good of humankind…until the day that he made a decision to go against orders to obtain victory and save lives.
The bat­tle was won, but Hugo was con­demned and dis­hon­ourably dis­charged by Ser­vice com­man­ders for defying regulations. There is no place in the Service for heroes. Their soldiers serve and obey.
Officially, anyway.
Unof­fi­cially, Hugo is re-​​assigned to cap­tain the crew of the Zero, an eight-​​man craft clas­si­fied as, at best, a pri­va­teer ship and at worst a smug­gling and crim­i­nal enter­prise vessel. But what very few know is that the Zero, and her crew, are con­tracted by the Ser­vice. Their role is to inves­ti­gate and infil­trate the less savoury lev­els of soci­ety. They sell on, buy in, bar­gain, threaten and report back on every­thing the polit­i­cal lev­els the Ser­vice don’t offi­cialy want to know about.
The Zero’s rag-​​tag crew look to their com­man­der, Ezekiel Webb, as their leader and mid­dle­man between the reg­i­mented expec­ta­tions of the Ser­vice and the harsh and unpre­dictable demands of the under­world of colo­nial space. He has lived in both worlds his whole life and has trouble adjusting to Hugo, as he has every captain before him.
Hugo has to find a way to manage this unruly ship and unruly crew as they are pulled deeper into an orbit-​​wide game of pol­i­tics, deceit and cor­rup­tion which will threaten to tear them apart as well as throw human­ity back into a cycle of war and destruc­tion. Hugo, Webb and the crew will have to over­come per­sonal tragedy, insur­mount­able odds and every depraved twist of fate that the Orbit can throw at them in order to survive and prevent events that could threaten the lives of millions.
For Kaleb Hugo, nothing will ever be certain again.

The above is the blurb about Zero, the debut novel by JS Collyer, (published by Dagda Publishing) a sci-fi epic that is actually longer than 200 pages! While these types of stories are further down on my "favorite genres" list, this book really appealed to me, with its amazing descriptive text, making me feel like I was there, on the Zero, on the colonized moon.
The story is visual, and I could actually see every unique place Collyer took the characters. It would make and excellent movie, and an even better anime!
The characters themselves run the gamut from generic to unique and so realistic I felt like I could look up from my ereader and see them standing in front of me.
With political overtones, corruption, and covert operations, this is a book for Star Trek fans, Star Wars fans, surprisingly, Cover Affairs fans, and people who are new to sci-fi. Great work and I look forward to more from the author!

5/5--excellent!

Purchase Zero via:

Amazon (PRINT)

Amazon (KINDLE)

Goodreads