With a veteran 's eye for the harsh and gritty details of war, David
Drake depicts a futuristic analog of Vietnam-era tank combat in his
Hammer's Slammers fiction. Upon this tactical foundation, Drake uses
historical metaphor to provide a rich and detailed future-history that
is both unique and strangely familiar. The characters that make up the
Hammer's Regiment are neither cartoon heroes nor propaganda villains;
rather they are competent professionals engaged in a deadly business.
The inevitable conflicts between policy, necessity, and human nature are
often at the forefront of the Slammers narratives, and it is this rich
fusion of elements that makes Drake's Slammers fiction instantly
identifiable and utterly compelling.
The Hammer's Slammers series is some of the most important and
influential work in military SF. The Vietnam War made indelible marks on
the science fiction genre, and Drake's service with the Blackhorse
Regiment during the war gives his fiction a unique perspective. It is
this perspective that is sometimes lacking in military SF, and one that
makes Drake's work so important to the science fiction genre as a whole.
This three-volume set collects all the Slammers short fiction and novels
into a set of uniform editions, and presents a new, previously
uncollected piece of fiction in each volume.
This second volume collects the first four Slammers novels, At Any Price
(1985), Counting the Cost (1987), Rolling Hot (1989) and The Warrior
(1991). The novella "A Day of Glory" was written for this volume, and
has been uncollected prior to the publication of tihs volume.
