Book Review: The Last Senator by Bowen Greenwood

Strong Scifi Action/ Survival Tale With Romantasy Elements. The description of this book (as it exists as I write this review about 6 weeks or so after publication) says that this book is a cross between Tom Clancy and Independence Day, and that's really a pretty fair assessment. There is a lot of alien fighting, including one sequence that is a direct homage to an Independence Day sequence, and there is quite a bit of military techno-rabble that Clancy's fans (or Dale Brown's fans) will instantly be familiar with.

But there is a lot more going on here too, including a "Christian" version of a typical romantasy "love triangle" (impossible when all three individuals involved are of a sexuality such that they are attracted to exactly one sex and both sexes are among the three people) that I personally am most familiar with from Tracy Banghart's Rebel Wing trilogy. (Wow, talk about a deep dive - I read those books roughly a decade ago!) And yes, with the large emphasis on the exploits of pilots and flying, there is even more rough similarities to that trilogy.

For those that are leery of anything remotely Christian or Christian-adjacent... this won't do anything to alleviate those concerns, let's just say. The Christianity professed here wants to come across as sincere, yet really comes across as just as performative as those who choose to loudly pray over every meal, even in a crowded restaurant. Such as at least a few instances of "this person thought about cursing" rather than just dropping even a "shit!", much less anything worse, and the aforementioned "love triangle" getting damn near into 90s era "Christian romance" levels at times.

The romance and Christianity displayed here will absolutely work for some readers - and hey, truly, those readers are far too often far too underserved, particularly in tales like this, so the existence of this book for that market is truly awesome, and I hope that market embraces this book as much as they did the Left Behind series (which featured a similar-ish approach).

With all of that noted though, the above are really just annoyances at best for most readers, particularly given how strong the actual tale as a whole is. This is a survival tale with nearly as much realism as an alien scifi tale can get, particularly in its land chases through the wilderness with unknown aliens hot on the trail and in its tense, War of the Worlds level portrayal of actual alien attacks. The stakes are always high, and get ratcheted even higher at a solid pace, to the tune that the final sequences become almost reminiscent of Mass Effect 3's opening sequence, particularly where the Normandy finally shows up at the end of it.

Like that opening sequence of ME3 - and like Jeremy Robinson's UNITY, also about a sudden alien invasion - this is a story that ultimately begs for more. This tale is strong, engaging, and sets it world up clearly while telling a complete tale in and of itself... that leaves the reader damn near begging for at least one more book to see where things go from here. Which is exactly what you want if you are an author who planned this to be Book 1 of a series... and still an awesome experience if you are a reader never knowing if that follow up will actually be written.

Very much recommended.

This review of The Last Senator by Bowen Greenwood was originally written on June 26, 2026.