Leviathan Wakes

My copy of ‘Leviathan Wakes' came as a free addendum to Abraham's ‘The Dragon Path.' When I finished Path, I needed a break from the story building technique's of Abraham's brain, so I set it aside.

What a mistake.

It took me a few tries to get past the initial chapters of the book, which cost it a star. The book starts with a great, tone setting hook, then switches POV immediately to a beat cop on an asteroid. Mwah? Alas, if I had just pushed past this POV switcheroo and moved ahead on my first try, I would have recovered. Miller's story took me a little while to become invested in (Holden's, on the other hand, I was taken with immediately), but I did come around. The book is laid out as an alternating POV (and worldview) between Miller, a beat cop in the Belt, and Holden, captain of a crew from a water hauler. Set in mid future - not tomorrow, but also not at a point where we're roaming free among the stars - ‘Leviathan Wakes' is modern space opera, pure and simple.

Should you read it? Maybe. But only if you are the kind of space opera reader that likes alien phages, cloaked ships, asteroid hurtling, fate of the human race in the balance kind of stories. Otherwise, nah, leave it for the folks that do.