Rating: 9.5/10

Thanks to the publisher and author for an advance reading copy of The Last Watch (The Divide #1) for review consideration. This did not influence my thoughts or opinions.

The Last Watch is my pick for science fiction debut of the year. Dewes has written a masterwork space opera that needs to be on bookshelves world-wide. Epic, character-driven sci-fi goodness that is the cure for your Expanse hangover.

The Last Watch is the Night’s Watch in space, but no Wildlings or White Walkers were harmed in the writing of this book. Instead, we have a collapsing universe, an alien species, and a group of Sentinals attempting to prevent the former from sidling away from the edge they are sworn to protect. Thing is, in order to do this efficiently, they need pieces of the puzzle that aren’t accessible – you know, LIKE WORKING COMMS…

In the words of the almighty Charlie Brown “Good grief!”

Dewes begins the story by dropping us onto the spaceship Argus (where about a 1/4 of the plot takes place) and introduces the reader to Cavalon Mercer and the captain, Arlequin Rae. Two completely different personalities, both aboard for polar opposite reasons, yet forced to work with one another to prevent this collapse. I enjoyed reading the story from both perspectives (especially with the dual-narration from Andrew Eiden and Nicol Zanzarella) because I wanted to get a true sense for who they were and what they did to be put in such a situation; but as you slowly understand the intentions and motivations for each, you become more and more engrained in the story and become champions for both no matter their past.

The story itself is on a massive scale but feels very intimate as we progress through the character arcs. Clearly we are talking about the edge of the universe (you know, the massive thing that surrounds our world that we know so much/so little about) but Dewes brings it into focus by giving you a group of characters to care about. You want to see them succeed and you don’t want to see them die and OMG GET THEM SOME HELP. We are also helped along by a fast-paced narrative with some interesting twists that will have you flipping pages at a rapid rate.

There is science aplenty, some romance, handfuls of angry aliens, you know about the devastating impact of a collapsing universe, and all of the spacey goodness that comes with a solid space opera. What you really need to come for are the characters. Like, seriously. They are written SO well that I wish some other authors could take some notes. This one will tick the boxes for space opera and military science fictions fans alike.

The Last Watch is a very cinematic space opera, a compulsively readable event with a cast that you’ll love from the start. It’s full of action and the kind of book that would make an excellent TV show.

In the world of The Last Watch, soldiers who have broken the rules, or who are otherwise criminal, are sent to the Divide, the edge of the universe. Beyond the Divide, nothing exists. Why they are sent there — well, that bit was less clear, a point I will get to later. Adequin Rake captains the Sentinels at a particular point on the Divide and Cavalon Mercer is sent there by his grandfather (for reasons that later become clear). But then they realise that the universe is collapsing and they have to do whatever it takes to survive.

Firstly, let me start with the best part of this book: Cavalon. You know when you open a book and within the first few chapters you know who your favourite character is going to be? That was how I felt about Cavalon. He was basically the confluence of all the best character traits. And the relationship between him and Adequin? Gruff veteran captain accidentally adopts a hyperactive kid with authority issues, I mean. Say no more.

And, really, that relationship is what carried this book for me. That’s not to say the rest of it was bad, but I think if I hadn’t liked that nearly so much, the book wouldn’t have been as good. Because, in all honesty, a lot of the parts surrounding it are a little weak.

Mostly, my issues lie with the worldbuilding and the plot. In the case of the worldbuilding, I thought at some points it was a little shallow, I guess. I mean, we don’t know half of the way the world is set up until near the end. And I’m not saying I wanted or needed an infodump earlier, it’s just that I guess it felt tacked on? And left me with way more questions than actual answers.

Actually, come to think of it, I have finished the book with a lot of basic worldbuilding questions. If the Legion doesn’t think there’s anything at the Divide, why are the Sentinels sent there? Merely to get them out of the way for Augustus Mercer’s plan? But then how do you explain that to everyone who isn’t in Mercer’s pocket (of which surely there are a few)? And, at the Divide, why do they send a ship full of people spinning across the edge of the universe? Science trips? But if they’re watching for that, why don’t they notice that the universe is collapsing again well before they apparently do?

What I did appreciate about the world, though, was that it was all grounded in somewhat believable science. I don’t want to say wholly believable, because some of those aspects were a bit like ...okay if you say so, but it’s the kind of science that, if you can deal with Star Trek type science — especially early Star Trek science — then you will easily be able to here. But all that science kind of obscured the fact that I didn’t get a lot of answers to questions about the social side of things. How are the societies set up? Have humans expanded to the entire universe? How? When? Are there more than one type of alien? I get that a lot of this can’t be answered within the scope of the story being told, but at the same time, there are ways and means of just slotting those tidbits of information in as you go along, to build up the world, and that’s what I think this book missed out on a little.

I think, then, that my points about the plot really tie back into the worldbuilding. I said at the start it’s a very cinematic book — and it is — but with the sense that it’s written with a tv show in mind. I could easily see this being adapted for television and, in all honesty, it’s not a book where you would lose much by doing that (as opposed to, say, Ninefox Gambit or A Memory Called Empire). I’m not saying that as a bad thing, but I just think it meant I didn’t get the depth of plot or of worldbuilding that I was perhaps looking for.

However, all that being said, it was still a fun book. I enjoyed reading it, I didn’t ever have the experience of putting it down and not wanting to pick it back up, and I will be reading the sequel. It’s just that, when all was said and done, it felt a little lacking.

This will appear in Grimdark Magazine #26 on April 1, and on social media shortly thereafter. I will update links as they are posted.

The Last Watch by J.S. Dewes
Review by malrubius

The Last Watch is the debut novel from author, cinematographer, and video editor J.S. Dewes and is the first book in a new series called, The Divide. It tells the story of the crew of The Argus, a spaceship at the edge of the universe, part of a fleet of Sentinels standing guard against the inevitable return of the enemy Viators from beyond the blackness. However, their problems begin without the Viators as they find that the universe is crashing in on them, and somehow they must stop it despite being alone on the far edge of space with no communications and no help from the empire. The story combines likeable rogue characters, interesting scientific speculation, and some subtly great, unpretentious writing into a very entertaining space opera. Although the publishers have humbly billed it as Game of Thrones meets The Expanse, what will come of the series remains to be seen, but it seems to be off to a great start.

Perhaps the most endearing aspect of The Last Watch is the story’s characters. Dewes has smartly limited the cast of this sprawling novel to just a few very important characters, whom the reader will have a hard time not empathizing with. Perhaps it is not the first time that a cast of blackguards has been sent off into space for one reason or another, but the two main characters in this adventure, Cavalon Mercer and Adequin Rake, are very nicely drawn both deep and wide. Cavalon Mercer is the heir to the empire, which he tries to keep secret because everyone else on board The Argus has been sent out to the edge of the universe for crimes against the empire of one sort or another. The story starts with Cavalon’s imprisonment on the ship in lieu of a death sentence after he rebels against his grandfather, the emperor. He is quiet about his crime but eventually reveals what he’s done, and as an example of the author’s dexterity in plotting, his crime is intimately tied to the duty of The Argus, to keep Viators out of the human-dominated universe. Rake also has a past that she slowly reveals to Cavalon, and the stories they tell each other not only reveal their inner humanity and fallibility, but are also very successfully plotted into slower-paced sections of the story as a great contrast to the fast-paced action. Complicating their growing relationship is the return of Rake’s beloved Griffith, whose ship seems to have been lost to the encroaching edge of the universe. But Rake has been keeping a secret from him that could throw their whole lives into hell and take several others down with them. It’s a really well done, deep, and human problem, and it creeps out of the background to throw a spanner in the works.

The other aspect of this novel that I enjoyed quite a bit was the author’s use of scientific speculation. (I use the term specifically because this is not a hard science fiction book.) The science becomes the integral to the plot, which I think is missing in some science fiction. For example, this is not a gang crime story or a war that happens to be set in space. The universes is collapsing—big science problem. Equally important, though, is how Dewes uses the science to create a good ol’ fashioned sense of wonder that harkens back to classic speculative fiction. As the edge of the universe creeps closer, time starts to slip a little, forward and backward, which Dewes deftly shows instead of having her narrator explain it in boring, abstract exposition. Likewise, the characters have certain active tattoos embedded mostly on their arms, according to their class and rank and other societal categories. This idea leans more toward fantasy than science fiction, but it is beautifully done. The concept is intriguing at first, but when Dewes puts it into action, it is surprising and very well thought out. There are other science fiction tropes in the novel that readers of the genre will recognize such as abandoned spaceships, communications units that fail, characters that age differently according to where and how fast they travel, etc., and they all seem quite well done to me, especially when the characters get to the massive space buoy at the edge of the universe. Dewes does a fantastic job of immersing the reader in this giant mechanical construct, which I think many writers would find difficult to translate into words on the page.
And words on the page is really what swept me through this fine novel. The writing is completely unpretentious, sharp, occasionally witty, and everything comes through the characters, not the narrator. The third-person narrator facilitates the story in such a way the narration is nearly invisible, allowing the characters to always be in the forefront of the action and dialogue.

But is it grimdark? I always like to ask myself this question near the end of my reviews because we are, after all, Grimdark Magazine. However, when I come across a book that cannot be locked down to grimdark, I am still mostly concerned about whether or not I enjoyed the story. The Last Watch contains nice grim settings that show the desolation of outer space, with its space junk and abandoned ships. In this particular story, there has been a movement to retrieve personnel from the edges of the universe, but no one has told the rogues aboard The Argus, which is a pretty grim situation. The characters all have criminal or transgressive backgrounds that have led them to be outcast at the edge of the universe, which I enjoy in grimdark fiction. Both Cavalon and Rake have made decision in their pasts that society has deemed morally wrong. So in that way, The Last Watch should be very appealing to grimdark readers. Overall, I am more inclined to think of The Last Watch as less a grimdark story than a story of unlikely heroes. Nevertheless, it is very well executed and beautifully written in a way that doesn’t call attention to itself. I enjoyed it very much, and I highly recommend it to readers of space opera and other character-driven science fiction. I look forward to reading book two in The Divide Series, The Exiled Fleet, which is currently scheduled for August 2021.

The Last Watch is scheduled for release on 20 April 2021 in the US by Tor Books.

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An excellent debut and one that left me already excited for the sequel.

Creative, imaginative scifi plot built around a group of misfit soldiers MacGyvering their way to saving the universe. Several stand out (Adequin, Cavalon) but all are interesting and add to ther overall misfit community.

Ratchets from hazard to hazard; Dewes doesn’t hesitate to throw multiple issues at her characters without pause. It’s a breakneck, high speed blast.

Totally fun and immensely readable. For fans of the Expanse, Jon Scalzi’s Collapsing Empire series, and/or Drew Williams’ Universe After series.

★★★★½ out of 5

The Nights watch but in space is an accurate description of this novel and first part of a series buts its also so much more then that. I love Sci Fi but it's been awhile since I connected with a Sci fi novel so quickly and completely. The story hits the ground running with some great characters and truly terrifying situations. The idea of being at the edge of space and realizng that the edge is moving in, was beyond scary. I definitely recommend this novel.

The universe is collapsing, and it's up to a ragtag group of exiled war heroes, a POW survivor, a pick pocket, and an exiled prince to stop it. Using alien technology they barely understand, they're humanity's only chance to stop the very forces of the universe from implosion. This layman's terms hard scifi deals with a little bit of everything: nuclear fission, dark energy, space-time continuums, even how to jury rig warp cores and build stars. It's NOVA meets The Wall from Game of Thrones, and it's easily one of the best debuts of 2021.

TL;DR

J.S. Dewes impressive debut, The Last Watch, had me staying up late wanting to read just one more page from beginning to end. The Last Watch feature big ideas, kick-ass characters, and an environmental collapse; you have to try to not be interested in this book. Highly recommended!

Review: The Last Watch by J.S. Dewes

Our universe is expanding, and there exist three possible states of universal growth. The first, and most likely, is that the universe will continue to expand forever to its heat death. The second is that whatever force is causing the universe to expand will reach equilibrium with gravity, and the universe will reach a stable size. The final is that gravity will eventually overpower the expansion force, and the universe will begin to contract. This is known as the big crunch. In The Last Watch by J.S. Dewes, the universe has reached equilibrium and is neither expanding nor contracting. This gives the universe an edge, an end point, and who better to stick there than the misfit soldiers and the occasional misbehaving prince. Soon, that lovely edge begins to move inward, destroying anything and everything in it’s path, including the ship set to guard the edge against humanity’s ancient foe, the Viator. Can Commander Adequin Rake protect her crew from the universe itself?

The Last Watch starts off with the intake processing of Cavalon Mercer, who, though not a soldier, got himself stationed at the edge of the universe. Cavalon gets thrust into an important role quickly because of his studies. As an idle royal, Cavalon spent his time pursuing advanced degrees, which sounds heavenly to me. He soon meets Excubitor Adequin Rake, commander of the Argus, hero of humanity, and legendary Titan. For her sins, she got promoted to babysit misfits at the edge of the universe after the war with the deadly Viator ended. The Argus is ancient and falling apart. It’s also humanity’s first line of defense if the Viator return. In reality, it’s a place to stash the soldiers that the military doesn’t want. Cavalon nuked his grandfather’s genetic labs, which was enough to get exiled from the family and sent to the Divide. As the edge of the universe begins to collapse, Rake has to deal with losing the people under her command without help from the inner systems. Along the way, she also has to tame the petulant Cavalon in order to use his knowledge and talents to save as many as possible.

As soon as I read about this book on Edelweiss, I knew I wanted it. Once I saw that beautiful cover, my interest grew. The Last Watch blew away all my expectations. I don’t often enjoy natural disaster novels, but I loved The Last Watch. This novel is built on BIG ideas, but the focus remains on the characters and their decisions. Cavalon starts out a jerk who thinks the world is against him, and what he needs is Rake. She challenges him to be better and gives him structure. Since he hasn’t been through the same basic training as the other soldiers, his inexperience in space and high pressure situations degrade his expertise. Rake, burdened by her own secrets, acts more as a babysitter for the misfits on the Argus than a commander, and this suits her just fine. As the collapse begins, she tries to push off her leadership duties as soldiers under her command lose their lives. I loved both of these characters journeys towards being better people. Cavalon struggles to learn how to perform and live up to expectations from someone he respects, and Rake must adjust her leadership style to save her people.

The Viator

Humanity’s enemy doesn’t show up much in the novel, and when they did, it had all the more impact. Instead, we get to see the two species that were the Viator geneticists attempt to cross themselves with humans. The Savants got intellect, grace, and an appearance that is alien yet not frightening. The Drudgers, however, look more like Viators than humans, and they were created to be front line warriors. They’re large, strong, and nearly impervious.

That said, when we do see the Drudgers, they’re not quite as frightening as they’re supposed to be. The humans deal with them relatively easy yet not without taking damage. I hope we get to see more of them in the next books; I want to see more of why they’re so feared.

Politics

The politics of the Divide aren’t front and center, but if you pay attention, the hints are quite interesting. Cavalon is a prince, who notes that his grandfather is the power behind the throne. I’m interested in seeing more of how the politics work. Cavalon’s grandfather leans heavily toward the fascistic side of the political spectrum. Is this just his world? Or are the many worlds of humanity ruled by monarchs? In this high tech age, has humanity reduced itself to feudalism?

Space Well Done

Dewes nailed the mechanics of space and how novices would react to being surrounded by it. There’s a scene where Rake and Cavalon have to go outside a ship to fix it. Rake is a veteran of space operations, but Cavalon has never been outside a ship in the hard vacuum. The stark difference between how they move and how they react rang true to me. For example, Cavalon drops a screw and reaches down to pick it up. But in space, you don’t drop anything as there’s no gravity. The screw will stay where you release it (assuming you’re not moving), but Cavalon reacts as he would in full gravity by bending over to pick up the screw. This is a terrible idea, and he upsets the balance of forces, requiring a rescue. I won’t say more, but I loved this minor scene.

As an aerospace engineer, reading about space involves a lot of suspension of disbelief in SF novels. Modern SF novels have much better depictions of space, but I can’t remember reading a description of space that made me as claustrophobic as Dewes wrote in the above scene. I loved it. The vastness of space is difficult to imagine because so much of our experience involves gravity. Dewes does a great, great job describing what I believe what working in space is like.

The Environment at the Edge of the Universe

The Last Watch features the collapse of the environment in a much more literal way than what we are facing with climate change. But the humans in the story react similarly. When they learn what is happening, they deny it. This creates a delay, and lives are lost because of the delay. This perfectly encapsulates how many people treat climate change. They won’t acknowledge the truth until they have no choice. I think this is well done and not – repeat, not – didactic.

One of the coolest features in the book takes place near the edge of the universe. The high amount of gravity along the divide creates ripples in time. They’re cool and weird. It was a wonderful addition to an odd concept of the edge of the universe.

Conclusion

J.S. Dewes’s The Last Watch is a fantastic debut novel. Big ideas, great characters, and universal collapse make for a fun, fast read. I’m ready for the sequel, and I’m confident that Dewes has a great story to tell. I had high expectations for The Last Watch; it was my most anticipated debut novel for the year. This disaster novel delivered on…well, everything. I can’t wait to see where the Divide series takes me.

9 out of 10!

Don't waste your time by reading this review -- if you like science fiction books, the you should stop what you are doing and get this book! Seriously! Really enjoyed reading J.S. Dewes' first book in the The Divide series. I look forward to the 2nd book, and just made a calendar reminder to pre-order it. Once The Last Watch is published, I will recommend that my library purchase a copy.

Thanks to Tor Books and NetGalley for providing an early copy for me to review.

Exciting, well-paced, space adventure! Pitched as Battlestar Galactica meets the Night's Watch from A Song of Ice and Fire (Game of Thrones), which is accurate in all the best ways. I'll take the liberty of adding: with a captain that gives off major Commander Shepard vibes (Mass Effect). I enjoyed the ride and cannot wait to read more (dangit why did I read an ARC? Now I have to wait even longer for the next book, woe unto me!) As an aside I am jealous of J.S. Dewes' skills with dialogue. Thrilled I got a chance to read this book before it was released! Highly recommend!

Got this one a bit early thanks to the publisher!
Adequin Rake is the kind of character you want to read about. Impossible odds either the drama you’d expect in GoT, this one will have you guessing until the end!

Science Fiction is one of my favorite genres, and J.S. Dewes' debut novel The Last Watch was a compelling adventure in space. The absorbing plot and engaging characters kept me enthralled.

The Sentinels stationed on the Argus are a mixed bag that have some problematic reason for their posting: hacking, disobeying an order, lack of respect for officers, etc. Adequin Rake, the Commander of the Argus, is a Titan--one of the elite soldiers during the last war. Titans are legendary heroes and Quin is one of the best known...so why has she been relegated to the edge of the Divide?

The first chapter begins with a "spread your legs" scene as a new recruit goes through the physical examination of entering his new post. Cav Mercer is relieved that his reason for being banished to the Argus has been redacted; he'd rather no one know his identity and lineage. Brilliant, with a list of advanced degrees, Cav is also a smartass. A failing he needs to overcome if he is going to survive as a new recruit with no military background.

The Last Watch is a smart military space opera with a gripping plot and characters you can't help but root for as they attempt to stave off the collapsing of the universe.

Read in Oct.; blog post scheduled for March 1, 2020.

NetGalley/Tor/Forge
Military Science Fiction, Space Opera April 20. Print length: 480 pages.