March to the Sea (March Upcountry)

Book Description

A Bad Neighborhood

"Always Faithful." That was the IMC motto, and the Marines of Bravo Company, Bronze Battalion, of the Empress' Own Regiment, lived by it...even if they did occasionally wonder why they bothered. After all, Prince Roger MacClintock, Tertiary Heir to the Throne of Man, was a real piece of work. A spoiled rotten, arrogant, whiny, terminally handsome, thoroughly useless young pain in the butt.

But that was before the Royal Brat and his body guards were marooned on Marduk by an assassination attempt. Before they found themselves facing 120° heat in jungles where it rained five or six hours a day...during the dry season. Before they had to march half way around the entire planet, through damnbeasts, Capetoads, killerpillars, and atul-grak. Before they encountered treacherous local potentates, barbarian migrations, and an ocean full of sea serpents that could swallow a topsail schooner whole.

Under the right circumstances, even the most spoiled brat can grow up fast, and it turns out that under his petulant, spoiled exterior, Prince Roger is a true MacClintock, a scion of the warrior dynasty which created the Empire of Man a thousand years before. The Marines assigned to guard him have discovered a new belief in him -- and in their motto -- and they're determined that they will get him off of Marduk aIive.

Of course, the planet has other ideas...

Customer Reviews:

4 star novel, acceptable sequel with comments below.......2006-10-16

This novel is a decent sequel to March Upcountry, with more cases of inventing ancient weaponry to fight hordes of generally stupid barbarians and traitorous monarchs. (the one semi-competent barbarian general was unable to actually do what he wanted and later removed).

From writing style I suspect this book was mostly if not completely written by John Ringo. Many parts read VERY similarly to his other works I have read, including the posleen series and the council war series. Lectures on ancient military and industrial practices, techniques, etc are one aspect that is very familiar, and the characters of Pohner and Roger are very similar to his later Edmund (charles) talbot and Herzer from the council wars series. Battle scenes against hordes of poorly led barbarians are similar enough to posleen battle scenes to give me flashbacks to those novels as well.

As is noted elsewhere, the aliens in this novel are for all practical purposes human in character and behavior. He might as well have written a novel with the marines marooned on a human planet which had regressed to bronze-age tech.

In the end, if a series dealing with a technologically advanced group's need to re-invent some primitive military technologies in a primitive enviroment while being led by extremely competent leaders against usually incompetent or horde-like enemies is your thing, this is a very good example of it.

I do feel like this is something I have already read by John Ringo.

Too Many Similar Characters.......2006-06-24

I liked March Upcountry, the first in this series by Mr. Weber, but I found myself having trouble concentrating on March to the Sea, book two, mostly because the cast has grown to about 30+ characters and the multiple POV switching began to drive me a bit nutty. It would be one thing if these characters were different, but I found the aliens and their culture to be too human, and to find the alien characters almost virtually interchangeable.

I liked Prince Roj, Portena and some of the other characters, but they seem to take a back seat to some minor characters in this book. Perhaps this book would be better with a few hundred pages edited out?

Good, but not great. 3 stars.

Great books with one caveat.......2005-11-23

I've read quite a bit of Ringo recently, and thoroughly enjoyed his books...

but!

If I see either of the words "abattoir" or "actinic" one more time, I'm going to beat the man to death with a thesaurus!

John. You're a professional author. I think your plots, backgrounds, characters, etc, etc, are great... but PLEASE come up with some new way of describing things. Perhaps even a kind of battle other than "hordes of dumb bad guys and their occasional clever leader being messily killed by high-tech death", so those situations don't come up (again) to be described in the first place.

Having said that, March To the Sea has presented fewer opportunities for those two Dreaded Words to be used, and a second author to moderate their use that much more.

Where the combat of first book of the series (March Upcountry) was universaily between the humans and an overwhealming number of locals (who were slaughtered en mass), March To The Sea shows Roger & Co working with, arming, and training The Locals. Roger also progress up the military ranks. In March Upcountry, Roger grows from a (skilled, pampered, bratty) civy to a reasonably competent junior officer. Here, we see him becoming more of a general, heading up both his own force of Marine bodyguards and an expanding force of Mardukans.

Roger's going to have to lead an entire continent against that distant star port if this sort of progression is to continue. ;)

We're also seeing a slow shift in odds. It won't shock me to find that "march to the stars" ends in a horde of friendly Mardukans throwing themselves at Vastly Outnumbered Baddies, and being mowed down by plasma fire. More "actinic-fire spawned abattoirs". Whee. ;)

We're also priviy to the on-going Forbidden Fruit relationship between Roger and one of his female Marine bodygaurds (whose name escapes me at the moment), some of which is deeply amusing.

Weber and Ringo ROCK together!.......2003-10-23

This book took off exactly where the first left off! The Marines, with a bunch of new recruits, continue their march to the sea in hopes of purchasing ship transportation across the monster filled ocean.

Getting to the city near the coast was as hard as getting transport. Of course, battles for both had to be fought and won. But with each battle the challenges get harder. Ammo was not unlimited and few of the original Marines were left.

A bit of romance was thrown in for the fast maturing prince. And the readers get a few surprises thrown at them!

***** Not as many battles as the first book in the trilogy, but just as great! I do not know which author subtly alluded to the "Nancy Bell" poem near the ending, but it was done so smoothly that I can not help but wonder how many people noticed it. This is the best Sci-Fi series I have read all year! I am eagerly awaiting the third book. Highly recommended! *****

Part of the series, I will purchase this book for my collect.......2003-09-02

I loved the first book in this series "March Upcountry". I waited a long time for this sequel to come out and have read the third book in the series "March to the Stars".

Of the 3, I found this middle book to be very unoriginal (it seams to repeat the first book over and over); no one seems to grow or change; new elements do not add overwhelmingly to the book.

To say I was disapointed was saying it nicely, however the first and third book was excellent and worth collecting the series!!!!!!! So I will re-read this one and see if maybe I was just "off" when I read it the first time.

Product Description

Prince Roger was young, handsome, an excellent dresser, and very spoiled. But that was before he found himself shipwrecked on the barbarian jungle planet Marduk. Can Roger grow up in time to get himself off Marduk alive, capture a spaceport from the Bad Guys, and commandeer a starship home?

Customer Reviews:

In which Weber and Ringo pay homage to Xenophon.......2007-03-28

This is the first in the "Roger McLintock" series of books, and also begins the Marduk trilogy in which Prince Roger McLintock, spoilt younger son of the Empress of an interstellar empire, is stranded on the primitive planet Marduk.

The sequence of books so far in the series is:

March Upcountry
March to the Sea
March to the Stars
We Few.

The title is a reference to Xenophon's "The Persian Expedition" which is the story of ten thousand greek mercenaries who found themselves stranded in the middle of Persia when Prince Cyrus, whose bid for the throne they had been hired to support, was killed in battle in 401 BC. They had to fight their way home through enemy territory.

Xenophon, who was in command of the survivors by the time they got home, subsequently wrote an epic account of their story. These days it is most commonly available under the title "The Persian Expedition" but it has also been known as "The Ten Thousand" and as "Anabasis" - which means "March Upcountry".

Prince Roger, third in line to the throne of the Empire of Man, is on his way with his bodyguard to a ceremonial visit when their ship is sabotaged and damaged. As they limp to the nearest spaceport, on the largely unexplored and barbarian planet Marduk, they are jumped by two carriers from a hostile star nation,the "Saints."

Roger and a company of his bodyguard find themselves stranded, with no weapons or equipment beyond what they can carry, on the opposite side of the planet from the starport. To return home they will have to trek thousands of miles through all kinds of terrain, and cross the oceans. The flora and fauna of Marduk are as dangerous as anything which has ever lived on earth - the land animals make T-Rex or Velociraptor packs look like a minor nuisance and the sea creatures could have Liplourodon for breakfast.

But the animals of Marduk are as nothing compared with the challenge of dealing with some of the tribes of the indigenous intelligent species.

If he and his companions are to get home, Prince Roger will have to grow up in a hurry ...

This series is an excellent collaboration between John Ringo and David Weber. The naval battle scenes and political manouvering could have come out of an Honor Harrington book, while the ground fighting scenes are very reminiscent of the "Posleen" series. In other words, the best of both writers.

Perhaps there was some hubris in giving this novel the name of a classic story of high adventure which has been read avidly for nearly two and a half thousand years. I would be prepared to bet that in 4,404 AD, when this novel is as old as the original "March Upcountry" was when this came out, people will still be reading Xenophon. I doubt if they will still be reading about Prince Roger. But that doesn't mean our generation can't read it and enjoy it.

What a team these guys are!.......2006-11-23

When I picked up this first book, I wasn't sure. As I got into it, I discovered characters who became real and had some depth, which surprised me. It surprised me because the books are full of action, fighting, details of an alien world and race, and I expected a page-turner without a lot of character depth. I was SO wrong.

While you can read each book alone, you really should read the entire series and grow along with Prince Roger.

Very good entertainment.......2006-10-15

This novel by Weber and Ringo (I am not sure who the primary author was, if any), while having a fairly predictable backstory (spoiled brat prince becomes responsible man over time in face of adversity), is a very well-written book with some original plot events and an excellent way to kill 6+ hours (600 page book).

I really don't have any complaints, though I did find the fact the aliens who had the party captive did not decide to simply take the casualties to capture their weapons, and that the party leadership was allowed, armed, in the presence of the king during the battle.

Much of the battle sequences reads like Ringo's posleen series, with hordes of enemies being killed by a numerically inferior force.

This is an enjoyable book - well worth reading.

Disregard the Cover, Great Book.......2006-06-12

Dave Weber introduces Prince Roger a spoiled pretty-boy with an attitude and waist-length blonde hair. Rog is a lazy, eccentric fop who leads a life of privilege and excess. When he is assigned a diplomatic mission Rog does everything within his power to wriggle out of it, however his Mother (the empress) remains firm.

Rog is forced to mature quickly when a failed assassination attempt leaves him stranded on a primitive world with even stranger natives.

I listened to the unabridged audio edition of March upcountry. It was a great book filled with excitement and adventure. I felt prince Rog was a breath of fresh air in a world of testosterone-infused bodybuilder-type action heros. I liked the marines too, particularly Ponner, and Julian.

I want to comment that the cover of this novel is extremely ugly. Prince Rog looks like a teenager with a mullet, when in fact Rog is 22, with nice long blonde hair. The marines look really, really bad. Their body-armor is big and solid, not like something from Victoria secret. If the publisher wants to sell more books I think he/she might be advised to switch cover artists.

Cliche.......2006-05-09

This book was the biggest train wreck, AWFUL. The only reason I finished it was to perhaps save someone else my fate. Some decent concepts, but the characters and events around their development were cliche and predictable, other events lacked motive.

The March of the Ten Thousand (The March Upcountry, The Anabasis, The Persian Expedition)

Average customer rating:

Gripping eyewitness to history

The March of the Ten Thousand (The March Upcountry, The Anabasis, The Persian Expedition)
Xenophon
Manufacturer: Audio Connoisseur
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio CD

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ASIN: 1929718187

Book Description

1 MP3-CD, With Music and Sound Effects, 7 Hours 33 Minutes THE MARCH OF THE TEN THOUSAND, (The March Upcountry, The Anabasis, The Persian Expedition, March to the Sea) is one of the most admired and widely read pieces of all ancient literature. Xenophon employs a very simple, straightforward style to describe what is probably the most fabulous military adventure ever undertaken. When Cyrus, brother to the Great King of Persia, attempts to overthrow his feckless sibling, he employs a Greek mercenary army of 10,000 hoplites. Xenophon is among the common soldiers. When this army becomes stranded as a result of the death of Cyrus, and then witnesses the treacherous murder of its entire officer corps, despair overtakes them. Xenophon rallies the Greeks, has them elect new officers, then leads them to freedom across 1,500 miles of hostile territory seething with adversaries. It is an epic of courage, faith and democratic principle.

Customer Reviews:

Gripping eyewitness to history.......2007-04-30

This is a gripping tale of an army of men trapped deep in enemy territory 1,500 miles from home - alone, leaderless and outnumbered - and their ability to regroup and safely retreat against all odds. Google around the web for a few good maps to help you follow the march.

I especially enjoyed the several magnificent speeches Xenophon gives to rally the troops or to defend himself against accusers. One of his best quotes: "a prince's finest possessions are justice and generosity."

This very human study shows human behavior does not change. It's easier (or clearer) to deal with enemies than friends, as friends come in many guises. Interesting for insight into political machinations of the ancient world. But one could substitute more familiar terms such as "senate" or "mayor" and recognize the same types of people and patterns of behavior.

Good reader, good pacing.

Average customer rating:

Well Paced action, with a serious intrigue.
Watch out Ray Kroc,here comes Prince Roger
Very Entertaining
Another RIngo winner
Good but could have been better

We Few (March Upcountry)
David Weber , and John Ringo
Manufacturer: Baen
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 074349881X

Book Description

Prince Roger MacClintock was an heir to the galaxy's Throne of Man-and a self-obsessed spoiled young brat . . . until he and the Royal Marines sent to protect him were stranded on Marduk with only their feet to get them half way around the entire planet. So far, they've crossed a continent, crossed a sea full of ship-eating monsters, taken over an enemy spaceport, and hijacked a starship. But they're not home-free yet, because home is no longer free. In Roger's absence, a palace coup by enemies of the MacClintock family has seized control of the Empire. His mother the Empress is a captive in the palace and even in her own body, drugged so that her will is not her own. Roger's bother, the heir to the throne, is dead. And Roger himself has been branded an outlaw and traitor. Roger and his faithful band of human marines and native alien warriors have beaten the barbarian planet Marduk, and now they must re-conquer an interstellar empire. But they aren't about to give up, and with the help of those on the throne planet who are still loyal to the Empress they will infiltrate (under cover of a restaurant specializing in exotic Mardukan dishes, no less), they will make anyone who gets in their way (such as local mobsters who make the mistake of kidnapping Roger's fiancé) very sorry that they did, and they will not rest until the rightful ruler has been restored. Once again, a lot of power-hungry people are going to learn a hard lesson: You do not, ever, mess with a MacClintock!

Customer Reviews:

Well Paced action, with a serious intrigue........2007-09-10

This one was a more intriguing concept, as it added in a lot of space battle portions. Now I don't mind space battles, and I can see Weber's contributions in this, but I think the concept of the "March to the..." did not apply to this, and it did lose the plot a bit. Still, it was a good read and I believe the value was there strongly from two masters of Sci-Fi Space Opera. Weber & Ringo are excellent writers, and they showed their teeth well in this.
I have gotten all of Weber's books, and am beginning to amass John Ringo in droves. Never mind the exact science stuff, these guys show their writing skills time & time again. I can't wait to see what they pull up next.

Watch out Ray Kroc,here comes Prince Roger.......2007-02-21

We Few (2005) by John Ringo and David Weber is the fourth book in the Empire Of Man series which includes:

1) March Upcountry
2) March To The Sea
3) March To The Stars, and
4) We Few

It is my understanding that David Weber writes the outline and then John Ringo fills in everything else,i.e. dialogue, etc.

The only real fault I have with this series is that, according to Ringo's website, it'll be two years after he gets the outline from Weber until the next book cones out and he doesn't have an outline, yet.

For an excellent summary of the book, see Arthur W. Jordin's review below. Meanwhile I'll just summarize my thoughts.

As Poertena would say, stop reading the pocking reviews and buy the pocking book. After of course you vote "yes" for my review.

Gunner ( February ,2007 )

Very Entertaining.......2007-01-13

The plot is very easy to follow since the first pages helps readers catch up on the previous events in the series.

However, the ending was very abrupt, unless there are other books after this.

Another RIngo winner.......2007-01-12

John has written another enjoyable entry in the Prince Roger saga. The barbarian in the Prince came out in the first three books and now has to succeed in the "civilized" world where people aren't coming after you with a sword or gun, but they're after you politically. The parallelisms with today's world and the need for good people to stand up to evil is very apparent.

Good but could have been better.......2006-12-27

This is a satisfying end to the series, but it was also the worst book of the series. Maybe the authors got run down after three volumes of action. It seemed to me that they wanted it to be over, and they were going to make it happen. They needed to resolve the tension between Roger and Nimashet, but they did it in an abrupt and unbelievable manner from the way they left things at the end of the previoud volume. They also inserted some tedious elements. Why is it that successful authors think it's o.k. to use their characters to lecture their captive readers on the authors' philosophy? We got long, unnecessary, and out of character discussions on comparitive economic systems, male-female relations, and even video gaming. Give me a break and stick to the story.

We Few: Library Edition (March Upcountry)

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We Few: Library Edition (March Upcountry)
David Weber , and John Ringo
Manufacturer: Blackstone Audiobooks
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: MP3 CD

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ASIN: 0786180153

March to the Sea: Library Edition (March Upcountry)

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March to the Sea: Library Edition (March Upcountry)
David Weber , and John Ringo
Manufacturer: Blackstone Audiobooks
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: MP3 CD

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ASIN: 0786172541

3 HBs by John Ringo: Von Neumann's War, March Upcountry, Hell's Faire

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3 HBs by John Ringo: Von Neumann's War, March Upcountry, Hell's Faire
John Ringo
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000UEE13S

Product Description

Hardbacks

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March to the Sea (March Upcountry)
David Weber , and John Ringo
Manufacturer: Blackstone Audio Inc.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio Cassette

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ASIN: 0786147512

Product Description

Prince Roger MacClintock, Tertiary Heir to the Throne of Man, was a spoiled rotten, arrogant, whiny, thoroughly useless young pain in the butt. But that was before an assassination attempt marooned the Royal Brat and his bodyguards on the planet Marduk, and before they had to march half way around the entire planet, through 120-degree heat and five-hour rainstorms in jungles full of damnbeasts, capetoads, killerpillars, and atul-grak, not to mention hostile peoples, to make their way back to port.

Product Description

Since his attempted assassination, which marooned him with his bodyguards on the hostile planet Marduk with its unending series of adventures, Prince Roger McClintock has evolved from a spoiled, petulant heir into a true leader of humans and aliens alike.

This third edition to the Prince Roger Series takes the Bronze Barbarians of the Imperial Guard across the Eastern Ocean of Marduk, facing giant sea monsters and pirates, and eventually to a spaceport held by humans of questionable loyalties. Roger learns that his assassination attempt was part of a larger plot, and that not all is as it seems on Earth or on Marduk. Fortunately, he's got the Bronze Barbarians and the Basik's Own at his back.

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