War Dogs (War Dogs #1) by Greg Bear

Science Fiction

From Goodreads:

AN EPIC INTERSTELLAR TALE OF WAR FROM A MASTER OF SCIENCE FICTION.

One more tour on the red.

Maybe my last.

They made their presence on Earth known thirteen years ago.

Providing technology and scientific insights far beyond what mankind was capable of. They became indispensable advisors and promised even more gifts that we just couldn't pass up. We called them Gurus.

It took them a while to drop the other shoe. You can see why, looking back.

It was a very big shoe, completely slathered in crap.

They had been hounded by mortal enemies from sun to sun, planet to planet, and were now stretched thin -- and they needed our help.

And so our first bill came due. Skyrines like me were volunteered to pay the price. As always.

These enemies were already inside our solar system and were moving to establish a beachhead, but not on Earth.

On Mars.

Look for the unexpected in War Dogs.  Bear takes some familiar themes and really turns them around.  There are the aliens (The Gurus) who show up first and seem helpful.  Then there are the aliens  (The Antags) that show up on Mars. The Gurus recruit humans to fight the Antags on Mars..  Sound familiar but it gets all turned around when something new is discovered.

War Dogs is the first book in a new series and most of it is devoted to back story and world building.  Told from the first person view of  Master Sergeant Michael Venn, a Skyrinen, after he  made it back from Mars.  His story moves back and forth from the present on Earth to the past on Mars. 

At times I found the story very slow going.  What kept me reading were the unusual things that kept happening.  It was hard to tell where the story was going.  That did not change. Don’t expect to understand everything by the end of the book.  Do expect to be left hanging and in the dark.  Even so if you are a big SciFi fan I think you will enjoy this Military Science Fiction story full of plot twists and turns.

Sky Dogs is an interesting start to a new series.  I am waiting for the next book Killing Titan to see if at least some of my questions are answered.

Orbit published War Dogs by Greg Bear in 2014.