Tiamat's Wrath

Don't be a whiny little cunt, Avarasala said in his imagination. Hope in one hand and shit in the other. See which one fills up first. Get to work.

For the first time in The Expanse novel series, James Holden is not a primary viewpoint character. It is probably for the best because as a VIP prisoner -- as a dancing bear, as he puts it -- to mankind's new god emperor, High Consul Duarte, Holden doesn't have much of a chance to affect happenings. A reactive protagonist is not a likable one and it is better he's left on the side for a bit. His viewpoint does shortly appear in the interludes though.

Holden's crew is working as part of a resistance that was formed against Laconia's rule, as I suspected might happen. The resistance turns out unexpectedly effective against the much more powerful opponent. It's maybe not quite a deus ex machina -- there was bound to be an explanation why Laconia's battle cruisers can shrug off nuclear missiles -- but it was still awfully convenient that the resistance got their hands on that tech and were able to use it against the ships.

Like Persepolis Rising previously, was Tiamat's Wrath an entertaining read. Especially after two Mika Waltari's books, James Corey's prose felt effortless to enjoy. I saw some things coming before they happened but there were surprises too.

I read some older thread on r/theexpanse where the poster was complaining about repetitive expressions. I have noticed that and even in this novel there are things like someone 'patting the air' a few times. But I'd say it's not frequent enough to be annoying.

The only thing I found kind of weakly written in Tiamat's Wrath was Teresa Duarte, Winston Duarte's daughter, who's one of the viewpoint characters. I didn't get the impression of a 14-year-old; she seemed younger than that. Was it intentional or was that kind of not-self too difficult to write? Not that I was an expert on how a 14 years old girl thinks.

In addition to the struggle against Laconia, the other big thing are the mysterious dark gods who destroyed the gate builders. Duarte wants to get more information about them in a rather aggressive manner and the novel's title ends up being claimed in full when the entities retaliate.

Since the next, still unnamed novel will be the final one, people are taking their guesses on how the series will end. One possibility is total annihilation but I think that would be dumb. Nine books only to end in a "What did we learn today, kids? Don't anger the dark gods." doesn't seem likely. The gate nexus getting destroyed is a possibility but severing the galaxy's planetary systems and going back to where everything started feels lame.

I'd end the series in some manner of armistice between humans and the dark gods. A total understanding of the entities shouldn't be reached though -- better leave at least something open ended and filled in by the reader's imagination. And how would you even explain something that is clearly on a whole another level of existence compared to humankind.