If wars began with rage, they ended with exhaustion.

For the first half of the book I struggled with the purpose of Babylon's Ashes. The frenetic pace of Nemesis Games or crushing perils of Ilus in Cibola Burn were obvious. The story was present and the dangers were known.

When you play at our level, grudges cost lives.

Babylon's Ashes felt like a chess match with slow methodological moves but no flourish or excitement. And yet, this deliberately slow pace was a conscience and welcomed change.

If every book in The Expanse was go-go-go and full of action it would be exhausting and have no opportunity to develop the story in a meaningful way. I am grateful that the authors felt confident in their plan to adjust the pace and build to a single climax instead of having many peaks throughout.

I mean, weird, dead alien technology with effects we don't understand sweeping whole ships away without leaving a trace or explanation. That's probably safe to play with, right?

I trusted that the purpose of the story would be revealed and as I got closer to the finish the plan (or what James Holden was cobbling together) would be worthwhile payoff. Without requiring spoilers I appreciated how the climax came and went. Like the rest of the book before it the final chapters didn't deviate from the pace and stuck to the formula.

"Here we are still doing all the same things we did before. We've got a bigger battleground. Some of the sides have shifted around. But it's all the crap we've been doing since that first guy sharpened a rock."

Babylon's Ashes addresses the questions I have raised in past reviews: how can humanity keep repeating the same mistakes and if so, is humanity fundamentally flawed and destined for doom regardless of the stage. Both sides of conflict believe that their answer is best to resolve conflict now and for future generations. Uniting the sides forever instead of being in repetitive battles...and enforcing peace with violence seems ironic but at least both sides agree on this being the next step to take.

He had been her sworn enemy. He had been the symbol of her failure. He'd even become a symbol, somehow, of the life she could have had if she'd made difference choices.

The multitude of POV characters was fantastic but this impacted the rhythm. I couldn't expect where the story would go next as the cadence would be thrown off by a one off character from the ring or someone else that I didn't identify as having relevance to the story.

And that character I brushed off before would have relevance and be mentioned in later chapters and because I didn't absorb their details I felt lost in what I was reading and missed some payoff of item that was advancing the plot.

This has been compounded a bit as the next book in the series features names of characters I may have overlooked initially.

I have killed, but I am not a killer because a killer is a monster, and monsters aren't afraid.

I may have been reluctant at first but this was an excellent story and it did as much to propel the plot forward as it did to explore the psyche of those locked in racist and geopolitical struggles. Be prepared for the pace to be slightly different but it still delivers a knockout punch and is the peaceful exhale after the chaotic book (Nemesis Games) before it.

And because I ended up highlighting too many passages in the book here is everything else I found noteworthy:

A decent idea now is way better than a brilliant plan when it's too late.

He put blood on my hands too. He thought it would make me easier to control.

Fought the oppressor before. Still fighting the oppressor now. Followed your heart then. Still following your heart now. The situation changes; that doesn't mean you do.

Under the best conditions, disasters and plagues did that. It wasn't universally true. There would always be hoarders and price gouging, people who closed their doors to refugees and left them freezing and starving. But the impulse to help was there too. To carry a burden together, even if it meant having less for yourself. Humanity had come as far as it had in a haze of war, sickness, violence, and genocide. History was drenched in blood. But it also had cooperation and kindness, generosity, intermarriage. The one didn't come without the other, and Holden had to take comfort in that. The sense that however terrible humanity's failings were, there was still a little more in them worth admiring.

He'd made the classic mistake - he wasn't too proud to admit it - of trying to fight the last war on the next battleground

Maybe, if they could find a way to be gentle, the stars would be better off with them.