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A review by simonmee
Babylon's Ashes by James S.A. Corey
2.0
The Expanse.
Genocide is measured in the tens of billions.
1,300 new worlds are less interesting than the outer ring of our own solar system.
A mysterious alien process of wondrous powers serves as shield plating on a space ship.
"It was like Holden had become an actor and his role was James Holden"
Babylon's Ashes is the sixth book centred around the crew of the Rocinante and its captain James Holden. Holden is the everyman who's everywhere doing everything, be it contractor, warrior, diplomat or documentarian, a black hole of plot devices where his characterisation should be. His primary antagonist is Marcos Inaros, formerly a mass murderer, now a black hole of contrived failures where his characterisation should be. Two black holes, sucking each other off.
Anyway, the good guys win, the bad guys are disposed of via a magic trick, and a political accord is reached where each of the formerly warring sides needs the other. All nice and fine. Just because the plot of this series has not met my expectations is not, in itself, a cause for complaint.
"They'd die on Earth, yes, but keeping the Belt fed wasn't going to be trivial either."
My issue is that, when looking at the series holistically, the books appear driven by a "villain of the week" motif that escalates to bombarding Earth with asteroids. Moons and planets have been devastated; every organisation is a whirling dervish of rivals, subfactions and defectors; and political power is exercised via military action (the "Outer Planets" seem to exist solely through a militarised starbases and spaceships). Humanity has discovered a system connecting it to over a thousand worlds, yet all we seem to read is about how badly these new colonies are going (the series even devoted a book to how awful one planet was). You start ending up in a dark place.
You can argue that there is a grittiness to this series. That going to space is not meant to be simple. That humans will be affected in ways we haven't considered and it's not as easy as Star Trek makes it out to be. I accept that. But The Expanse uses magic when it suits, and it tends to use it in destructive ways. The are teases ofa bright future but delivery is always deferred. Bad actors are forgiven or rewarded. It's a universe that feels like it is collapsing on itself, yet I am not sure what the point is. You can go grim dark, like the Warhammer 40K universe, where there are lessons in the boundless evil. But the authors of The Expanse have characters telling me their universe is not that, as they plot the murder of tens of billions.
I'm finding it harder each time to believe them.
Genocide is measured in the tens of billions.
1,300 new worlds are less interesting than the outer ring of our own solar system.
A mysterious alien process of wondrous powers serves as shield plating on a space ship.
"It was like Holden had become an actor and his role was James Holden"
Babylon's Ashes is the sixth book centred around the crew of the Rocinante and its captain James Holden. Holden is the everyman who's everywhere doing everything, be it contractor, warrior, diplomat or documentarian, a black hole of plot devices where his characterisation should be. His primary antagonist is Marcos Inaros, formerly a mass murderer, now a black hole of contrived failures where his characterisation should be. Two black holes, sucking each other off.
Anyway, the good guys win, the bad guys are disposed of via a magic trick, and a political accord is reached where each of the formerly warring sides needs the other. All nice and fine. Just because the plot of this series has not met my expectations is not, in itself, a cause for complaint.
"They'd die on Earth, yes, but keeping the Belt fed wasn't going to be trivial either."
My issue is that, when looking at the series holistically, the books appear driven by a "villain of the week" motif that escalates to bombarding Earth with asteroids. Moons and planets have been devastated; every organisation is a whirling dervish of rivals, subfactions and defectors; and political power is exercised via military action (the "Outer Planets" seem to exist solely through a militarised starbases and spaceships). Humanity has discovered a system connecting it to over a thousand worlds, yet all we seem to read is about how badly these new colonies are going (the series even devoted a book to how awful one planet was). You start ending up in a dark place.
You can argue that there is a grittiness to this series. That going to space is not meant to be simple. That humans will be affected in ways we haven't considered and it's not as easy as Star Trek makes it out to be. I accept that. But The Expanse uses magic when it suits, and it tends to use it in destructive ways. The are teases ofa bright future but delivery is always deferred. Bad actors are forgiven or rewarded. It's a universe that feels like it is collapsing on itself, yet I am not sure what the point is. You can go grim dark, like the Warhammer 40K universe, where there are lessons in the boundless evil. But the authors of The Expanse have characters telling me their universe is not that, as they plot the murder of tens of billions.
I'm finding it harder each time to believe them.