Reviews

The Consuming Fire by John Scalzi

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eesh25's review against another edition

4.0

When I think about it, The Collapsing Empire could have been a standalone novel if it wanted to be. You can see a direction for the story at the end of the book. The Emperox finally knew about the collapse of the flow, she was still alive, Nadashe had gotten arrested... except this book didn't go in the direction one might have thought, which kinda justified why this needed to be a series. Because it not only continues the plot but delves more into the concept of the Flow and the history of the Interdependency.

The book takes place soon after the last. Nothing's been resolved because the Emperox saying the flow is collapsing doesn't mean anyone believes her. Also, it turns out the rich and powerful don't give a fuck about the fate of the world (shocker, I know). And Nadashe may be in prison, but her fucking mother's arrived.

The plot of the book, in the beginning, is just to get the general public and other major Houses to take the problem seriously. Which, of course, they don't. It makes a nice parallel to climate change in the real world.

The Flow issue is what Cardenia and Marce are working on. Kiva is just trying to keep things running smoothly and fucking with the Nohamapetans, and I love her for it. Kiva is my favourite character in this series and the one whose survival I care about the most. Though I'd like Marce to survive as well. Cardenia... I really like her, but I think her death would be interesting and I kinda want it to happen.

So anyway, after the initial plot, there are several new findings that I won't be revealing. Let's just say they're unexpected and intriguing, and they give the book more significance.

The thing that's missing from the book is everything related to End. There's nothing about End here. There are no POVs and, because the flow shoal from there collapsed, no word. It was weird having no clue what was going on there. I'm hoping that Vrenna has whipped Ghreni into shape, but we just don't know. Though it does serve to amp you up for the third book.

Overall, this was a solid installment. The ending was epic, the pace was good but slower than the last, the plot and further world-building were great, I still like the characters—though we're missing a few from End—and I'm excited to see how the story will conclude.