Interstellar Service and Discipline: Victorious Star

Victoria Stark is a First Lieutenant in the Imperial Interstellar Service, and a Nav-Pilot who interfaces directly with a sentient ship. She has the reputation of never losing a ship, and is a legend among the ships of the service – however, her commanding officers don’t have the same high opinion about her. She tends to value the ships over the captain, and has embarrassed many a captain by pulling the ship out of a perilous situation – besides which, she refuses to allow any captain her sexual favors.

As our story begins, just such an event has occurred. As usual, Stark has been relieved of duty after winning a battle against great odds because she won the battle after the captain and first officer have abandoned ship. Waiting on a space station for pickup by the Imperial service, Stark is kidnapped by pirate captain Ravnos to serve as Nav-Pilot on his ship the Hellsbreath, and is pressed into service in treasonous contravention of her oath as an officer in the Imperial service. She also finds herself caught in a dominance struggle/sexual ménage à trois with Ravnos and his executive officer, Seht.

This book kind of reminded me of the British Navy of the 18th and 19th centuries. The uniforms are elaborate, and the officers are sadistic. Hawke really pushes a lot of buttons in this story. She manages to combine a very good, complexly plotted science fiction story, with a scorching erotic bisexual BDSM ménage. Warning: This book is not for the faint of heart – it is very intense and violent on many different levels. I have to admit that the sexual violence portrayed in this novel disturbed me. But I also – somewhat against my will -- found it very exciting. The scenes include male/female/male sex, male/male sex, oral and anal sex, bondage, spanking, slavery ... the list goes on and on. It’s a fairly long story (300+ pages), but it was so riveting that I finished it in one day – it was that hard to put down. I have to consider this one of my Recommended Reads for this month.

Reviewed by: Jean