Cibola Burn (Corey)

Cibola Burn
by James S. A. Corey (2014)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

I read this nearly a month ago, or at least it seems that way. Once again, I watched the show first which might've made this book go by a little faster. That said, there were enough differences between them.

For starters, most of the book takes place on and above the planet Ilus or New Terra, depending upon who's talking. Any of the shows subplots that take place in the Sol system are absent here. There is also some rewriting of settlers.

Belters and Outer Planets people (such as refugees from Ganymede) managed to get through the Ring and settled on an inhospitable planet that has a lot of lithium, which they are mining to sell to hire lawyers to stake their claim to "Ilus". They've already been there for a while when a UN/Mars backed team of scientists, backed by corporate interests, come in to claim the planet. Some of the Belters already there decide to blow up a landing pad (which they built for the UN group) to prevent them from landing. Unfortuantely, it's too late and the shuttle is already descending. The shuttle takes damage so it can't lift back up into space. It crashes, killing many people, including the new Governor. This basically leaves Murtry, the head of corporate security, which is basically running the ship, in charge on the planet.

Conflict ensues. James Holden and his crew are sent to mediate. Unfortunately, he brought Miller along (along with a piece of the protomolecule on his ship), and the planet starts to wake up. There's an explosion on the far side of the planet which causes high winds and a tsunami. Everyone makes it into one of the ancient structures, and everyone, for the moment, helps each other.

This all falls apart as everyone but Holden starts going blind, and they discover slugs that are deadly to touch. Miller appears to tell Holden that they need to shut the entire planet off. Murtry wants to protect his company's interests, even if it kills him. The original pioneers didn't last long, but they opened the frontiers for everyone else. Basically, he's nuts.

Miller realizes that there's stuff on the planet that he can't see, so it must belong to whatever killed the beings that made the protomolecule, so he can use that to shut down the planet.

When the book's over we discover that there's a problem with Mars. Now that there are new words to be explored, there's no reason to live underground on Mars while it takes a century to terraform.

I'll give it a few months and then I'll request the next book. I've already started the series, and I imagine that some of the stuff from this season of The Expanse will happen in the next book.

Abaddon's Gate (Corey)

Abaddon's Gate by James S. A. Corey (2013)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

As previously noted: I watched the first season of The Expanse when it first aired on Syfy. I have to admit, I was somewhat lost and couldn't follow a lot of lost was going on. I couldn't even understand some of what was being said. Had I thought about it, I might've deleted the timer I had set for the series. However, I forgot to, so it taped the second season, which I watched and enjoyed more. I can now confirm that the third season aired on Syfy before it moved to Amazon, as I remember these episodes.

Comparing the book to the show: the first season of the show did not cover the entire first book. However, it did include characters from the second book, in particular, every character on Earth. The first half of the second season, which I recently rewatched, introduces a couple of Book Two characters in the first episode, setting them up for later, or repurposing them. The person whom I would call the "main" new character of Book Two, Prax, doesn't appear until halfway through the season when Ganymede is attacked (or about to be). Somehow they managed to finish book three by the end of season three. However, since most of it took place while everyone was trapped in one location, it sped things up. They also combined or repurposed existing characters so new ones didn't have to be introduced.

The book opens with the gate already out there in deep space and everyone keeping an eye on it, where it had been for about a year. In the show, it launches from Venus in the middle of season three.

A slingshotter, someone in a ship that slingshots around plantary bodies without crashing or crushing themselves, decides to make a name for himself by slingshotting through the ring. He dies in the attempt because the ring stops his ship, slowing it down to its own speed limit. The gate, now activated, draws even more interest.

Meanwhile, the daughter of Jules Mao decides to seek revenge against James Holden and the crew of the Rocinante. She's had her body augmented so she can kill easily, but needs to rest afterward. With a new identity, she boards a ship heading toward the gate working as a maintenance crew member. (She mostly supervises others' work but she took a crash course in it.)

The Roci crew, meanwhile, has a problem where the ship is locked down because the Martian government is suing to get it back. A documenatry crew shows up to hire the ship to go to the gate and promises that it can use its news connections to get the lockdown order lifted. This happens and Holden and crew are heading where Mao wants them. Added to this, a member of the crew is a saboteur who will allow Mao computer access so that she can fire the Roci's weapons at another ship, making Holden a villain. The ship's communications are also compromised with a spoofed Holden delivering an ultimatum and claiming ownership of the ring.

Miller starts making appearances. He only shows up when Holden is alone and only briefly. This is explained that the protomolecule is talking to him from Venus and it has to trip a lot of switches in Holden's brain for this to happen. It's more difficult if more are present. Miller warns him about doors and corners and rushing in blind.

When everything goes bad, and there's no safe harbor, Holden orders Alex to take the ship into the ring, but slow it down. Ships moving below the speed limit can proceed. Faster ships are halted and drift to the center.

Other ships follow, including the OPA's ship Behemoth, which is the Nauvoo repurposed. It turns out that the Nauvoo was never intended to accelerate forever to create gravity. Rather it has a drum in the center that could spin to provide gravity. However, within the solar system, that isn't necessary, so the ship is used top-down, and what should have been the ground is now a really thick wall. The fact that it can spin will become important will everything goes wrong again later on.

Holden comes to believe that Julie Mao is somehow manipulating him through the protomolecule, not knowing that it's her living sister. He ends up going to the station in the center of the spherical space within the ringspace. The Miller construct tries to help him fix whatever's wrong. Miller also wants answers to what happened to the race that created the protomolecule two billion years ago, and why are all the other exits closed?

Before they can get answers, Martians capture Holden. In the process, one fires off a weapon that the ring decides is bad. The speed limit is suddenly reduced dramatically. This causes a lot of death and injuries on all the ships. Worse, without a fix, none of the ships would survive the months-long voyage out to regular space.

There's a fight for control of the Behemoth to prevent in some setting in motion the destruction of the solar system by the ring, and everything works out. And Miller has plans for Holden.

The story is left wide open for the next book without it being any kind of cliffhanger.

This is the part of the show that I remember the most -- probably because that's when I was finally getting into it and understanding the characters. It seems funny that after spending so much time on each of the first two books that they managed to finish this one in so few episodes without leaving too much out. They hit all the major points that they had to. It's possible that they knew that they weren't being renewed so they needed to finish it, ending with Miller's promise that there's more out there. When the producers found out that Amazon was picking up the series, I couldn't say.

I enjoyed this book. I ordered the next, but barely started it before it was due back because of other book club readings. But I'll get back to it.

I do wish I'd written this sooner because Show "Expanse" is intermingling with book "Expanse", particularly with the minor bits.

Caliban's Way (Corey)

Caliban's Way by James S. A. Corey (2011)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

As previously noted: I watched the first season of The Expanse when it first aired on Syfy. I have to admit, I was somewhat lost and couldn't follow a lot of lost was going on. I couldn't even understand some of what was being said. Had I thought about it, I might've deleted the timer I had set for the series. However, I forgot to, so it taped the second season, which I watched and enjoyed more. I think a third season aired on Syfy before it moved to Amazon.

Comparing the book to the show: the first season of the show did not cover the entire first book. However, it did include characters from the second book, in particular, every character on Earth. The first half of the second season, which I recently rewatched, introduces a couple of Book Two characters in the first episode, setting them up for later, or repurposing them. The person whom I would call the "main" new character of Book Two, Prax, doesn't appear until halfway through the season when Ganymede is attacked (or about to be).

In Book Two, Prax is more the driving force, in my opinion, than Martian Gunnery Sergeant Draper, who is an important character, but more supporting the action than driving it. Having the Russian reverend be a former colleague of the UN Secretary General helped the narrative and allowed the character to be added early and given sufficient backstory for when she's needed in Book Three (which, thanks to the time off from this blog, I have already read).

In Book Two, the crew of the Rocinante is running missions for Fred Johnson for a year or so after the events of Book One. Miller, the dead detective, starts appearing to Holden whenever he's alone, warning about "door and corners" and clearing the room instead of blundering in. Meanwhile, on Ganymede, the largest food plant/greenhouses beyond the Belt, a child is kidnapped by her doctor and a strange woman posing as her mother. Her father Prax is an engineer. There's an attack on Ganymede by an protomolecule engineered soldier. Earth and Mars fight. Satellite mirrors crash. The greenhouse is destroyed. The ecosystem is spiraling into chaos and won't be salvageable.

The Roci crew is trying to bring aid. Prax hires them to find his daughter, who he discovers was kidnapped from the daycare center. His daughter has a genetic condition because of the astronomy of the situation (radiation, etc.), which makes her one of the better candidates to receive the protomolecule, which is still being researched. Meanwhile, stuff is happening on Venus, and the two sets of alien tech are talking to each other.

Cutting to the chase, it was a satisfying read, using some of the threads left from the first book, and adding more that may show up again later. It was worth the wait to get it from the library, but the size of the book put me off pace to finish my book club selection!

Leviathan Wakes (Corey)

Leviathan Wakes by James S. A. Corey (2011)

(Not a review, just some notes to help me remember the things I've read. But written this way because it's the Internet, and some people will stumble across this page.)

I watched the first season of The Expanse when it first aired on Syfy. I have to admit, I was somewhat lost and couldn't follow a lot of lost was going on. I couldn't even understand some of what was being said. Had I thought about it, I might've deleted the timer I had set for the series. However, I forgot to, so it taped the second season, which I watched and enjoyed more. I think a third season aired on Syfy before it moved to Amazon.

I considered suggesting the first book recently for my book club. I rejected the idea for two reasons: first, since it's been around for a decade, anyone with an interest might've already read it. Second, the length of it -- if I didn't like it, I'd have to slog through 400+ pages before our next chat.

Still, I reserved it from the library. Even after all this time, there is a wait list for the book. Reading it on my own would allow me to bail if I didn't like it.

That was not a problen in the slightest. Yes, the length bothered me -- when is this going to end? But the book moved. It just didn't move by the time my loan was up, so I had to shut the wifi off on my ipad and finish half the book in about three days.

I didn't remember much about the first season of the show, other than the ship and some parts on Earth with Shohreh Aghdashloo. Yes, I just looked up her name, but I remembered her from 24 at the time the show first aired. Oddly, her role is NOT in the book. In fact, none of the book takes place on Earth at all. Earth is only referenced, and we hear reports from there.

In fact, the entire thing, after the prologue with Julie Mao, is told through the perspective of either Holden, the Rocinante captain, or Miller, the Belter cop. It even switches perspective when the two of them are together. Also in the book, Holden's crew, Naomi, Alex, Amos and Shed, don't have a problem with him. He was the XO of the Cant and now he's the captain and Naomi is the XO. Furthermore, he relies on Naomi for a lot. (TV Holden isn't trusted immediately despite having been on the ship for a long time. He's got nowhere else to go.)

Julie is a rich girl who defied her parents and joined the OPA (Outer Planets Alliance, i think). She's on the Scopuli when it's hijacked by terrorists. A fake distress call brings the Canterbury to the rescue. They send a shuttle and a crew of five to check it out. They realize it's a trap. A ship using Martian stealth tech ignores them and destroys the Canterbury. The shuttle is then rescued by the Martian ship Donnager, which is then attacked and destroyed. But not before Holden and his crew get off in a Martian attack shuttle.

Someone is trying to start a war to cover their own tracks, and Julie Mao is in the middle of it.

Miller was given the case to find Mao and drag her home. He discoveres that she isn't on Ceres. He's told to let it go but he can't. He falls in love with Mao from reading her files and her emails.

Space adventures, of the hard sci-fi variety, ensue. The entire story happens "out there" between the Belt and Saturn. It's discovered that the Earth should have been destroyed two billion years ago by a biological weapon that accidentally was caught up in Saturn's gravity well on its way to Earth. The race that created it were already gods then. Scientists here (the ones without morals) want to be able to duplicate the programming of the virus so that the human race could be on equal footing and make our way out into the galaxy.

Saner heads prevail. Mostly.

I enjoyed this and started rewatching the series on Amazon. I immediately noticed differences in the narrative, so which just moved the story along and some that didn't seem to have a point. I assume that the Earth sequences are to set up characters for later books in later seasons. I have the second book on reserve. Hell, at this rate, I should probably put the third book on reserve as well. Or maybe when I'm done with that, I can get the next Sue Grafton book. I think I'm up to T.