Review: Abaddon's Gate

Abaddon's Gate by James S.A. Corey
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Honestly, the third book in the Expanse series is weaker than the first two. Not bad, just weaker. If you're not interested in reading about how it's weaker then just stop reading here. The rest of this review is just me clarifying my feelings. I'm not mad at it enough to allow this review from turning into a rant, so, if anything, I'll probably just come off as whining.

This book's biggest problem is that it takes too long to get started. This mostly stems from certain characters not having much to do for much of the early parts of the book. They become essential to the plot in the latter half, but just kind of hang out until they're needed. A good example of this is a news crew that joins Holden early in the book. Besides a subplot that involves them, they spend much of the book invisible in the background. I literally forgot they were even there until, late in the book, Holden needs to broadcast something. This is also true for the characters Bull and Anna, who spent much of their time introducing themselves until they're needed. Melba does the same thing but in reverse. She's super important to the beginning but just stands around once she fulfills her part of the plot.

The characters Bull and Anna also didn't really do it for me. Which is saying something since Anna is a redhead. Bull feels generic in a lot of ways and Anna's background is more interesting than herself as a person. Anna does kinda grow on me, but it's a too-little-too-late kind of situation. I even have my problems with Melba since her chief character trait is motivation. But reading her chapters is at least interesting to see things from her point of view. I think my problem is that they don't bring anything new to the table. Not every character has to be a badass, but it helps.

This third book is also more of a sequel to the first one than a continuation of two novels. This is more of a note of how these novels act as a series than anything else. Anyone who keeps up with these reviews will probably see more comments like this as I work my way through them.

With a sluggish start and more sluggish characters, I had problems with getting through this one. It felt more like work, where I was reading it so I could continue with the series. It's not bad, much less a deal-breaker, just lackluster from what I've come to expect. Where everything feels just slightly uninteresting until things devolve into a gunfight. Because, in a world of space travel, we can't seem to just super nuke our problems away.

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Review: Caliban's War

Caliban's War by James S.A. Corey
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I'm going to start with a side tangent. There's a section of the book where it is obvious that one, or both, of the author(s) is venting a social/political opinion. It comes off as uninformed and makes the typical white American mistake of assuming that if poor people were given money that they would become lazy so quickly they would open a quantum singularity. But I'm not pointing it out because I disagree with it, I'm pointing it out because it's obvious when a writer starts ax-grinding. Writers always think they're so clever and think we don't notice when their personal opinions leak onto the page. I doubt any authors are reading this, but I'm here to tell you something important: WE KNOW. It's obvious. Reading the entire library of Heinlein might have made me extra sensitive to this, but 99% of the people who have already read 'Caliban's War' know exactly which chapter I'm talking about.

Using ax-grinding to point out ax-grinding aside, I rather enjoyed this book. If you read and liked the first Expanse novel, 'Leviathan Wakes', you'll be happy to hear it's more of the same. Good pacing, intelligent plot and characters, and remains to its core belief of being a sci-fi adventure story. Its flaws are a little more apparent in this volume, but nothing that subtracts from the overall experience.

Caliban can be enjoyed mostly on its own as much of the story is self-contained. Which, to ax grind a little more, is one hundred percent how book series should be written. It's okay to connect books with related events and characters, but I've waded through so much garbage where literally nothing happens in the entire first novel because it's all set up for the second and/or third. This is especially true in the bane of modern literature, the trilogy. That isn't the case here as much of the novel succeeds of its lone merits. I don't recommend reading Caliban without first reading Wakes, but you can and still enjoy yourself.

Perhaps the biggest problem with Caliban, and perhaps the Expanse series in general, is a lack of logical motivation from the villains. They just seem to be a bunch of mad scientists who do terrible things with science because they're mad. I call it Gargamel Syndrome. We don't know why he's trying to capture the smurfs, only that it doesn't really matter to the story because he never succeeds. There never seems to be an endgame for the Expanse villains beyond avoiding getting caught even though they do things so brazen they're obviously going to get caught. Their motives don't seem to matter because they don't succeed (spoiler?). The book, at the end, even asks why but doesn't seem to care enough to allow an answer. They might be saving it for a later book, but right now it's more of a mild annoyance.

Bottom line, at least for now, is that the Expanse novels are enjoyable. Usually, I require more than that, but I think the books do enough to set its tone so you know what you're in for. Something smart, fun, and can easily recommend. And that's what I'll do here. It's fun while it lasts, but expect to donate it when KonMari comes to your house.

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