I hated the first book in this series so much, I just read the first three chapters before throwing it aside, laughing my ass off at such rubbish. I thought it was a piece of shit and I still do. However, I had bought both books at the same time, because both had awesome reviews, so I decided to give this one a try. And this one is better. But not good enough to save it from the trash heap.

In this book, you have a planet where there seems to be a revolution. Who’s behind it? No one knows, but the government in place is determined to stop it. So far, it’s in rural areas, so highly armed and armored troops are sent out to kill and capture some of these rebels, some of whom are rumored to have special powers. And, boy, do they. They’re virtually impossible to kill, can withstand nearly anything shot at them, use supernatural weapons against the troops, slaughter them wholesale, and to cap it off, tah dah, THEY’RE SPACE ZOMBIES! I’m not kidding. It turns into a military sci fi horror novel. I like some horror. Edward Lee is probably my favorite horror novelist. However, I don’t like the two genres mixed. And this creepy, we can talk to you and get you to join us in death and everything will be so fucking great plotting just irritated the hell out of me. So, I read about half the book this time before stopping. Now, don’t get me wrong; Hamilton can be a decent writer at times. In fact, I just finished a rare stand-alone book of his that I thought was quite good, but this series blows. And from what I understand, there are actually more books in a giant overall super-series. Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong. I hope I am. Two stars for originality, but not recommended. ( )

lame, and lazy too. also he still can't write. well, it is pulp, garish and empty. and i admit, i've been reading a lot of the new hard-science space opera stuff, Asher and Reynolds and MacLeod, which really puts this kind of throwback potboiler to shame. two more to hand, so i'll read them, but i probably won't bother to pick up the two last entries in this series. ( )

It is still hard to review this book. Even though a complete book has been finished, the story has only been started and Peter Hamilton makes no motions in the direction of self-containment of this story.

It continued to be interesting and fast paced though it occasionally lapsed into blow by blow battles that I had a hard time keeping track of (someone with a more tactically-oriented mind might find them a lot of fun to read). ( )

(Alistair) Well, I've now finished both parts of the first book-pair of the Night's Dawn trilogy-of-duologies (first part here), and I'm still not sure entirely what I think of it. Nifty as the background is, it appears I'm still not entirely sure what to make of an SF universe in which The Dead Come Back From Hell, or at the very least, a void that's pretty damn hellish for those trapped in it.

(I am, however, strongly considering breaking my usual mostly-rule about the inviolability of my reading-list order and moving the remaining book-pairs in this series, the twinned volumes of The Neutronium Alchemist and The Naked God up next to each other, since this ends in a much better place than the first one did, substantiating my chopped-in-half-without-much-care theory. And it sure would make my reading pleasure more of one.)

As you can tell from the Dead Coming Back, up above, it's pretty clearly "soft" SF/space opera. Not that that's a bad thing. And it certainly does handle the plot-fu well enough to keep one reading, although I am starting to be a little bit concerned - says the Wheel of Time reader - that he's spinning off so many characters and plot subthreads that many of them are going to go astray over the next two/four books.

We'll see. I continue to read.

( http://weblog.siliconcerebrate.com/cerebrate/2009/04/the_reality_dysfunction_exp... ) ( )

About the only thing keeping me from recommending this whole-heartedly is it’s length. Otherwise, it’s fine space opera.

(Full review at my blog) ( )