User Profile

...but still a good listen on audiobook. It's like an 8 hour show covering a VERY broad range of very interesting topics relating to the question "what causes a society to collapse?" There's some real bangers in there, and I thought one of the best was "does abusing children lead to a more fragile society?"

The downside is with such a broad range, you don't get a lot of the detail that you get from the show, which typically focuses on one historical narrative rather than a broad question (with the exception of the Blitz or Addendum episodes). And a lot of the things that are detailed are either later topics focused in modernity or topics we've heard a bunch about, like the Greeks, Romans, Huns, etc.

The narration is good, though it's almost the same cadence that he uses in the show when he's quoting someone else, and then when someone is quoted in the audiobook, he -really- throws himself into it.

But, all-in-all, it's like an 8 hour Blitz episode. I enjoyed it, but I'm also a massive DC fanboy.

This one was one of the more interesting entries in the series and it does something a little different: every character sort of goes off to do their own thing, and they all have to deal with what's happening in the solar system at the time. Every character gets POV chapters throughout the book dedicated to them, allowing some insight into characters from the Roci who aren't James Holden, which is nice. Not to say James Holden hasn't grown on me as a character, but his chapters can be a little too "boy scout" for me.

This is another book where the politics of the solar system are a main factor, and in a huge way. Everything revolves around the diaspora of the Roci's crew and how they weather the consequences of what's going on around them, and eventually get back to where they're supposed to be.

This book also sets up another villain in a great way, one I'm familiar with from the show, but you get a better depth of the character and how manipulative he is from Naomi's viewpoint, based on her past. It was a great way to show who the threat was and why, rather than just having information relayed to Holden by other characters through the book.

This book almost reads like the setup for the "next big part" of the series, with a war looming and mysteries yet to be solved. Time to move on to book six and see how it turns out.

At this point, this is one of the better sci-fi series I've ever read. I still haven't found a disappointing entry.

Finally reaching a point in this series where I am reading books I hadn't read yet. Impressed with how each one I like a little more than the one before it, with maybe the exception of book 2, mostly because there are some bangers of lines from Avasarala in that one...but this one probably has my favorite line from her.

This one is basically a frontier space western. A new Sheriff comes to town to go toe-to-toe with the mining company that is trying to stake a claim on a lawless world. I think the book sums itself up well with the line "The frontier doesn't have laws, it has cops."

As a result, the political intrigue that backbones the series becomes a lot more close-up and intense. There's a theme of how thin the line between enemy and ally really is, especially when survival is on the line.

On top of that, the scientists and engineers of the Expanse universe get a lot more screen-time, which scratches the "competency porn" itch that the series sort of teases at sometimes. If you liked it when Andy Weir had his protagonist "science the shit" out of a string of bad situations, you'll like this book.

I am looking forward to getting beyond the books coveted by the show, and I think either the next book or the one after should get me there.