I'm still not entirely convinced by the form of this story, and I finally know why. For me, the whole concept would have probably worked better as short stories or something similar. I keep expecting the separate lines to run together in the end, but they rarely do, which leaves me a bit confused about what the goal of the books was.

Still, I'm fascinated by the oportunities a long Earth/Mars/universe offers, so I'll have to keep going for the last two books as well.