Jurjen
(Read this the week it released but forgot to add my review to the rating)
This one was a surprise because it's an incredibly different read to the Expanse. Whereas the Expanse is a thoroughly character driven story with a limited set of POVs in each book, The Mercy of Gods is much more plot driven with a sprawling set of POVs. There's positive and negative aspects to this, but how it lands for you will likely be personal preference as I believe the plot-driven approach to be about as well executed as the character driven approach in the Expanse.
The world and plot captivated me immediately. The story was wonderfully confusing, unique, and strange, which had me turning every page just to see what would happen next. The book asks a great deal of questions, most of which you won't get the answers to, but trying to find the answers together with at least one character, Dafyd, is a very immersive experience.
I appreciated how alien the aliens felt. Not just in what they looked like, but in what they believed, and what grounded those beliefs. It got me thinking that if some sort of alien encounter happened in the real world, I could see these truly fantastical events playing out in this way.
I had 3 minor complaints while reading
1 one character, strangely, has no reaction to another character telling them something bizarre about themselves, and what they're there for; I think the book should have done more with that, which is related to:
2 as I said, the book focuses much less on the characters than what i'm used to from Franck and Abraham (both with the Expanse and Kithamar), resulting in me not feeling as much of an emotional connection than I did to the likes of Holden, Alys, Sammish or Garreth, after reading one book of them.
3 This book felt short. It wasn't necessarily rushed, but I think a lot more could have been done if it had been 200 pages or so longer. I don't think it would have been over-indulgent, nor suffered from pacing issues, if it had.
Loved the book an incredible amount, and I can't wait to read Livesuit in October and the sequel whenever it releases.
(Read this the week it released but forgot to add my review to the rating)
This one was a surprise because it's an incredibly different read to the Expanse. Whereas the Expanse is a thoroughly character driven story with a limited set of POVs in each book, The Mercy of Gods is much more plot driven with a sprawling set of POVs. There's positive and negative aspects to this, but how it lands for you will likely be personal preference as I believe the plot-driven approach to be about as well executed as the character driven approach in the Expanse.
The world and plot captivated me immediately. The story was wonderfully confusing, unique, and strange, which had me turning every page just to see what would happen next. The book asks a great deal of questions, most of which you won't get the answers to, but trying to find the answers together with at least one character, Dafyd, is a very immersive experience.
I appreciated how alien the aliens felt. Not just in what they looked like, but in what they believed, and what grounded those beliefs. It got me thinking that if some sort of alien encounter happened in the real world, I could see these truly fantastical events playing out in this way.
I had 3 minor complaints while reading
1 one character, strangely, has no reaction to another character telling them something bizarre about themselves, and what they're there for; I think the book should have done more with that, which is related to:
2 as I said, the book focuses much less on the characters than what i'm used to from Franck and Abraham (both with the Expanse and Kithamar), resulting in me not feeling as much of an emotional connection than I did to the likes of Holden, Alys, Sammish or Garreth, after reading one book of them.
3 This book felt short. It wasn't necessarily rushed, but I think a lot more could have been done if it had been 200 pages or so longer. I don't think it would have been over-indulgent, nor suffered from pacing issues, if it had.
Loved the book an incredible amount, and I can't wait to read Livesuit in October and the sequel whenever it releases.
