All the Way to the Gallows — David Drake

Widely known for the grim and gritty battlefield realism of his bestselling adventures of Hammer's Slammers, and for other popular novels of military science fiction, David Drake now takes deadly aim at the funnvbone. Meet the goblin paratroopers and learn why a sane goblin would want to jump out of a perfectly good lighter-than-air balloon. Follow the problems of a team of hard-boiled, fearless space cops who have to operate under the niggling restrictions of a politically correct alien supervisor. March into the desert with a troop of rough, tough mercenary elves and humans who have to lose a dangerous magic talisman so that it will stay lost, all while being hectored by that same obnoxiously vocal talisman, which doesn't want to be lost. Enjoy a collaboration by Drake and Larry Niven that is as unlike the "Man-Kzin Wars" universe as it is delightful. And more. And laugh all the way to the gallows.