TS Ransdell's The Last Marine: Book Three

You know guys, not much that I read honestly scares me. I mean, I've read more nightmare images of combat than I care to count. And the depiction of nightmare creatures like vampires and zombies is something I've enjoyed over and over again. Still and all, no dragon, no demon, no fireball casting wizard, no flesh eating zombie or crazed alien hits as hard as this TS Ransdell's The Last Marine: Book Three. This is the kind of book that will keep me awake at night. 

See, the thing about The Last Marine, both as a series in general and when dealing with the third book in particular, is that it's exceedingly possible. This is a story of the American government turning on the American people. It is a story of a so-called "liberal" government that forces its agenda down the throats of the people it supposedly serves. It is the story of  a population that believes what it is told and that everything its government is doing is for the greater good. In book three, the government has seized majority control of the narrative both online and on television in the form of the Office of Balanced Media. 

This is a story of government run amok. It is the story of patriotism being branded as extremism, former and retired members of the military being branded as security threats and children taken from the homes of parents who believe in freedom. It is, in short, the story of what the United States turns into if the extreme left gets their way.

What makes Book Three (and please allow me to voice my wish that the books had more creative titles, but that's all there is.) different from the first two is they were based heavily on recollections and flashback. The primary subject of those books was the Sino-American War (which obviously hasn't happened in the real world) and the way the American government turned its back on its own veterans. They were horrifying and indicative of a particular worldview (which I happen to share, for what it's worth.) but removed in a way from the concerns of the average American. Not so, Book Three.

Book Three is a story that takes place in rural Arizona. Many of the main characters are, themselves, veterans, but most of the side characters are not. The effects on the man in the street are obvious. So are the effects on their children and spouses. In the world of The Last Marine no American goes unaffected. Most suffer. Some profit, especially those with government connections. At the end of the day though, freedom suffers.

Ransdell's Amazon bio states that he has an MA in History. I believe it. I wonder if, and how closely, he has studied Erich Fromm's Escape From Freedom. I would guess that he's studied it quite closely, given how closely The Last Marine follows Fromm's thesis: That true freedom comes from freedom to (freedom to speak one's mind, own a gun, conduct one's business with a minimum of government interference) as opposed to freedom from (freedom from hunger, from medical bills, from offensive speech, from global warming, from exploitation by the rich, etc.)

There's more to the book than just the politics of course. The characters in The Last Marine are all easily believable and that just makes it more haunting. Whether it was a corrupt government official, a non-corrupt government official who turns a blind-eye to what's going on around them because they believe the party line, the military veteran who can see it for what it is and refuses to get up, or just some common person who is swept up in the insanity around them, it was easy to get into the mind frame and come to grips with the point of view of the character I was reading. 

The action sequences are well written and exciting. Ransdell is a veteran of both Desert Shield and Desert Storm. I was unable to determine whether or not he ever saw actual combat but, based on the way his action scenes read and how easily things go wrong for the aggressor, I wouldn't be surprised if he had. Either way, things moved quickly and held my attention well. Ransdell is a bit graphic at times, but it's combat and it needs to be graphic. This is not a Berenstain Bears book, it is the tale of a war.

Just in case I haven't made it obvious enough (and Lord knows I've tried.) Ransdell's worldbuilding is amazingly well done. The United States he has constructed feels like it exists. The characters live and breathe, but so does the setting. Ransdell placed the vast majority of Book 3 in rural Arizona. This makes sense as his bio indicates that he's from Arizona, so he knows the place well, but it's more than just getting the details right. The Last Marine is a truly immersive experience. I've never been to Arizona, but I almost feel like I've driven those streets and eaten in those homes. 

The rise of FedAPS, the Federal Agency of Public Safety is, in many ways, reflective of the rise of the SS in Nazi Germany. Scarily, it's also not that far off from the creation of the Department of Homeland Security in the United States that actually exists. The majority of people in pretty much any time and place will accept the creation of a government entity if they believe that it is meant to protect them from a threat. What that threat looks like changes based on time and place, but the basic drive does not. Mission creep (the Office of Balanced Media is part of FedAPS, as is CSS, the national department of Child Safety Services) is something that exists in the United States now and has since...

Well...

Uhh...

I'm honestly not sure when it started, but we've got it now and it's been around a lot longer than I have. 

Anyway, it's a concept that has a place in any realistic depiction of the US government, and realism is what makes this series so creepy. 

Ransdell has not released any information about whether or not there is another book coming, but there better be. The fight is just getting started. There is a long way to go and it looks like the rebellion is just getting started, assuming FedAPS doesn't snuff it out. And, while it's small enough that the rebellion could fail, I don't think Ransdell would do that to his series or his fans. I'm waiting for the next book (im)patiently. We'll see where he takes it from here.

Bottom Line: 5.0 out of 5 Head of Stolen Cattle

The Last Marine: Book Three
TS Ransdell
Self-Published, 2022

The Last Marine: Book Three is available for purchase at the following link. If you click the link and purchase literally anything from Amazon, I get a small percentage at no additional cost to you.