Smoke and Thunder
Captain Mike Sandhurst and the 157th Tank Regiment have redeployed to Mars and are stuck in unrealistic training environments designed by those without combat experience and frustration mounts.
Lieutenant Vivian Llewelyn’s Thunderbolts find themselves in a similar situation compounded by their newly assigned Commander Air Group. The loss of the planet Haven speeds the creation of Task Force Victory, combining armored ground forces and dedicated air support, but not before a devastating accident shakes the Thunderbolts to their core.
After a brazen, unprovoked attack on a critical Earth colony planet, Earth Maneuver Forces are without their second largest logistical hub and must respond in force. Task Force Victory deploys forward to the Haven system and a mysterious, barely hospitable planet named Honalee. Given the mission to take and hold a massive island named Paradise, Sandhurst and his friends discover the alien world, while capable of supporting life, is a very dangerous place. Confronted by a dedicated enemy force, complete with a newly discovered variant they name a Brute, Task Force Victory must overcome all of the challenges to establish a beachhead on the island and press the attack forward.
Will Sandhurst and Llewelyn succeed in bringing their units together to take Paradise, and what mysterious secrets are to be found there? What happens when the Task Force gets the attention of the rest of the galaxy?
The fight against the Buzzers rages on in the Buzzer War Series, by Kevin Ikenberry. With realistic military action, space and ground battles, and a vicious bug alien invasion, it's perfect for fans of Starship Troopers, Hell Divers 2, and Rick Partlow's Drop Trooper!
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Kevin Ikenberry
Kevin Ikenberry writes science fiction with the precision of a military strategist and the heart of a lifelong dreamer. Before crafting vivid battlefields on the page, he spent over two decades serving as a space operations officer in the U.S. Army. That experience didn’t just shape his discipline—it defined the way he writes: grounded, thoughtful, and always with one eye on the stars.
Growing up in Colorado, Ikenberry was the kind of kid who scanned the night sky and imagined what lay beyond it. That fascination eventually turned into a career in space science education—running U.S. Space Camp programs and Challenger Learning Centers—before he returned to his first love: storytelling. His novels aren’t just about aliens or distant worlds; they’re about leadership under pressure, sacrifice, and the complex choices made in the heat of battle.
The Buzzer War
When the silence of space is shattered by a signal no one can trace—and everyone fears—the question isn't just where it's coming from, but who survives hearing it.
Set in a near-future shaped by cold alliances and fragile truces, The Buzzer War unfolds in a universe where sound is weaponized, information is scarce, and trust is a liability. What begins as a subtle interference in deep-space communications soon reveals itself as a threat capable of unraveling entire military hierarchies. The buzzers—unseen, unknowable, and devastating—aren’t just attacking ships; they’re dismantling the very idea of control.
The Buzzer War consists of six books. The current recommended reading order for the series is provided below.
