The General series
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The General (also known as the Raj Whitehall series after the lead character) is a set of military science fiction books written by S.M. Stirling from an outline by David Drake. Clearly inspired by the Byzantine commander Belisarius, the series shares numerous common elements with the more recent Belisarius series by Drake and Eric Flint.
Contents |
[edit] Books
[edit] Original series
Centering on Raj Ammenda Halgern da Luis Whitehall
The first two books were also published as an omnibus Warlord (2003), with the next three in another as Conqueror (2003).
[edit] Follow-on series
- The Chosen (1996)
- The Reformer (1999)
- The Tyrant (by Eric Flint, 2002)
[edit] Plot
The first 5 books are set on the planet Bellevue. Previously part of a high-technology galactic civilization, planetary civilization collapsed during "the Fall", when extensive fusion bomb destruction greatly reduced the planet's population and technology level. Technology has redeveloped only slowly, The most advanced groups have reached the level of double-expansion steam engines, wrapped brass-cartridge breech-loading rifles (Martini-Henry lock or very similar) or lever-action carbines, cast-steel breech-loading cannon, simple revolvers, etc. Progress has slowed at this point: the breech-loading rifle was adopted over two-hundred years ago, but other groups still use flint-locks or percussion cap weapons.
The concept of technology has become the basis for a schismatic religion, the Holy Federation with priestly Hierarchs, Sysups and so on, an inquisition called Anti-Viral Cleansers. The people speak various mangled tongues, including Sponglish, Spanjol and Namerique, with elements of English, French and Spanish apparent. At the time of the Fall the planet had no horses, so now cavalry is mounted on 1000-lb dogs of various breeds.
The books begin in the Year of the Fall 1103, when the protagonist, Raj Whitehall, stumbles across a working remnant of the old technology, the computer "Center", which he regards as an angel (which is how computers are thought of by his religion). Center describes itself as a "sentient artificial entity of photonic subsystems tasked with the politico-military supervision" of Bellvue. Center tasks Whitehall with uniting Bellevue and provides him with a constant mental link, strategy assessments and simulations, historical data, and a number of other handy features as aid.
True to their historical model the books focus on the convoluted "strategic offensive, tactical defensive" campaigns of General Whitehall around the Midworld Sea and his fraught relation with his paranoid 'emperor' - Governor Barholm Clerett - and the avaricious Chancellor Tzetzas. Whitehall's nation is called the Civil Government, amongst his opponents are the Military Governments of the Brigade, and the Squadron, and the Islamic Colonists.
[edit] Chosen series
In the follow-up novels, Center, along with the recorded mind of Raj Whitehall, are sent to the planet Visager to help boost that society to the point where it too can join what has now become Bellvue's multi-world Federation. This time, Center recruits two brothers, Jeffrey Farr and John Hosten, to help remake a world. Standing in their way is a nation of eugenically bred warriors called the Chosen, the strongest, most technologically advanced military force on the planet, who believe that all non-Chosen are merely slaves who haven't been caught yet.
