Book Reviews: Fear Agent Vols. # 1 and 2

If you like pulp action with a retro sci-fi feel, then Fear Agent, Volume 1, Re-Ignition is for you!

Down-on-his-luck alien exterminator Heath Hudson, stumbles across a conspiracy to destroy Earth.

He narrowly escapes from a space station overrun by octopoid monsters with Mara, the only survivor of the attack. 

 They zip past the octopoid armada in Heath's rocket ship, but end up crash-landing on a post-apocalyptic planet, where they discover two things:

One:  They've been transported thousands of years back in time. 

Two:  The planet they're marooned on is the homeworld of a race of killer robots, hell-bent on exterminating all life forms in the galaxy. 

So it's "Plan B" for our intrepid couple--stop the robot conquest of the galaxy before it begins.  But after a desperate battle, all seems lost.

In Fear Agent, Vol 2, My War, our hero Heath Hudson rebounds and manages to thwart the evil robot plan. 

However, as with other time-travel stories, the "present" turns out to be worse off than before--on many levels, from personal to planetary.

The octopoids still manage to conquer Earth, while the survivors flee to an overcrowded base on the moon.

My War ends with remnants of the Human Race preparing to launch a search for habitable planets in order to hide from the octopoids--and just about every other race that wants to see humans eradicated from the galaxy.

Several more Fear Agent volumes have been published since Re-Ignition.  For a synopsis on all of them, with plot spoilers, here's the Wikipedia "Cliff Notes." 

Fear Agent Volumes 1 & 2 are a retro-romp across time and space. 

I give both issues 5-stars/two-thumbs-up.  A plot-twist was revealed at the end of My War, that I should have seen coming, but didn't, because I was too mesmerized by the action.  So I made sure I didn't read the Wikipedia synopsis past Volume 2.

There is a scene with hints of sex and nudity, along with some dialogue discussing sex.  Not to mention all the graphic violence of people, aliens and robots being blasted and/or eaten.

So if you're think about getting Fear Agent Volumes 1 & 2, and probably any of the subsequent issues for that matter, as gifts, you may want to consider this "NC-17 or R-Rated" material.

Both volumes averaged 4.5 stars on Amazon.com.  I didn't notice any of the plot issues the less-than-four-star raters commented on.  My copies of Re-Ignition and My War had no production flaws either.

I'm hooked and look forward to getting caught-up on Fear Agent!