<p><b>The launch of a new science fiction adventure series--by the <i>New York Times</i>-best selling author of the Safehold series and the Honor Harrington series <br></b><br> The Galactic Hegemony has been around a long time, and it likes stability--the kind of stability that member species like the aggressive, carnivorous Shongairi tend to disturb. So when the Hegemony Survey Force encountered a world whose so-called "sentients"--"humans," they called themselves--were almost as bad as the Shongairi themselves, it seemed reasonable to use the Shongairi to neutralize them before they could become a second threat to galactic peace. And if the Shongairi took a few knocks in the process, all the better.<br><br>Now, Earth is conquered. The Shongairi have arrived in force, and humanity''s cities lie in radioactive ruins. In mere minutes, more than half the human race has died.<br><br>Master Sergeant Stephen Buchevsky, who thought he was being rotated home from his latest tour in Afghanista