Terminal Alliance is Jim C. Hines' first foray into the field of space opera and I loved it. His previous form has run strongly on the side of the humorous and ridiculous – and with Terminal Alliance both of these elements of his writing and personality are strongly on display. However, although Terminal Alliance is quite a silly book, it is also a clever space opera surprisingly more in line with the works of John Scalzi and Elizabeth Moon than the zany critiques of bureaucratic corporations found in the works of the great Douglas Adams (although, there are still some similarities to the great sci-fi parody master here). And while Hines laces his story in humor, the themes of Terminal Alliance, in many ways, are quite serious. Terminal Alliance is a story about the nature of racism and the erasure of history. And is a story about fighting for justice. So what's the story? In a nutshell: A virus has decimated earth, leaving the humans mindless feral beasts (they basically become zombified). Magnanimously, an alien race called the Krakau, who are part of the Alliance, managed to keep ten thousand humans alive. As humans are hardy and eat pretty much anything, they are useful for all the dirty military jobs nobody else in the Alliance wants. But the Krakau, in saving humanity, has also completely rewritten human history and language. We find our misfit heroes in janitorial positions among on starship EMCS Pufferfish. This crew is out in space, wearing their containment suits as they clean up yet another disgusting mess, when the cruiser abruptly goes silent, and when they get back inside, they discover their human shipmates gone feral-zombie, and the Krakau officers dead. Being left in charge, they decide to investigate this bioweapon attack and they soon discover that the history they were told about Earth was not all they were lead to believe... Terminal Alliance host a cast of highly original cast of extraterrestrials and re-created humans I've ever encountered. From Mops, the lieutenant in charge, and her typical misfit crew: a tough ex-infantryman named Marilyn Monroe (HAHAHA), a gun-ho sanitation tech named Wolf who is super bloodthirsty but also pretty much incompetent, Kumar, the nerdy rule follower, and Grom, who isn't human at all, but Glicidae, a kind of gigantic centipede, who is also a nerd addicted to video games. This is a pretty remarkable space opera one that begs for a reread in the near future as it is filled with plots within plots and mad machinations, and really fun world building. I look forward to the next book within the series. For fans of: John Scalzi, Douglas Adams, Elizabeth Moon, James S.A. Corey.

While the multiple cover quotes comparing this to Douglas Adams may have been a bit overblown, I enjoyed this book for its wit and creative world building befitting of a space opera. The drama of a galactic conspiracy was nowhere near as compelling as a strong janitorial staff aboard a ship they barely know how to fly, and the many tricks they have to use to stand on the same stage as trained soldiers and even armies. I would be interested in reading the next installment!