Content levels
Trigger warnings
Positive tags
Hero archetypes
Protagonist archetypes
Tropes
Themes
Synopsis
The year is 2108, and the North American Commonwealth is bursting at the seams. For welfare rats like Andrew Grayson, there are only two ways out of the crime-ridden and filthy welfare tenements, where you're restricted to two thousand calories of badly flavored soy every day: You can hope to win the lottery and draw a ticket on a colony ship settling off-world, or you can join the service. With the colony lottery a pipe dream, Andrew chooses to enlist in the armed forces for a shot at real food, a retirement bonus, and maybe a ticket off Earth. But as he starts a career of supposed privilege, he soon learns that the good food and decent health care come at a steep price…and that the settled galaxy holds far greater dangers than military bureaucrats or the gangs that rule the slums.
Tags
Terms of Enlistment: content & age rating
Intended for adult readers (18+).
Military SF with strong combat violence, harsh dystopian poverty, and military language. Andrew's journey from desperate welfare recipient to soldier involves warfare against alien threats and the brutal realities of military service.
What to know going in
This book has strong violence, no sexual content, and strong language. Content notes include death, violence, and class struggle (see the full list above).
Who'll love this
Teens interested in gritty military science fiction will appreciate Andrew's hard-won path from poverty to becoming a soldier facing alien dangers.