Asgard’s Heart
Brian Stableford
Five Star, Feb 2005, $25.95, 316 pages, ISBN: 1594142106
reviewed by Harriet Klausner

Asgard is a gigantic artificially-made world consisting of many different levels, each area containing habitats with its own ecosystems. The Scarid from the thirty levels invaded Skychain city but the alien Tetrax put an end to the war by infecting the humanoids with influenza. Mike Rousseau, who made contact with the Nine, a machine intelligence, fights to get his way to the center of Asgard. War between two different life forms continues and at the moment of contact with the Nine, Mike hears a desperate cry for help.

Whoever connected with him also inserted something in his brain so when the time came, he would have a weapon that would even the odds. Rousseau, Susarma Lear of Star Force, a Tetrax and a manifestation of the Nine travel down the levels to the center fighting monsters that are materializations of the real enemy as they go. The enemy has shut the lights in Asgard; Rousseau must put them back on again otherwise all of Asgard will perish. While he is wrestling with this dilemma he must figure out how to use the weapon that his alien gave to him if he wants to defeat the enemy once and for all.

This is the third and last book in the Asgard trilogy and it ties up all the loose ends and answers all the questions that weren’t addressed in the previous two books. Rousseau doesn’t wish to be a hero but fate places him in that role and he rises to the challenges. ASGARD’S HEART is non-stop action that would make a terrific movie featuring one of the bravest and original heroes to ever grace the pages of a science fiction novel.