Now that you don’t have to wait as long to read the last book, I highly recommend this series.  The first book, called Gibraltar Earth tells of humanity’s first encounter with an extraterrestrial intelligence and of the chilling revelation that one species dominates all others in hundreds of thousands of worlds. Those who won’t submit are summarily destroyed.

In Gibraltar Earth the humanity takes its first steps in confirming the information that the have been given is in fact true.  While in the following two books the story plays out in ways which are not totally unexpected and that can sometimes be quite predictable, the reading is light and generally entertaining. 

Gibraltar Earth was one of the very first ebooks I purchased, back in 1999.  I read that first novel in paper form, after printing it out on an HP Laser printer.  Gibraltar Sun, the second book in the series was read on my notebook’s screen while the last title, Gibraltar Stars, was read on my iPod.  I guess this progression shows just how far ebooks have come in these eleven years.

By Schism Rent Asunder takes us through the continued, and unstoppable, events that were triggered by the events in the previous book.  As with with Off Armageddon Reef, By Schism Rent Asunder is the kind of book which you will not want to put down.  In this book David Weber seems to have done a great job of controlling his usual tendency to sometimes indulge in long descriptions and the book flows very well.

Upon reaching the end of the story I was left, once again, with a craving for more information about what will happen with the main characters and how will events turn out for the last remnants of the human race.  Having to start a civilization entirely from scratch could not be easy, but having to do so with the weight of religion which was specifically created to prevent technological innovation certainly seems to be a challenge.