I missed the fact that this was a sequel and wasn't able to get into the first book when I tried it out. It's a very interesting premise for a series, but I struggled to connect with the characters and the writing style. Thank you for the chance to review!

i loved the use of a murder mystery in space, it was a lot of fun to read. I really enjoyed going on this journey.

The Last Campaign by Martin L. Shoemaker is a highly recommended political thriller/murder mystery/procedural science fiction novel set on a Mars. This is a sequel to The Last Dance.

Rosalia Morais and Nicolau Aames are a couple who have established a life together in Maxwell City on Mars. The city is fast growing and with that crime is on the rise. When Rosie accepts the position as the first Sheriff of Maxwell City, she immediately begins to build a team and install in them a sense of responsibility and accountability, but can she get her team ready for arson, insurance fraud, political conspiracies, and murders? Suddenly Rosie has a murder and a huge mystery to solve that could affect the future of colonists on Mars.

Essentially The Last Campaign is a political thriller/procedural/mystery set on Mars. The science fiction aspects are basically the setting which put some limitations on actions and movements as they go through their daily lives on Mars and the background of the characters. It also feels in some ways like it is the story of a new Sheriff in town in the Old West, albeit a strong female Sheriff. But there are a whole lot of political machinations going on in this novel, so if you like political thrillers this may be a good choice for you. The interconnected cases are all tied into politics. The reelection shenanigans and muckraking reporter in the plot feel rather pertinent today.

The plot is solid, descriptive, and interesting. Descriptions of living on Mars are simply the background to the mystery. I haven't read the first book in the series, The Last Dance, which meant I was lacking some background stories and details that might have made my experience with the novel filled with a richer understanding of the characters and the colony. Personally, I didn't quite connect with the characters. Although they are developed, I didn't feel I knew them as well as people who read the first book. I also felt like the dialogue could have been written to flow more smoothly and in a realistic, conversational style.

Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of 47North.
After publication the review will be posted on Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

This sequel to The Last Dance, a mystery on board an Earth-Mars transport ship, follows two of the main characters from that book, Mars Founder Nick Aames and ex-Admiral Rosie Morais, as they settle into married life in Maxwell City on Mars. Together they run a business as incident investigators with dreams of building their own homestead and opening a school one day to teach advanced survival skills. Maxwell City has grown to around 50,000 inhabitants with a growing crime such that the Mayor decides to start a police force, appointing Rosie as Sheriff. While Rosie expects to mainly be training her new recruits to deal with petty crime, a lab fire, murder and insurance fraud soon put paid to that idea.

I mostly enjoyed the novel, however, felt it got bogged down too much in the politics and bureaucracy of the place with an upcoming election, politicians and journalists all getting in the way of Rosie and her team doing their job. While this might be realistic it felt a bit cliched and overdone and I would have liked to have seen more investigation of the crimes that occurred (particularly the murders) and less of the politics. The world building was good, given that most of the action takes place in a large city complete with shopping malls and restaurants and there wasn't a huge scifi element, although there also some scenes on the surface of Mars that were well done.

While it would be best to read the first book to learn about the characters' backstories, there is sufficient information given about previous events to read this on its own. However, I felt the characters were a bit wooden, particularly Rosie, who is the narrator. Despite this I didn't get a good feel for her character at all apart from her official persona as Sheriff, even when her marriage started to undergo some stress due to her job and Nick acting like an immature teenager. The plot also lacked suspense with only one scene towards the end raising any tension, however the plot does all come together, making all the elements slot together quite well.

Didn't hold my interest

I enjoyed Mr. Shoemaker's "Today I am Carey" last year. The writing style here is similar, but in "The Last Campaign" the dryness is even more pronounced. The writing is almost mechanical and I did not get any pleasure from reading.

This novel definitely lives up to the collective title of Near Earth Mysteries. Intricately plotted, most of which is unpredictable, with great characters, and realistic dialog and interpersonal relationships. Highly recommended.

This was a very enjoyable follow up book to The Last Dance. I was very glad I had read The Last Dance first, because if I had jumped straight into reading this I would not have had the understanding of Rosalia Morais and Nick Aames' characters and back story, both of which are very important to know who they are now. I wasn't keen on the first person narrative from Rosalie's POV, not because I don't like her but because I couldn't feel her and therefore think it would have been better told in third person. The plot was very good. I love the politics and Rosalia's character arc and, although everything tied together well at the end, there is plenty of scope for the continuation of the series. I really like the writing style, and even though there were technical terms I am not familiar with, they were used in a context where I could at least grasp what I needed to know.
I'm looking forward to the next book in the series!

This is the second book in the series, which I didn’t know when I picked it up. There are references to things that happened in the past—at least some of which I’m assuming are from the first book. I didn’t exactly have trouble following anything, since things were explained, but I felt like I would have gotten more out of it if I’d read the first book.


The book starts with some nice humans-against-environment action, then quickly gets into some more personal stuff with the characters. It did a good job of pulling me in and getting me connected with them so that I cared about them and what was happening, even if I still didn’t super understand everything yet. There’s a politician who shows up and acts like an expletive, as politicians do, which I didn’t love—but that’s a personal thing because I hate politics, even fictional politics.

Unfortunately, my interest waned considerably around 20% into the story, when the actual police stuff started, for reasons I’ll explain farther down.


I liked the main character at first, but I grew to like her less as the story went on. She’s capable, confident, smart, and has integrity. But she risks her marriage for the sake of her job, which is wrong. And she makes some choices regarding her ex which she should have known were bad decisions.


There were times where I thought the pacing was a bit off, where most of a chapter would go by with the characters basically doing busy work without anything substantial (either plot-wise or character-building-wise). Or where the author would summarize events rather than showing them, which could make the developments feel oddly abrupt and meaningless. For example, early in the book, there’s a confrontation that happens between the main character and another guy. The confrontation is written well, with plenty of detail and emotion. But when they make amends, it’s skipped through with basically just a few paragraphs of summary description. I felt like actually having some kind of written-out conversation between the two of them would have been a more satisfying conclusion to that particular story beat.


This book wasn’t what I expected it to be. I thought it would be a police procedural or detective story in space, where we’d get some good mystery, investigation of crime scenes, tense interviews of witnesses, and peril/fighting/action sprinkled throughout. There is a certain amount of most of that (though very little action, except at the end), but the book has a whole lot of politics. (Fictional politics about fictional issues, at least, but still very much politics.) Mostly, it has politics and bureaucracy getting in the way. Also, journalists who are not even attempting to convey impartial truth but are blatantly pushing certain agendas, including trying to help the campaign of a certain politician while pretending to be impartial. And I . . . just kind of hate all of that stuff. It’s too realistic, and I read fiction for escapism. But maybe people who like that sort of realism and who like politics in their crime/police novels will like those aspects.

The setting of being on Mars was fairly interesting. Mostly, it takes place in a certain Martian city, but because of the facts of being on Mars, things are different in mostly fairly minor ways which build an interesting overall backdrop.


Personally, there isn’t enough criminal investigation or action in this story for me, and way too much politics. I found myself, at various points, not even remembering what exactly they were investigating or why certain developments were important—because so much time was spent dealing with issues of politics that I lost track of the rest of the plot.


I think this book has a real problem with stakes. For at least half the book, the main crime being investigated is insurance fraud. Sure, there are a few murders, but whenever a body appears and things look like they might be getting more interesting, nothing really comes of it. The murder is basically swept aside and it’s back to the insurance fraud case. This was a very strange choice, since it should be obvious to anyone that murder is a far more interesting crime to hang a plot on than insurance fraud. About 70% in, another criminal scheme was revealed, one which amounted to large-scale . . . building without a permit. In the very last part of the book, things get more exciting, but it came so late in the game that I’d stopped caring and had started skimming.


There’s also a problem with the way the investigation (such as it is) is conducted. The discussions and theories are very vague, such that the reader in some cases doesn’t actually know what specifically the characters are thinking happened. Discussions are vaguely summarized as having taken place, and new directions are said like, “But what if we pursue the simple option?” I don’t read a lot of crime/detective stories, so it’s hard to put this critique into words, but the book just wasn’t written in a way that let me follow along with the investigation very well.


I really had high hopes for this book when I started. I liked the main character right off, I liked that her husband was a major character and the dynamic they had, I got pulled into what was happening (though that first 20% of the story ended up being nearly irrelevant to the rest of it). But the whole police investigation part was just not what I wanted, since so little time was spent on investigating, even less of that time was spent on investigating the murders, and a huge majority of the time was spent complaining about politics, politicking, doing interviews with the press, figuring out how to spin things politically, etc. etc. It’s a book about a sheriff trying to do her job and the primary antagonist is politics. And the primary stakes are the main character's marriage (where the two of them mostly refuse to actually talk anything out), the mayor’s political campaign, and (what appears for most of the book to be) insurance fraud. It just completely missed the mark for me.


(I got a free copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.)

This was a really great sequel to The Last Dance! There was plenty about the story and the mystery that I enjoyed with only a few minor details that felt like they could be improved, but overall I had a really great time with this.

To start off, I'm finding that I just really enjoy the world that Martin L. Shoemaker is putting together in this series. Mars feels like the next frontier in this series and I am here for it. There is definitely more emphasis and a sense of greater importance involved with the politics in this book and I know that may not be everyone's favorite thing, but I enjoyed it. Plus it gave me time to get to know an adult Anthony and see the person he has turned into since his introduction in the first book which was great.

Moving on to the characters, Nick Aames is someone I have really loved getting to know through this series and even through all his flaws, I love getting to read more about what he's doing post-Aldrin. There are plenty of nods to the previous book and those characters which kept my nostalgia alive and well. It made me want more information on what everyone on the Aldrin was up to and how they were holding up, but I did love getting to know Rosalia and see how the Nico/Rosie relationship was getting along.

One of the biggest reasons I enjoyed The Last Dance as much as I did had to do with how much I loved reading all the little stories that played into the bigger picture of that book. The Last Campaign follows basically the same idea. It was a little different because there was no need to go back in time to tell off-the-record accounts and stories from the past during an investigation, but it still followed the same pattern.

In terms of any negatives, I only had smaller complaints. One was that some of the conversations felt a little off and unnatural to me. This had to do with the use and non-use of contractions at times. I know that seems nit-picky, but everything just didn't feel as completely realistic and natural as I would have liked because of it. For the most part I could overlook it, so it wasn't a huge deal. Another thing that felt off was the ending. Not what happened or anything like that, but it did feel a little rushed to me.

Overall, I really liked this! I couldn't help but to compare it to the first book which is probably why some of the little details got to me a little more, but it was good. I really love this world and the characters, so hopefully Martin has more ideas and stories to tell in this universe because I'm excited to read them.

As much as I enjoyed the first book in the series, I am puzzled by the second book by Martin Shoemaker entitled “The Last Campaign.” The first book was a creative sciene fiction opera set in our solar system and mostly on board a transport vessel. “The Last Campaign” uses the same main characters who are now in positions of authority in Mars’ main city of Maxwells City. The story mixes a Police procedural with the politics of an emerging society on (and under) the planet’s surface. If one opened the book to almost any page of the book one will not find the “science fiction” in the storyline. The reason I am a bit disappointed is because I read a lot (and I mean “a lot” of mysteries, suspense, and police procedurals and enjoy that genre immensely: I was hoping for an exciting story told with the imagination for the futurism of a great science fiction saga. So thanks to NetGalley for the chance to read the uncorrected proof of “The Last Campaign” and excited to give this author another good read with the next book in the series.

I really enjoyed this book. It was a departure from the style and premise of the first book, and could ultimately be treated as a standalone if there was a bit more backstory put into a prologue or throughout the book.

The pace and story of this book were engaging. There could be a bit more in the character development around the team that Rosalia assembled for her command squad. I felt like their development was very thin and I never really felt connected with them. This normally is not a problem in books for secondary or tertiary characters, but they played a larger role than most throughout this book. It would have been nice to dive a bit deeper into their personalities and develop them a bit more so you could more fully understand what took place.

My only other issue with the book is around the plot development. There seemed to be focus given to areas that really didn't affect the overall storyline, while major plot points were glossed over without providing detail or development of the plot. Without giving anything away, some of the arrests and corruption were just presented as if it were obvious. Maybe I missed it, but it was as if Rosalia had no idea what was going on or who was behind something on one page, but then on the next she is solving the case. Also, the ending seemed rushed as well. There was no build-up, just a sudden revelation (if you can even call it that) and then a conclusion to the story.

I would have liked a bit more development in the plot to bring some suspense and build up to the turns of the book, but overall it was a good read. I am not sure if there is a planned sequel to this book, but I will pick it up if/when it is released.

Martin Shoemaker has written a superb read with The Last Campaign. Well worth the time and a true page turner!

Thank you to Netgalley for the opportunity to read and revies this book. The Last Campaign is more of a whodunit than scifi, even though it takes place on a recently colonized Mars. It is the second book in the series but the author does an adequate job in describing what happened previously so that this is a fine stand alone novel. There could have been a better description of the science involved with colonization and the background poiticla situation could have been clarified better. That may have occured in the first book but i did not read it. The action is first-rate and the characters are believable but the story sometimes moves along ploddingly. Not bad, just not great.

It was ok. This was not a true standalone bu5 continues events of a previous novel. If you’ve read the first novel, it will help immensely.Couldn’t really get into this one. Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the advance review.

This is from a fairly prolific author. He knows how to tell a tale. It has good pacing, interesting characters and decent dialog. There's some good mystery as well. I suspect this will fly off the virtual shelves once released. Recommended.

Thanks very much for the ARC for review!!

This book was very interesting. I didn't realize immediately that it's the 2nd book in a sequel, and that made it hard to understand the dynamic between Rosie and Nick, and Marcus. And to some extent, Anthony. I think I may have to go back and read the first book now, just to see how that all unfolded. And the concept of a spaceship becoming a sovereign nation sounds very interesting too! Anyway, here we were in the present, and now the sovereignty in question is of a city on Mars. Or really Mars in general. There are some surface jaunts in a rover, with camping, but that's about as sci-fi as this got. The rest is more like a police procedural. There are a string of murders, all connected, and the new, politically appointed sheriff in town has to figure it all out under pressure since it's also an election year. It all tied together in the end very nicely. What stuck in my mind to ponder after finishing the book was the relationship between Rosie and Nick. It felt very much like it was unraveling. Rosie does a really unfair thing, accepting an all-consuming job when the two of them were just about to start new business together. Nick is understandably upset, and is incredibly difficult to get along with. Rosie lives on eggshells to accommodate him. Somehow she manages to keep it all from blowing up, even though he is so self involved and withdrawn that he can't be supportive of her at all. Or maybe Nick cares enough about her to make an extreme effort to reconcile, though it's outside his nature. My experience in and observing these kinds of relationships is that they are continuously fraught and rarely end well. It seems like the author has some experience with this as well, and it was good to see that it sometimes can work out, for a time. So - a bit light on the sci-fi, heavy on the politics, an interesting and satisfyingly resolved mystery, and a very intriguing character study of a difficult but loving relationship.

The second book in the "The Near-Earth Mysteries" series. This is an exciting continuation of the characters from the first book. The events of the first book are now behind them, they are building a life for everyone in Mars’s Maxwell City when a significant situation unfolds that could end much of the life already established. A mixed murder and arson mystery. Martin Shoemaker brings a unique skillet to his writings. definitely one to watch.

While it took a little bit to get into the book, I really enjoyed the development of the story. There was a complexity to the backstory of the characters, combined with the political elements of the narrative, were compelling and relatable.

Interesting but the pace was a bit too slow for my liking, and I had to abandon it since I was struggling to make any progress.

A great sci-fi mystery mash-up. This is a sequel and even though I haven't read the first yet I still thoroughly enjoyed this book. Will most def seek out the first now and will also be keeping my eyes out for other books by Shoemaker. Highly recommended.