Waiting on Wednesday – Spaceside by Michael Mammay

Welcome to my weekly segment, Waiting on Wednesday, where I look at upcoming books that I am planning to order and review in the next few months and which I think I will really enjoy. Stay tuned to see reviews of these books when I get a copy of them.

Spaceside Cover.jpg

For this week I look at Spaceside by Michael Mammay, the sequel to one of my favourite books from 2018, Planetside. Planetside was an incredible debut from Mammay, who blended together mystery and science fiction elements to create an outstanding space military thriller with an absolutely explosive ending that I still cannot get over. As a result, I have huge hopes for Spaceside, which is set to be released in August, and I am very excited to see how Mammay tops his amazing first book.

Goodreads Synopsis:

Following his mission on Cappa, Colonel Carl Butler returns to a mixed reception. To some he is a do-or-die war hero. To the other half of the galaxy he’s a pariah. Forced into retirement, he has resettled on Talca Four where he’s now Deputy VP of Corporate Security, protecting a high-tech military company on the corporate battlefield—at least, that’s what the job description says. Really, he’s just there to impress clients and investors. It’s all relatively low risk—until he’s entrusted with new orders. A breach of a competitor’s computer network has Butler’s superiors feeling every bit as vulnerable. They need Butler to find who did it, how, and why no one’s taken credit for the ingenious attack.

As accustomed as Butler is to the reality of wargames—virtual and otherwise—this one screams something louder than a simple hack. Because no sooner does he start digging when his first contact is murdered, the death somehow kept secret from the media. As a prime suspect, he can’t shake the sensation he’s being watched…or finally succumbing to the stress of his past. Paranoid delusion or dangerous reality, Butler might be onto something much deeper than anyone imagined. But that’s where Butler thrives.

If he hasn’t signed his own death warrant.

I have to say that the plot for this new book sounds really intriguing. I am looking forward to seeing Butler investigate another complex science fiction crime. I like that that author has taken the story into a somewhat new direction, focusing on a corporate crime, but I hope the story spends a good amount of time exploring the repercussions of his actions in the first book. There are so many ways that the awesome story that was started in the first book could be continued, and I look forward to seeing if the conspiracy he uncovered in Planetside plays into this new mystery.

I am very confident that this book will be pretty epic, and Spaceside is currently sitting at the top of my must-read list for 2019. I have not decided if I will get a physical copy of this book or try and get the audiobook version. R. C. Bray did an incredible job narrating the audiobook version of Planetside, so I would like to listen to the sequel. However, if I get an advanced copy of the trade paperback of this book, I very much doubt I will be able to restrain myself enough to wait for the audiobook version. Sigh, life is so hard when it comes to awesome upcoming books.