Book Review: The Iron Truth – S.A. Tholin

Iron Truth was a brutal space opera rich in desolate exploration and spiders, so many spiders.

Space exploration has come to an end, corruption seeping out into the universe corrupting every mind that it touches. To counteract this impurity the Primaterre Protectorate was born. Their control is paramount to the safety of the entire world, their message is simple. Purity above all else. Commander Constant Cassimer is the purest of them all and his team has been sent to Cato. A planet full of dust storms, Rebearther rebels and the red. The red who the rebels claim will save them, the red that could kill them all.

They are sent to find and recover a lost ship, but they find much more than they bargained for. This dangerous recovery mission will have his team face horrors they never thought possible, but for them, it is just another Tuesday. 

Joy Somerset is a junior botanist, and brother Finn has organised for them both to abord one of the last colony ships set to venture into a new world. One they hope will bring the clean air and skies Joy needs for her miner’s lung illness. She goes to into cryostasis with dreams of a lush new planet, a journey meant to take 5 years. She wakes 119 years later, on Cato, full of red sands, dangerous rebels and a new untrusting military group pulling their weapons out on sight.

Somerset and Cassimer will need to learn to trust each other and work together if either of them is going to come out of this alive.

This was probably my first real taste of a hard space opera/military sci-fi and I’ll be the first to admit, it took some brain power to get through. There is so much happening here, and the elements of danger are built up and up without any end in sight for our poor team in these pages. That being said, what a story! I can certainly see why it took out the SPSFC title for 2021. There is so much going on here that I don’t even feel like we have scratched the surface in book one.

I have a few praises for Iron truth, the first being the character and character interactions. While space operas can err on the side of the dramatic, none of our character interactions felt forced or over the top. We are dealing with one group of people who have crash landed onto a planet they have no idea about, and are struggling to stay alive during their day to day. Joy is naive but damn determined to show she can pull her weight and help. Cassimer’s team are trained for combat and mistrust of anyone and anything outside of the Primaterre so when their paths cross it makes sense that they are more likely to shoot, then chat. The interactions between Joy and this group are complex, and we see them open up to one another over time and go back and forth on their opinions. It was humbling, human and well executed in my opinion.

Another thing worth mentioning is the combination of horror elements interwoven into this story. Space is terrifying and this book plays these elements up. First up spiders, spiders everywhere, if you are an arachnophobe, this book is NOT for you. Then we have the red, the lichen, the demonic plant life forcing itself into bodies to become a functioning entity. No thank you, not for me, but very well put together as a horrific spacey element. Horror also wove its way into the battles. Our team is dealing with a rebel force and an unknown dangerous entity. They were brutal, bloody and had some of the highest stakes I have come across in the genre thus far. S.A. Tholin is not afraid to put these characters through the ringer and really make them show us what they are worth. Along with some cool sci-fi augments and tech, these scenes made for one hell of a heart rate.

The last thing I will mention here is the story progression itself. The first half of the book really focuses on the planet itself and our two teams of people getting to know their new environment. This gives the reader enough time to build the stakes up for themselves before we get into the crazy military stuff. During the second half, more complicated layers of alternate horrors and military groups come into play suggesting that there is a much bigger story here to tell.

I had a great time with Iron Truth and although my poor brain needs a break from sci-fi for a while, I am looking forward to continuing with this series.