The Consuming Fire

This was reasonably entertaining, but it did feel rather like the characters were just pieces being moved around a chess board, not real personalities acting out of their own motivations and constrained by their own knowledge.

It starts out very slow, with a largely irrelevant personal history of a church official, and then segueing into . . . a committee meeting. However, it does gain momentum pretty steadily, and by the end I wanted to know what was going to happen next, and found some of the revelations really intriguing/cool/satisfying.

Unfortunately the resolution involves a plot device verging on deus ex machina, which drained a little energy from what was otherwise a Crowning Moment of Awesome. Still, it was a fun ride.

There is something about John Scalzi's writing and characters. I've read so many of his books now and he writes science fiction in a way that just keeps you hooked. I am a big fan of The Interdependency series so far. This book continues on the store and mythology in a way that I could not put it down.

The idea of flow shoals and memory rooms and the habitats that this space-faring society lives in are really fun to think about, but what makes this story stand out are the characters and the interactions. I don't think I saw the end of this book coming though I knew something was going to happen.

I like where this series is going and can't wait for Scalzi to finish it up or hopefully he will keep it going for a long while like with Old Man's War.

Overall: An enjoyable read with some interesting ideas, let down by a couple of annoying characters - yet still a big improvement on Book 1.

Book 1 managed to just scrape into ★★★”Liked it” territory...just. The two big problems were:
1. Some really annoying main characters (Lagos and Nohamapetan).
2. Being utterly predictable. The “Surprises” were preceded by flashing neon signs.

Book 2 had some pretty neat twists, I did not forsee the trip to Dalasýsla, or that the Rupture was artificial. and some proper SF “idea” moments, meeting the Dalasýslans and having chats with Chenevert was pretty cool. Watching Cardenia learn the ropes was good, but I really would have loved a lot more time with her as she grew in her role.

On the downside Ms Nohamapetan continues to twirl her metaphorical evil mustache and Lagos continues to bore me senseless with her endless use of the F word and minimal character development.

So a huge improvement from book 1, but it could have been so much better.

I had a good think about why I am enjoying this series so much. Part of it is the space opera/political intrigue which is entirely my cuppa. The other part I think has to do with the fact that while the characters at first seem a little simple without too much development of the course of fairly plot-heavy books, they can be divided into essentially two camps: characters motivated by doing good for others and characters motivated by doing good for themselves. The interesting thing is that this places people from both camps on the protagonist/antagonist teams. And that's a big edge towards keeping this series from being overly simple.

If you liked The Collapsing Empire, it's definitely work continuing, and I'll most likely finish the series up after a break for my book club.

This is a direct continuation of [b:The Collapsing Empire 30078567 The Collapsing Empire (The Interdependency, #1) John Scalzi https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1464097677l/30078567.SY75.jpg 50498420]. Read it first. The overall story is quite good so far.TCF doesn't end on a cliffhanger as the immediate problems are resolved, but it does set the stage for the final book in the series. (Scalzi says it will be a trilogy, and he tends to do what he says.)Some new characters make their appearance in this book, but many characters from the first book also reappear in this one. These include the Emperox Grayland II (aka, Cardenia Wu), Lord Marce the flow physicist, and (my favorite) the very profane and totally badass Kiva Lagos. The antagonists are mostly related to or allied with the powerful Nohamapetan mercantile family. Things get very tense and some seriously dirty deeds are done (but not dirt cheap (my apologies to the AC/DC rock band)). As the plot twists and turns, we learn a lot about the history of the Interdependencey (quite painlessly, not as a data dump). We get a bit of romance too (quite well done) and some humor (hey, it's Scalzi after all). And finally, as Kiva Lagos puts it, “The Best Party Ever” near the end of the book is not to be missed.(If a lot of the above makes no sense to you ... well, you haven't read the first book yet.)I listened to the audio version. Wil Wheaton's narration is very good.Good book. Scalzi is a skillful writer. Solid four stars.

Executive Summary: Another fun book by Mr. Scalzi, although I wish it had been a bit longer.

Audiobook: Once again, John Scalzi and Wil Wheaton make a perfect fit. John Scalzi books are always full of snark, and Wil Wheaton is great at delivering it. He also does a few voices along the way that makes this a definite audio choice for me.

Full Review
I found the start of this book a little slow. I'm bad at names, so maybe I missed the significance later in the book, but I don't really get the point of the prologue. Once the story got back to the main characters of the first book however, I found it really enjoyable.

This series is the kind of character-driven space opera that I enjoy the most. There is just enough science there to make things interesting, but really it's all about the people and politics from a scientific crisis than about the science behind it.

Kiva continues to be my favorite character that Mr. Scalzi has written to date. Her chapters were again the ones I enjoyed the most in this book. She's still not a person that I'd probably get along with, but one I certainly find entertaining to read about.

I think Cardenia is now a close second. She's really coming into her own in this book. I really look forward to seeing where things go next. I don't want to get into specifics but people will continue to underestimate her at their own peril.

I liked Marce a lot more in this book than the previous one. His storyline was not at all what I was expecting and led to some very interesting developments that I wish were explored more in this book.

I always enjoy John Scalzi books, and this series so far has been one of my favorites. I am a bit concerned at how short this book was and how much their seems to be to wrap this series up in only one more book. He really expanded the plot a lot in this book. While this set things up nicely for the next book, I have concerns there will be a lot of loose ends to tie up.

Overall, another fun book in this series, and I'm eagerly looking forward to the next one.

Scalzi, ya did it again! 👏🏻 This is the second book in a trilogy, and I'm not sure I've ever seen a second book with such a satisfying ending. I definitely want to read on, but it's great to feel like each book in this trilogy is a complete experience, there are character arcs and reveals and kick ass denouements. There's a fair amount of politics and some hand wavy science but it's told from such a grounded view (Kiva's POV in particular is a TREASURE, Marce's a close second), that I never feel like I'm slogging though court intrigue or hard sci fi tech speak. There are some deliciously unlikeable characters alongside the badass and endearing ones, but that really just adds spice. Cannot wait to see how it all wraps up. On to the next!