Mike Brooks’s space opera Dark Run, published last year by Saga Press, was one of the most acclaimed SF debuts of 2016. The Keiko and its crew of smugglers, soldiers of fortune, and adventurers travelling Earth’s colony planets successfully took on a job that could pay off a lot of their debts, in a corrupt galaxy where life is cheap and criminals are the best people in it. In the sequel Dark Sky, arriving in hardcover and trade paperback next month, Captain Ichabod Drift and his crew sign on for a new smuggling job that soon goes south when they’re separated and caught up in a dangerous civil war.

When Ichabod Drift and the Keiko crew sign on for a new smuggling job to a mining planet, they don’t realize what they are up against. The miners, badly treated for years by the corporation, are staging a rebellion. Split into two groups, one with the authorities and one with the rebels, Drift and his crew support their respective sides in the conflict. But when they are cut off from each other due to a communication blackout, both halves of the crew don’t realize that they have begun fighting themselves…

Dark Sky (322 pages, $26.99 hardcover/$16.99 trade/$7.99 digital) will be published by Saga Press on July 11, 2017. It will be followed this fall with the third volume, Dark Deeds, in which a ship-wide vacation leads to the second-in-command being taken hostage by a criminal mastermind.

After the riotous civil war in Dark Sky, the crew of the Keiko decides to go on vacation at an illegal gambling port for a little fun. What they don’t realize is that the casinos are run by an ex-client who didn’t get his shipment due to the war. The mob boss decides to take Tamara Rouke, the Keiko’s second-in-command, and hold her hostage until the crew raises enough money to pay him back for the lost shipment. If they don’t pay up in time, Rouke will be killed. Captain Ichabod Drift and his crew agree. But as they find a way to get the funds, one will betray everyone and one will die…

Dark Deeds (336 pages, $27.99 hardcover/$16.99 trade/$7.99 digital) will be published by Saga Press on October 10, 2017. The covers for all three books in the series are by John Harris.

I don’t know…. maybe it’s the John Harris covers, or maybe it’s the rave reviews (“Fantastic… space opera that leaves you wanting more” — SFBook Reviews), but this one really appeals to me. The setting is intriguing, and the books sound like relatively standalone, quick reads. What more could you ask for?

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