‘Dirge’, the third book (chronologically by story events, if not publication order) of Alan Dean Foster’s Humanx Commonwealth series, pulls back from the personal level of the first two books and opens the saga up to a truly cosmic scale. If the previous books were ‘Close Encounters of the Third Kind’, the third book is ‘Star Wars’.Unlike the previous books, which focus on just one or two characters, ‘Dirge’ uses an interesting story-telling technique where each chapter presents the story as seen through the eyes of a different character. In most cases, the majority of these POV characters don’t even meet each other. I’d have been sceptical if somebody had described this story-telling method to me before I read this book but now that I have, I have to say it works extremely well and adds to the galaxy-spanning feel of the novel. Each event is connected, even if the individuals involved in them aren’t, adding up to a very coherent picture.The stakes are raised as well as the scope and some of the events of this book are truly gut-wrenching. There are two horrific mass-slaughters in that first part of the story leading to a full-on interstellar conflict in the third and final act. None of these events are guilty of glorifying combat; Foster writes them in such a way as to really portray the horror of wide-scale loss of life. I was genuinely moved each time.I was also gladdened by the steps taken in this story by the humans and the insectoid thranx to overcome their mutual xenophobia and begin forging the Commonwealth. I’m a bit of a hippy really and love to see people coming together through their similarities rather than pushing each other away because of their differences.All-in-all, this is a great chapter in this lengthy saga and I loved every minute of it. High recommended to lovers of science fiction/space opera (it strikes a nice balance between the two).Oh, and lest I forget, the cold-blooded AAnn, while not having that much of an overt presence in this volume, are lurking ominously in the background, biding their time until they reveal their sinister schemes… Bum-Bum-BUUUUUUUUUMMM!!!
