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vicioussquid 's review for:
The Ferryman
by Justin Cronin
I think this book is a well written take on a concept that I have unfortunately already read to death. It brings to mind the “Pathfinder” series by Orson Scott Card, which I adore. However I did enjoy the other storylines Justin Cronin included, such as the tale of grief and love and loss. I felt like maybe that story could have been better told from the perspective of Elise’s character, since Proctor’s had so much else going on.
One other issue I had, perhaps due to my familiarity with the concept, is that the first 2/3rds of the book are entirely overwritten by the ending. They nearly become pointless exposition. Why did we need to spend so much time with the characters on Prospera and the Annex when in the end their lives and stories were all but irrelevant? This is where I think more development earlier on into the themes of grief and conflict would have benefited. Much of the commentary on class division and climate change isn’t developed until after the big reveal, which kind of makes the first 2 acts of the book feel like a waste of time for me. To bring the comparison back to “Pathfinder”: (spoilers if you haven’t read that series) it would be like if the first book consisted of Ram Odin’s nightmares before he is awoken by the expendable, and then the story actually begins with Rigg and Umbo in the last quarter of the book.
All that being said, I like the book, but it wasn’t groundbreaking or thrilling to me. I sometimes even felt I was being spoonfed class commentary, which has been handled in sci-fi with more tact in the past. Still an engaging story that I enjoyed listening to at work!
One other issue I had, perhaps due to my familiarity with the concept, is that the first 2/3rds of the book are entirely overwritten by the ending. They nearly become pointless exposition. Why did we need to spend so much time with the characters on Prospera and the Annex when in the end their lives and stories were all but irrelevant? This is where I think more development earlier on into the themes of grief and conflict would have benefited. Much of the commentary on class division and climate change isn’t developed until after the big reveal, which kind of makes the first 2 acts of the book feel like a waste of time for me. To bring the comparison back to “Pathfinder”: (spoilers if you haven’t read that series) it would be like if the first book consisted of Ram Odin’s nightmares before he is awoken by the expendable, and then the story actually begins with Rigg and Umbo in the last quarter of the book.
All that being said, I like the book, but it wasn’t groundbreaking or thrilling to me. I sometimes even felt I was being spoonfed class commentary, which has been handled in sci-fi with more tact in the past. Still an engaging story that I enjoyed listening to at work!