Everything I said about Dauntless applies to Fearless, as Geary leads his fleet deeper in Syndicate space before returning home. There's more battles, more traps, more honor and cleverness on the part of our hero.

Where this book departs is that it introduces some new characters. Captain Falco is a rescued POW and self-proclaimed hero, with a Douglas MacArthur-esque penchant for trying to bend reality to his ego. Captain Falco provides a useful counterpart to Geary's cautious doubt and honor. Some of the minor commanders move up and display a little initiative. Best of all, Geary starts a relationship with Co-President Rione, a tough and skeptical politician who is afraid that the legendary hero Black Jack might set himself up as king back home, but likes the man John. It's a little hair-pulling, watching nominally mature adults act like kids, but people are believably done.

Of course, as a scifi setting buff, what I really enjoyed was the mystery of the hypernet gates: nobody knows who developed the key FTL technology, and the destruction of a gate could create a supernove that'd wipe out multiple star systems. Was it aliens? Aliens (officially) don't exist. In narrative terms, this is slamming a clip into Chekov's gun and racking the slide. I'm excited to see what happens next.