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A review by thekingcrusoe
Disquiet Gods by Christopher Ruocchio
5.0
I think this will be the Sun Eater book I have the most complicated relationship with at least until the next installment comes out sometime mid-2025 (or so). This is for a small number of reasons, but mostly comes down to how insane of a book it is compared even to its predecessors, which were themselves already pretty crazy at times, and how it's structured to some degree as well. My friends and I have this aversion to the phrase "batshit insane" for reasons I shall not disclose here, but I seriously have no better way of putting how this book went, and how its reveals felt, than actual batshit insanity.
But first I want to back up a smidge.
Anybody who has read (or is reading) the series has access to this book RIGHT NOW. You can buy it directly from Baen Books's website - the eARC that is. (Side-note: this eARC purchase actually provides a higher payout for Ruocchio than even a hardcover purchase does, so I recommend it if you're a fan.) That is how I am reviewing this book now, a little over 2 months before its official release.
Now we cut to my experience with the book: as I said before, it was absolute insanity, and I don't even know where to begin reviewing this book. TL;DR: it's a freaking doozy.
I mentioned in my review of Ashes of Man (it may have been the video review on YouTube, it may have been the written one on here, I don't remember) that it seemed quite clear that that book was the end of the 2nd Arc of Sun Eater as a series. Disquiet Gods confirms this by unequivocally being merely part 1 of this final arc (and we'll touch on this later in the review too).
If you are a fan of Howling Dark and Demon in White, this book is for you. Given that those two are the most popular answers for #1 of the series...this means liking this is practically a no-brainer. Much of the plot of Disquiet Gods reflects and ties in with what came in that early arc of the series (notably HD), most especially in the back half. It is awesome, and it actually confirmed a lot of my suspicions for the ultimate goal of this book just based on foreshadowing I picked up from my reread of Howling Dark in the middle of 2023. That was super cool.
The rest of the plot however, in the first half...well, let's just say it continues all of the really crazy and/or cool cosmic shit that's been slowly being laid from the beginning, but which really started happening in the middle of Demon in White, the climax of Kingdoms of Death, and as a background "character" of sorts in Ashes of Man. Disquiet Gods continues all of that, and Ruocchio therein cranks the dial all the up to 11 - 12 even - too. It is absolutely bonkers where this book goes at times (the end of the first act is one of those sequences; the 50-60% mark is another), and I have such huge respect for Ruocchio for what he managed to achieve and accomplish here, especially as somebody who has gone on record as a straight-up hater of math. The cosmic material in Disquiet Gods, and the scope of the book - the series in general as a result - is unfathomably epic and hard to put to words. I find myself scrabbling for SOME way to say it without just spoiling everything, but to do so feels genuinely impossible. The fact that this has been done at all is a monument to fiction writing as an entire medium. Chapter 40 happened to be a chapter that gave Ruocchio trouble for up to 2 months, and it becomes very obvious why that was the case when you read it.
Structurally, Disquiet Gods most resembles that of Demon in White as well - again, something that fans of this series are probably going to love to hear. Not only is Disquiet Gods practically equal in length to Demon in White, it has the exact same feel of being 3 distinct acts within a larger whole. Though this is not my personal favorite thing (I preferred, say, the pacing and structure of Howling Dark to that of Demon in White's - a lot of why I still rank HD higher than its sequel), I am still happy to say that Disquiet Gods reads INSANELY quickly. I took a month to read Demon in White. I read this in barely more than 2 weeks. Obviously, I read very slowly, but even I plowed through this, and WANTED to get through it that quickly where I normally want to pace myself a bit with Ruocchio's writing and style.
Act 1 of Disquiet Gods is absolute GAS; Act 2 is the perfect balance of pensive and forward-moving (compared to Act 2 of DiW which I admit felt a little slow at times); Act 3 is a satisfying conclusion to a lot of stuff foreshadowed previously in the series even though I found my personal spatial reasoning during the climax rather difficult to grapple with for some reason. Every single act contains more than its fair share of hilariously crazy stuff though, and I frequently found myself cackling at the sheer audacity of Ruocchio to do what he's done here. Oh, and to add to all the praise here, DG has easily the strongest opener of the series too.
The only thing I found myself to be broadly "worried" about with DG as I neared its conclusion was just the fact that the material of the first 40% (though I suppose even upwards of 66% is appropriate to say) of the book broadly was left just "unresolved" in some sense as the book went into the final act that it needed to have. This lack of a resolution for this one major aspect of the story is, of course, intentional, because that material is meant to be explored deeper and finished later, in Book 7. This is what I talked about earlier of DG feeling like just Part 1 of this final act. Never did I ever feel like any of the other mainline novels in the series were "incomplete" or like they were just PART of a greater whole left incomplete (no, not even KoD and AoM felt this way to me, even though they WERE originally being written as one and split in the middle of the process, with material added to account for the split in the wake of that move). DG is the closest the series comes to this “incompleteness” as a result of this finale being so big, so bombastic, so insanely huge in scope that it cannot be done in one binding.
Rest assured, however, that Ruocchio does still give this a satisfying ending - this is no supposed "Dust of Dreams" or "The Veiled Throne" where there is no proper climax and resolution because the book's been literally split into two bindings. Additionally, my one major concern with DG - that this "unresolved" thread would remain that way - was also fixed in the very last chapter. Ruocchio does set the reminder that that threat exists and is the next goal now that DG's climax has achieved what it was set out to achieve. This made me forgive whatever problem I had with the structure of the book, and has left me mostly just mad Book 7 isn't the book coming out in 2 months instead. I want it right now basically.
But I said at the top that this might be the book in the series I have the most complicated relationship with...why is that? Well, most of it is what I've already talked about in one way or another. But I also want to say that this one is going to be a doozy to proofread/do another copy edit pass on for the Diamond Edition on my re-read in a couple years. This will definitely be the most time-consuming one for sure.
With all of that being said...I THINK I've finished saying what I primarily wanted to say here. As a final note, however, I would like to say that those of you worried this book will kill you as a reader the way the last two books did basically need not worry! I will not clarify what I mean by "basically" in this context :)
Finally, I would like to add that if you haven't read the following short stories and/or novellas yet, you will absolutely get a lot more out of this book if you do so before picking this up:
- The Lesser Devil (the first of the side-novellas)
- Kill the King (in Tales of the Sun Eater, Volume 2)
- The Dregs of Empire (the third of the side-novellas, tho a novel in its own right)
- Mother of Monsters (in Tales of the Sun Eater, Volume 3)
- The Royal Game (in Grimdark Magazine, Issue #34)
- Daughter of Swords (in Tales of the Sun Eater, Volume 3)
To be fair, I recommend you read all of the side-stuff as a general rule, cuz its all great, but these especially before DG.
Anyway. This review was tough to write, and it might still be riddled with holes of things I did forget to bring up, but it's complete enough that I will leave it as is for now. I will do a video review of Disquiet Gods on YouTube on March 26th, 1 week before the officially-slated release.
But first I want to back up a smidge.
Anybody who has read (or is reading) the series has access to this book RIGHT NOW. You can buy it directly from Baen Books's website - the eARC that is. (Side-note: this eARC purchase actually provides a higher payout for Ruocchio than even a hardcover purchase does, so I recommend it if you're a fan.) That is how I am reviewing this book now, a little over 2 months before its official release.
Now we cut to my experience with the book: as I said before, it was absolute insanity, and I don't even know where to begin reviewing this book. TL;DR: it's a freaking doozy.
I mentioned in my review of Ashes of Man (it may have been the video review on YouTube, it may have been the written one on here, I don't remember) that it seemed quite clear that that book was the end of the 2nd Arc of Sun Eater as a series. Disquiet Gods confirms this by unequivocally being merely part 1 of this final arc (and we'll touch on this later in the review too).
If you are a fan of Howling Dark and Demon in White, this book is for you. Given that those two are the most popular answers for #1 of the series...this means liking this is practically a no-brainer. Much of the plot of Disquiet Gods reflects and ties in with what came in that early arc of the series (notably HD), most especially in the back half. It is awesome, and it actually confirmed a lot of my suspicions for the ultimate goal of this book just based on foreshadowing I picked up from my reread of Howling Dark in the middle of 2023. That was super cool.
The rest of the plot however, in the first half...well, let's just say it continues all of the really crazy and/or cool cosmic shit that's been slowly being laid from the beginning, but which really started happening in the middle of Demon in White, the climax of Kingdoms of Death, and as a background "character" of sorts in Ashes of Man. Disquiet Gods continues all of that, and Ruocchio therein cranks the dial all the up to 11 - 12 even - too. It is absolutely bonkers where this book goes at times (the end of the first act is one of those sequences; the 50-60% mark is another), and I have such huge respect for Ruocchio for what he managed to achieve and accomplish here, especially as somebody who has gone on record as a straight-up hater of math. The cosmic material in Disquiet Gods, and the scope of the book - the series in general as a result - is unfathomably epic and hard to put to words. I find myself scrabbling for SOME way to say it without just spoiling everything, but to do so feels genuinely impossible. The fact that this has been done at all is a monument to fiction writing as an entire medium. Chapter 40 happened to be a chapter that gave Ruocchio trouble for up to 2 months, and it becomes very obvious why that was the case when you read it.
Structurally, Disquiet Gods most resembles that of Demon in White as well - again, something that fans of this series are probably going to love to hear. Not only is Disquiet Gods practically equal in length to Demon in White, it has the exact same feel of being 3 distinct acts within a larger whole. Though this is not my personal favorite thing (I preferred, say, the pacing and structure of Howling Dark to that of Demon in White's - a lot of why I still rank HD higher than its sequel), I am still happy to say that Disquiet Gods reads INSANELY quickly. I took a month to read Demon in White. I read this in barely more than 2 weeks. Obviously, I read very slowly, but even I plowed through this, and WANTED to get through it that quickly where I normally want to pace myself a bit with Ruocchio's writing and style.
Act 1 of Disquiet Gods is absolute GAS; Act 2 is the perfect balance of pensive and forward-moving (compared to Act 2 of DiW which I admit felt a little slow at times); Act 3 is a satisfying conclusion to a lot of stuff foreshadowed previously in the series even though I found my personal spatial reasoning during the climax rather difficult to grapple with for some reason. Every single act contains more than its fair share of hilariously crazy stuff though, and I frequently found myself cackling at the sheer audacity of Ruocchio to do what he's done here. Oh, and to add to all the praise here, DG has easily the strongest opener of the series too.
The only thing I found myself to be broadly "worried" about with DG as I neared its conclusion was just the fact that the material of the first 40% (though I suppose even upwards of 66% is appropriate to say) of the book broadly was left just "unresolved" in some sense as the book went into the final act that it needed to have. This lack of a resolution for this one major aspect of the story is, of course, intentional, because that material is meant to be explored deeper and finished later, in Book 7. This is what I talked about earlier of DG feeling like just Part 1 of this final act. Never did I ever feel like any of the other mainline novels in the series were "incomplete" or like they were just PART of a greater whole left incomplete (no, not even KoD and AoM felt this way to me, even though they WERE originally being written as one and split in the middle of the process, with material added to account for the split in the wake of that move). DG is the closest the series comes to this “incompleteness” as a result of this finale being so big, so bombastic, so insanely huge in scope that it cannot be done in one binding.
Rest assured, however, that Ruocchio does still give this a satisfying ending - this is no supposed "Dust of Dreams" or "The Veiled Throne" where there is no proper climax and resolution because the book's been literally split into two bindings. Additionally, my one major concern with DG - that this "unresolved" thread would remain that way - was also fixed in the very last chapter. Ruocchio does set the reminder that that threat exists and is the next goal now that DG's climax has achieved what it was set out to achieve. This made me forgive whatever problem I had with the structure of the book, and has left me mostly just mad Book 7 isn't the book coming out in 2 months instead. I want it right now basically.
But I said at the top that this might be the book in the series I have the most complicated relationship with...why is that? Well, most of it is what I've already talked about in one way or another. But I also want to say that this one is going to be a doozy to proofread/do another copy edit pass on for the Diamond Edition on my re-read in a couple years. This will definitely be the most time-consuming one for sure.
With all of that being said...I THINK I've finished saying what I primarily wanted to say here. As a final note, however, I would like to say that those of you worried this book will kill you as a reader the way the last two books did basically need not worry! I will not clarify what I mean by "basically" in this context :)
Finally, I would like to add that if you haven't read the following short stories and/or novellas yet, you will absolutely get a lot more out of this book if you do so before picking this up:
- The Lesser Devil (the first of the side-novellas)
- Kill the King (in Tales of the Sun Eater, Volume 2)
- The Dregs of Empire (the third of the side-novellas, tho a novel in its own right)
- Mother of Monsters (in Tales of the Sun Eater, Volume 3)
- The Royal Game (in Grimdark Magazine, Issue #34)
- Daughter of Swords (in Tales of the Sun Eater, Volume 3)
To be fair, I recommend you read all of the side-stuff as a general rule, cuz its all great, but these especially before DG.
Anyway. This review was tough to write, and it might still be riddled with holes of things I did forget to bring up, but it's complete enough that I will leave it as is for now. I will do a video review of Disquiet Gods on YouTube on March 26th, 1 week before the officially-slated release.