The Red: First Light

There Needs To Be A War Going On Somewhere.Lieutenant James Shelley commands a high-tech squad of soldiers in a rural district within the African Sahel. They hunt insurgents each night on a harrowing patrol, guided by three simple goals: protect civilians, kill the enemy, and stay alive--because in a for-profit war manufactured by the defense industry there can be no cause worth dying for. To keep his soldiers safe, Shelley uses every high-tech asset available to him--but his best weapon is a flawless sense of imminent danger...as if God is with him, whispering warnings in his ear. Hazard Notice: contains military grade profanity.

Selected for the 2013 Locus Recommended Reading List

Praise for The Red: First Light:"Linda Nagata's The Red: First Light begins like a shot and never lets you go. Well-written, thrilling, and thoughtful, The Red: First Light is science fiction at its best. " --USA Today bestselling author Kristine Kathryn Rusch

"Remember the scare times of the Cold War, when President Eisenhower warned us of the power of the military-industrial complex? Don't you wish we had listened? In The Red: First Light, Linda Nagata gives us an alarming glimpse of the day after tomorrow--on an Earth torn by wars fueled by defense contractors. It's a thriller; it's a convincing character novel; it's a terrifying extrapolation--and it's a hell of a fine read. But...don't read this book if you don't want to think squarely about what our world is coming to. Don't read it if you don't want to risk some sleepless nights. Don't say you weren't warned! Once you start it, you're not going to stop."--Jeffrey A. Carver, author of The Chaos Chronicles

"Military fiction and high-tech speculation, complex and edgy characters, a pinch of Eichmann in the plot, sly bits of Frankenstein in the setting, ... make Linda Nagata's The Red: First Light compulsively readable." --Vonda N. McIntyre, Nebula and Hugo Award-winning author of Dreamsnake, Starfarers, and The Moon and the Sun.

The Red: First Light is a fast-paced, exciting story about soldiering in the near future. The characters are likeable and well-drawn, and the piece is infused with the kind of careful, thought-provoking attention to "how might this work, really?" that has always been one of Nagata's particular strengths." --Sean Stewart, author of the World Fantasy Award winner Galveston

Review"...an amazing novel... The Red: First Light is a dark, intelligent, cynical take on military SF. It's an excellent novel that deserves a much larger audience." --Stefan Raets, Tor.com

"...the novel's vision of the military--or at least of the soldier and his or her most immediate context of competence, loyalty, dedication, and courage--is anything but disrespectful or dismissive. The setting in which these virtues are employed, tested, and sometimes betrayed, however, is something else again... the same post-Vietnam sense of discontinuity that separates The Forever War from Starship Troopers, updated for the post-9/11 world." --Russell Letson, Locus

"Excellent, well-imagined, great characters, fast-moving, great writing, everything I want in my science fiction (in my fiction really) and rarely get. I can't recommend this book highly enough." --Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Recommended Reading at Kriswrites.com