George R. R. Martin in space, book 5

I love science fiction. I love genre fiction. It is my happy place. This is my ball of wax, my kettle of fish, this is what lights my Bunsen burner. As a series, The Expanse has rapidly become one of my absolutely of all times favorites and, damn, if this wasn’t the best so far.

Set hundreds of years in the future, when humanity has colonized Mars, moons, and space stations and when entire generations have been born, lived, and died in space and evolved physiologically to thrive in low gravity, The Expanse is still (like all good sci-fi) a story about our shared humanity. In this new, tough, amazing world appears an alien substance, one with the power, in the wrong hands, to wipe out mankind. And that’s where this ever-growing series starts.

Our primary protagonist on this journey has been James Holden, ship’s captain and disgraced military man, a man of galaxy-wide renown, hero or villain, could go either way. He’s never met a closely-guarded secret he didn’t think should be broadcast to every corner of the known universe, big believer in transparency even when he might be dead wrong. He’s got a solid crew–ex-Martian navy pilot, Alex Kamal; Earth bruiser and mechanic, Amos Burton; and a Belter XO with a first-class mind, Naomi Nagata. For four books, they’ve solved and exacerbated the galaxy’s biggest problems.

And that about catches us up. This series is so tightly written, the world so expansively built, that I hadn’t realized how little I knew about his crew. I knew I liked them and that I rooted for them, and I knew their personalities, but I didn’t know who they were and then in swept Nemesis Games to show me what I had been missing. This is hands down my favorite book of the series and I still don’t know all that much about Amos. Also I really want a Chrisjen Avasarala in my life but I also want the spine it would take to have a Chrisjen Avasarala in my life, that woman is hands down one of my favorite characters created across any medium.

I don’t want to spoil anything and I’ve already written too much but just please, y’all, join me in spreading the gospel of James S. A. Corey. These books are too damn good for words.