Cibola Burn
I love this series so much. I'm so glad it got turned into a TV series and was brought to my attention, or I may never have heard of it.
In the fourth installment, the protomolecule has opened the doors to thousands of empty, terraformed worlds. The aliens were also carbon-based, oxygen-breathing beings, so all of the worlds they created are able to sustain human life. More or less. The critters there aren't exactly edible and it's taking some work to figure out how to grow edible food in foreign soil (with all its foreign bacteria), but the vacuum of space is being held at bay and that's a big thing.
With all these worlds to explore, two groups of humans naturally decide to fight over the first one they come to. Because no matter how far we go, we take ourselves with us. The refugees just want a place to call home. The scientists want to study the biosphere before it becomes contaminated. The corporations want to get their hands on the huge lithium deposits. And Holden gets thrown in the middle of it all to try and broker some peace.
This book is a departure from the rest of the series in that the new characters are hard to empathize with. At least at first. Havelock is a chameleon-like security officer, willingly following the lead of whoever he happens to be working under. And at least he's honest about it, but his boss this time is a piece of work. Elvi is scientist with whom I identified so hard it hurt. She's bad at public-speaking, believes in science above all else, and compartmentalizes to a fault. And then there's Basia. His son died and he's holding on to the rest of his family so tight he's losing them, but all he can do is hold on tighter.
By the end of the book I loved them all. Because this series is essentially optimistic the same way Bujold's Vorkosigan series is optimistic. Characters die, often in surprising ways, but not the ones you really care about. And you find yourself caring so much about these characters who prove themselves to be essentially decent people. As things get trickier (the political ramifications of these new planets are so far-reaching) and more dangerous (where the hell did all these aliens go, anyway?), all you can do is hope that honor will win the day. And it's still not entirely clear that it will in the end. Holden may by aware of the fact that he's a quixotic figure, but that doesn't make the comparison less apt.
In the fourth installment, the protomolecule has opened the doors to thousands of empty, terraformed worlds. The aliens were also carbon-based, oxygen-breathing beings, so all of the worlds they created are able to sustain human life. More or less. The critters there aren't exactly edible and it's taking some work to figure out how to grow edible food in foreign soil (with all its foreign bacteria), but the vacuum of space is being held at bay and that's a big thing.
With all these worlds to explore, two groups of humans naturally decide to fight over the first one they come to. Because no matter how far we go, we take ourselves with us. The refugees just want a place to call home. The scientists want to study the biosphere before it becomes contaminated. The corporations want to get their hands on the huge lithium deposits. And Holden gets thrown in the middle of it all to try and broker some peace.
This book is a departure from the rest of the series in that the new characters are hard to empathize with. At least at first. Havelock is a chameleon-like security officer, willingly following the lead of whoever he happens to be working under. And at least he's honest about it, but his boss this time is a piece of work. Elvi is scientist with whom I identified so hard it hurt. She's bad at public-speaking, believes in science above all else, and compartmentalizes to a fault. And then there's Basia. His son died and he's holding on to the rest of his family so tight he's losing them, but all he can do is hold on tighter.
By the end of the book I loved them all. Because this series is essentially optimistic the same way Bujold's Vorkosigan series is optimistic. Characters die, often in surprising ways, but not the ones you really care about. And you find yourself caring so much about these characters who prove themselves to be essentially decent people. As things get trickier (the political ramifications of these new planets are so far-reaching) and more dangerous (where the hell did all these aliens go, anyway?), all you can do is hope that honor will win the day. And it's still not entirely clear that it will in the end. Holden may by aware of the fact that he's a quixotic figure, but that doesn't make the comparison less apt.
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