Thursday 24 October 2013

Abaddon's Gate by James S.A.Corey


The objective side of me liked several aspects of Abaddon's Gate: it was a continuation of the main "super powerful aliens" storyline of the Expanse series, it had many fast adrenaline-filled moments, it was logically sound, and it was very quotable. Plus, it reached a good point in the overall arc of the series. 

But the subjective side of me missed Bobbie and Avasarala. I could not see any reason for completely omitting the two best characters of the Expanse series in the book 3. And I didn't manage to bond as well with the new characters, with the exception of Bull.

In particular, I found Melba's story to be uninteresting. Usually I am a great fan of redemption arcs, but somehow Melba's journey felt predictable and contrived form the start, and because of that her chapters felt tedious to me. I kept thinking: "I know where this is going". 

And even overall, I found Abaddon's gate to be predictable. As soon as the purpose of the Ring was established and the new characters were in place, I guessed the ending in good detail. This can be a plus or a minus for different readers. I usually find predictability to be a minus. 

I give Abaddon's Gate 3 stars out of 5. This is still the series I love, but the book 3 felt like going over the hill after the book 2. I hope for better things in the book 4.


4 comments:

  1. i haven't read this yet. So skipping the review. But I'm sad to hear you didn't like it as much as the others

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    1. I tried not to be spoilery. Generally, these are open reviews, I will try to steer clear of spoilers.

      My main "beef" is non-spoilery - NO BOBBIE OR AVASARALA in this book. ;(

      BTW, you do know there are 3 more books to come,, right?

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  2. WHAT? WHAAAAAAAAAAT? I didn't know any of that!

    Are you sure? Cos I thought it was just a trilogy? Please don't get my hopes up and then there's nothing

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    1. I am positively positive. Wiki lists 3 more books and 5 novellas. The twitter James.S.A.Corey said something about sending a new novel to editors just the other day.

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