Set in the far future, mankind is neck-deep in a galactic war with the Mechan: a race of hive-minded machines bent on preventing humanity from spreading any further than its dying solar system.
Fortunately (or perhaps not so fortunately), the military has developed a way of throwing endless resources at the conflicts: when a soldier is killed in action, their consciousness is downloaded into a cloned body, complete with their memories up until their point of death.
The hero of the story is Specialist Adrienne Valero, a soldier with a drink problem who has been resurrected an astonishing ninety-six times. Valero is transferred to a forward recon unit which is tasked within uncovering the motivation of the Mechan enemy and (hopefully) discovering a way to defeat them.
In my humble opinion, this was a pretty good book. It was very heavy on the technical detail, especially concerning the resurrection process which involves transmitting the deceased neurological makeup to space stations where they can be downloaded into cloned bodies. It reminded me of Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom; after a while, you get the impression that immortality is not the panacea it’s cracked up to be.
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