James S. A. Corey

This was the most political of all the books. It was also the most battle-heavy. Unlike most fans of the genre, I'm generally not a big fan of sci-fi space battles. The nuts and bolts bore me. Love the stories, not fond of the pew-pew. However, I dutifully read the scenes, looking forward to the outcomes.

The end game of the war was a bit contrived, but I was okay with that. This is the sixth book into the series, and it has been excellent to this point, so I'm willing to say, show more “Seriously?” and move on. I should have known. Tropes and more tropes. At least the authors showed their work, and according to the Internet, they did a good job. I have no idea, as I am fully disabled when it comes to (breaking?) the laws of physics in space, even when it's explained to me like I'm five.

The politics of the book and the relationships between the three major human settled systems remain a highlight of the series. “All politics is personal.” popped into my head more than once. It's pulled into view many times during the upheavals of the book. Tribalism, long simmering hatreds, generational trauma, physical deprivation, financial tyranny, and, of course, the threat of annihilation. War is personal. It's never limited to soldiers, no matter how many times those in charge want to talk about precision attacks. It will always destroy a civilian population in addition to the warriors.

The warriors are beloved by someone who wants them to come home and will mourn them when they are gone. Children, spouses, mothers, and fathers are often forgotten in stories of fighting and war. Honoring them later is a poor substitute for loving them alive. The idea of “They chose this. They knew the risk.” is cruel and flimsy. But, that is obvious. Holden sees it too clearly so many times. He does not make a good politician.

Ashes seemed (to me, anyway) to be a natural ending point for the whole series, even with some bigger questions still floating in zero-gravity. But, I know it isn't. My curiosity is peaked, and I look forward to continuing. show less

I read this book after seeing the first two seasons of the tv show, so that was a bit of an oddity that influenced my whole way of experiencing the text; I kept imagining the tv actors performing the dialogue. Honestly, that kind of worked to my advantage, because I think at the beginning, especially, it's hard to get a sense of the main characters as people. The book just kind of makes them nice folks who get along. On the other hand, it's especially obvious which one of them is not going show more to actually become a main character, whereas on tv, I found the same moment really startling.

It's interesting how the show and the books are paced so differently. The events of Leviathan Wakes actually correspond to the first season of the show, plus the first few episodes of season two. In the show, the finale of the first season seems like a climax; in the book it's another point of escalation in the middle, even though it's basically the same events. The tv show adds a main character who's not in the novel (apparently she'll appear in book two), and since she's in politics, this gives a wider context to the adventures of our heroes; however, I was surprised that the book is still able to communicate this context, but maybe I shouldn't have been, since of course a novel can fill in those kind of details in a lot of ways. The politics viewpoint character in the show is on Earth, though, while the book gives us much more of a feeling for how the Belters feel about things, and why they do what they do.

The most striking difference, though, is speed. The show, for all the fact that it's harder sf than 90% of the sf on tv, gives the impression these spaceships get around the solar system at a pretty brisk clip, in a couple of hours when something's on the line. But in the novel, it's all we've got to get there as fast as we can... that'll take a few days. It's different, and I see why tv can't do that, but I like it a lot, it makes the universe feel lived in and real and distant and lonely. show less

I read this book very fast (~1 week) so clearly, I enjoyed this book. I liked how the characters of Holden and Miller played off of each other with Holden being the idealist who thinks there is good in everyone and thus deserves transparency to make the best decision vs Miller who is cynical (his character is the classic detective trope) and thinks that people will make decisions in their own best interests at the expense of the public good. Yet both are good people in their way. I also show more appreciated Amos' character as someone who almost seems aethical (as in not ethical - not unethical - but simply no moral compass). The only ethics he has is loyalty to his crew: He is an interesting character study. I look forward to reading book two - Caliban's War.

I like this rating system by ashleytylerjohn of LibraryThing (https://www.librarything.com/profile/ashleytylerjohn) that I have also adopted:
(Note: 5 stars = rare and amazing, 4 = quite good book, 3 = a decent read, 2 = disappointing, 1 = awful, just awful.) show less

The series is hitting its stride, here, and cementing the strengths and weaknesses relative to the tv adaptation. On tv we get to watch the characters come to life and space-ships shooting around planets and at each other. In the books, we get strong plots and one of the chief joys of science fiction - people explaining stuff to each other without needing one person to act a bit dumb or for people to snarl and shout and sneer at each other to inject drama into a scene because you don't have show more enough faith in the actors, characters, setting and story to be interesting without interpersonal conflit. Hat-tip to Gene Rodenberry. There's a lot more nuance in the books, and space for characters, pots and concepts to kind of stretch a bit. Some interesting creative choices here - making one of the POV characters a Minister with a commitment to saving people is a counterpoint to all the violence and agression. Good fun, looking forward to going back to this universe... almost straight away! show less