The Deaths of Tao

This felt much more pulpy than than first in the series (which was already a fair bit pulpy). The character development was virtually non-existent, and the main conceit doesn't really make sense of you think about it for more than a minute (if the main goal of the aliens is to accelerate human development, why did it take them millions of years to invent fire, or the wheel, or even the microchip?). So, although the first book held enough promise to get me to read the second one, I'm not sure I will go further.