Terminal Alliance, by Jim C. Hines

I enjoy Jim C. Hines' writing, so when spotting the first entry in a new series at the bookstore I grabbed it. A couple of centuries in the future the human race has become feral zombies, but compassionate aliens save as many as they can, using their advanced tech to bring them back to civilized beings and take them to the stars. Our heroes are saved humans now serving as janitors on an interstellar warship. Their jobs saved them from a bioweapon that wiped out the rest of the crew—they were wearing futuristic HazMat suits—and they proceed to uncover a conspiracy that would drastically change the balance of power in the galaxy... and it isn't clear if that is a bad thing.

The setup follows the same basic notes as The Expanse: underdogs band together and take control of an advanced warship while fighting a conspiracy on multiple fronts. Terminal Alliance, however, largely replaces space opera dramatics with humor, to great effect. The beginning of each chapter has a bit of history from the aliens POV about humans, largely about trying to understand our pre-feral history. One of my favorite bits was a passage about reconstructing literature:

• "Reviewed complete works of Dr. Seuss. These books are not, as first assumed, a guide to obscure Earth creatures. I suspect Seuss lied about being a doctor. Conclusion: total gibberish, completely untranslatable.
• Have reviewed the history and causes of Earth conflicts through the ages. Recommendation: do not translate or republish human religious texts.
• Works tagged 'fantasy' should be ignored. Based on early estimations of restored human intellectual capacity, these stores would only confuse them."

Another funny excerpt discussed our menu: "Humans' eating habits are, from an objective scientific perspective, disgusting. ... Some of the preferred meals we've reconstructed from their cookbooks and other literature include:

• The organs of an animal called a sheep, prepared and cooked within the stomach of the same creature.
• Tuna eyeballs.
• 100-year-old eggs. It's a wonder this species didn't go extinct sooner.
• Pufferfish. The toxins of this fish were highly deadly to humans. I originally assumed this meal was used as a means of suicide or execution, but in fact, humans ate this for pleasure. The risk of death was part of the appeal.
• Something called a Fried Twinkie. A slower method for humans to kill themselves."

Good story, snarky characters, and a compelling universe makes this a fast, fun read.

First Sentence:

"Marion Adamopoulos."