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Tress of the Emerald Sea is a great one-shot from Brandon Sanderson, and while it is set in The Cosmere, I don't think you need to consume anything else before picking this up. The narration style is unique and enjoyable, and the humour works perfectly for me and keeps the entire story lighthearted despite some rather serious scenes. It reminds me of Princess Bride, a fairy tale with an amusing back-and-forth from the narrator that keeps things moving and the story from drowning in its own self-importance.

And... while Brandon Sanderson is the magic system author, this novel isn't about the rules of magic and how to manipulate them (although it's there!). It also isn't about hopeless battles against antagonists that seem to have all the odds stacked in their favour (but that's here too!). This is about Tress leaving her home and growing up as she has adventures around the world, making great friends along the way. And I'd like to think that is something we can all identify with.

Highly recommended.

Children of Dune is a tough read, and at times it feels like it's just dragging on with random metaphors and meaningless statements, but at the end is a tremendous climax with page after page of revelations and action. It's a worthy read, but I think I'm going to need to take a break for a simpler novel after this.

At the heart of Children of Dune lies a complex set of interwoven plans that the various cast enact upon each other, and like game theory, the cast predict the moves of each other and devise counterplans that also get countered, with so many layers that the plans and outcomes need to be directly explained to the reader. I typically despise Telling instead of Showing, but even being lead to the solution, I struggle to understand why things are unfolding the way they are. This leads to the best parts of the novel: characters that are meant to be post/superhuman truly are. They think and act beyond a layperson's predictions, and to pull that off as a human author, I applaud Frank Herbert and his imagination.

On the other hand, the dense plot is not helped by equally dense scenes. Characters speak in riddles and metaphors, resulting in conversations that require multiple reads before you tease out all the meaning. This means that there are large chunks of the book that flew over my head, and I'm not personally looking for a novel that's an intellectual challenge like a textbook teaching me new subject matter.

All that said, Children of Dune is a worthy successor to the original Dune. I enjoyed it and recommend it. Now I need a vacation.

Within the safety of spoiler tags... the novel is also a bit of a retread of Dune except without the military element. We ultimately get an Atreides vs Harkonnen battle, though the latter through Alia and the former through many, many elements of the family retainers. House Corrino is around as before, inserting themselves but really a secondary element and they get played pretty well. Finally, the children once more outshine the parents...

Also, I'm not sure how Frank Herbert managed a novel that is almost entirely combat by conversation.

But we're onto the Golden Path and Leto II is doing what Paul was afraid to do, so I suppose by design, Dune 3 has to be a retread of Dune 1. I'm excited to see what happens in the fourth novel, and though I know a lot by absorbing elements around the internet, I'm sure there are plenty of surprises in store.

I think it's widely accepted that Dune Messiah isn't the sequel most wanted, and I concur. Dune was split into 3 parts chronicling the rise of Paul Atreides and this novel is really Part 4, rather than its own self-contained story. From that perspective, Dune Messiah is the victory lap that wraps up many of the themes that Dune set into action, and on those merits, the novel is a success and probably deserving of 4 stars.

But... Frank Herbert released this as a standalone novel, and it does not stand alone. The novel is half the length but the cast of characters is nearly as large as Dune, which means that many characters are nothing more than names. Some should be considered critical antagonists and yet they get one or two scenes at most. The arc of the novel is stunted as well, since the conspiracy that faces Paul has none of the clever foreshadowing and plots-within-plots that marked the glorious Harkonnen vs Atreides feud. Instead, it unfolds with us as bystanders, rather than secret conspirators the way we were told of Yueh's treachery, and the novel suffers for it.

Dune Messiah is required reading for the Dune series, but unfortunately, it'll feel like a speed bump compared to its predecessor. Do your best to read this immediately following the conclusion of Dune, and you'll be much happier for it.

Honestly I think the biggest weakness of this novel was focusing so much on Duncan Idaho, given the low page count, when he was given comparatively little screen time in the previous novel. Frank Herbert should have spent as much time fleshing out the conspirators as he did on Duncan and the genetic memories of the Gholas. I know in the future books these are critical events, but this novel was about Paul vs the Face Dancer, and that got maybe 20% of the focus.

Victorious is the conclusion of the Lost Fleet series, and as a climax, it slightly underperforms. To be honest, I'm doing it a disservice. Victorious is consistent with the quality of the last three novels, delivering a great deal of clever action, easy-to-love protagonists, and plenty of plot advancement (something missing earlier in the series). From this perspective, fans will not be disappointed and there is no drop in quality.

However, this is the conclusion of five previous novels and that means I expect build up to a fantastic climax. Yet the same weakness that's been present throughout the series weakens Victorious: a lack of foreshadowing before major action scenes. As a reader, you just don't know enough for there to be suspense, as all narration is from Geary's highly competent viewpoint. Surprises are just challenges to be overcome for our main character, but that means the reader never experiences tension.

Victorious has many clever elements, expansion of the setting, and the fleet combat was actually some of the best throughout the series, but ultimately it didn't feel like a satisfying conclusion. It's just more of the same, and that's not enough for a finale.

Recommended with reservations.

Within spoiler tags, I think others will argue that the aliens had been foreshadowed. That's not my complaint: the issue is that fleet battles never grow tense, and you're never really concerned for the survival of the Alliance fleet. This is hugely impacted by Geary's highly competent narration; always looking at setbacks as mere challenges to be overcome. But this is also due to the structure of the story: we enter the Syndic home system, and then we are told what the problems are, at which point Geary is a few pages away from solving it all. Rinse and repeat for the Alien battle. Rinse and repeat for his experience with the Alliance Grand Council.

I think other viewpoints need to be introduced, so that you can see plans shape to defeat Geary. Some of the plans have been exceptionally clever -- the Syndic home system was fantastic and the Alliance Grand Council is the true enigma. Other viewpoints would be confident in Geary's death, which allows the reader to worry. After all, Geary is not that worried for himself.

And finally... it was fairly obvious that the Aliens were a problem that was surmountable, given the placement of the scene (end of the series) and the plot armour surrounding Geary. I had personally guessed at sensor deception, though the exact mechanism was more clever than I surmised. Regardless, it's stuff like that that weakens this series.

A 'fun read' is the easiest way to describe Victorious, but I want more out of my 4-5 star books.

Incredible. To Stand Defiant is a masterpiece -- a rare sequel that not only delivers on the setup of its predecessor, but raises the bar even further. A lesser author could have gotten away with mere fan service, but this continuation of the Space Carrier Avalon universe pushes the setting further into the disintegration of the Terran Commonwealth.

To Stand Defiant holds no punches and delivers no easy answers. The Confederacy stands between two fires and its survival is entirely in doubt. In a way only a written book can, Glynn Stewart calmly strips all the 'outs' the Dakotans could have, explains away why fan fantasies can never come to be, and leaves nothing but the raw, hopeless conflict for our hero Tecumseh.

Phenomenal. Mr Glynn Stewart - give me more!

Little to complain about here, but as delighted as I was to finally see Periklos in person, it was the conversation between Walkingstick and Tecumseh that was the highlight of this novel. Words were spoken that I personally have thought: the pragmatist vs the purist. In the words of the Imperator himself: "Hell, all you had to do was argue with me. We could have found a middle ground!"

Beautiful.

Relentless is the strongest of the Lost Fleet series, as it continues to deliver on its strengths while finally patching up some of its weaknesses. Primarily, Relentless does a lot and advances the plot much further than previous novels would have implied. I have no complaints about an underdeveloped two-arc story here! Our protagonists are still easy to rally behind: good people doing good things. And the action and naval antics are still up to the high standards that Jack Campbell has set.

That said, I still dislike the lack of characterization for the antagonists/Syndics, as well as a lack of tension / foreshadowing. POV is Geary-only, which means that we're surprised only when he's surprised, and that means as readers, the emotional rollercoaster isn't quite there.

But... this is book five. If those had been problems for you, I doubt you would have made it this far. Relentless is excellent and I look forward to the sixth.

Within spoiler tags... I found the resolution of the internal fleet problems to be underwhelming. Geary succeeded by accident, as his foes took action which resulted in the dead man's switch triggering and giving Geary what he needed to dismantle the conspiracy. Even then, the opposing Captains were underdeveloped and obvious (as they were the only named characters amongst the fleet at that point). It's too bad because the internal conflict within the Alliance Fleet had been the best part of the last four novels.

On the other hand, the Aliens have taken centre stage. This outside-context problem is marvellously shown despite actually never having any screen time. I wish the author would find some way to build the tension, perhaps by leaking information to the reader that Geary is unaware of. Most problems that face Geary are solved within the next fifty pages, and that goes a long way to reducing tensions.

Alternatively, the next book could go full-on internal Alliance politics... again, we aren't given enough characterization of the opposition to even worry for Geary. The only Admiral we're shown had less than a paragraph of action, and we know nothing about the Alliance top brass. Should we care? I don't know! I guess I should?

Sigh. These books are sooo close to perfection. And yet... so far...

Great news! Valiant continues to deliver exactly what the previous Lost Fleet novels delivered: clever protagonists to cheer for, lots of action and victories, all wrapped up in a well-thought out military organization and a greater science fiction setting. We finally get interactions with Syndics that are worth recalling and foreshadowing of the greater battles to come.

Sadly, everything that was a weakness continues: the novels are just a bit too short, the antagonists are one-dimensional, undeveloped or incompetent, and there's still very little suspense as there's insufficient foreshadowing.

At this point, I've made my peace with the weaknesses of these fun, easy to read novels. Valiant is better than average, as Geary does have a match in the conspirators amongst the fleet. I don't know if Jack Campbell is intentional about this, but I view the Lost Fleet series as an internal conflict first, with the Syndics being mostly window dressing! The internecine fleet politics are nasty and well-developed, with blood being split both metaphorically and physically. I've enjoyed those scenes almost more than the space battles, and Valiant delivers some very satisfying internal conflicts.

Time to move on to the 5th novel.

As the third novel in the series, I think you know what you're in for from Jack Campbell. Everything that was a weakness continues: the novels are just a bit too short, the antagonists are one-dimensional feckless incompetents, and a lack of foreshadowing means that there's insufficient suspense. On the bright side, the protagonists are sympathetic, clever, and they win. It's a feel good novel with plenty of action and few flaws to be found in its primary goal of describing a military science fiction setting.

I'd normally give such a novel 3 stars, but Courageous does something different... and it shows how world-building can be shown without info dumps, and how very small changes can have cascading impacts. I'm also impressed by how much of the setting we're exposed to despite the Alliance Fleet being restricted in where they can go, as well as the viewpoint being restricted to Fleet Commander Geary. It's a pleasure to see and while I wish the villains can level up, I would be doing the novel a disservice to give it a mediocre rating.

Recommended.

I am not referring to the possible aliens and gates, but rather the revelation of how the Alliance's hero worship and focus on aggression resulted in a shift of talent wanting to captain Battecruisers, which in turn resulted in an effective policy of weeding out good people and protecting the idiots as they're on the Battleships. This goes a long way to explaining the current Alliance situation, and combined with the many organizational reasons (explored previously, but the core principle is that the navy has no organizational memory because they keep dying), showcases the tremendous subtle world-building that went into the Lost Fleet before page 1 of Dauntless was written.

Lovely stuff.

I am biased because I effectively jumped straight from Dauntless to Fearless, so as far as I'm concerned, this is just the second part of a single novel. As such, I found Fearless to be an excellent novel but I can see that as a standalone novel, it doesn't 'do' enough. Similar to Dauntless, the novel feels like it's far too short, as if there's only two acts instead of three. The writing is great though, and the action is thrilling. You will blow through the page count with a smile on your face, so what more can I ask?

Well, as the back of the book will tell you, this novel's enemy isn't the Syndics, but rather the Alliance fleet itself. The mutineers follow a trend of being one-dimensional though, with few positive traits and even less competence. I prefer my antagonists to be competent, sympathetic, and nuanced. We learn precious little of the Syndics, and generally I don't know enough to even fear for the Alliance Fleet. The stakes are high, but since we never really know what's coming next, there's not enough foreshadowing to create tension or suspense.

As such, The Lost Fleet continues to be an easy read -- fun, full of action, and unabashedly black and white. I recommend them, but I don't think they create enough emotional investment for you to look back on these and say they're the best.

Dauntless is an excellent novel to start off a military sci-fi series and setting, but it does start on extremely rocky footing and ends extremely quickly, leaving you wanting more. Jack Campbell's real life experience with in a navy means that he has an excellent grasp of military organizations, and this is translated extraordinarily well into text so that even us laymen can see the authenticity.

While the novel sells you on the idea of a man out of time, turned into a hero posthumously, struggling to live up to those ideals, I actually found the novel to be a brilliant breakdown on what might happen to society if it actually fought a modern 'total' war for a hundred years. Jack Campbell has given a great deal of thought to the military organization and its changes, and if there are oddities, I beg that you give the author time and space to make it clear why these things happened. His real-life experiences ensure that almost any part of the Alliance Navy that seems 'wrong' has very good reasons.

That said, the novel starts off with a poorly written cold-open which may alienate a lot of readers. The villains are either under-characterized or one-dimensional feckless assholes. Additionally, the novel is very short and you'll be left wanting more. I started Fearless (the next novel) immediately and while this is a fun, enjoyable ride, I don't see it being complex/thrilling enough for it to be perfect.

Recommended with reservations.

At about half the size of the full novel that was Network Effect, Fugitive Telemetry does a great job at combining the key ingredients to a Murderbot novel: mystery, robot action, corporation critiques and heavy doses of sarcasm. Additionally, Station Security provides great secondary characters to converse with Murderbot that is typically missing, and it's those interactions that are the highlight of this novel.

The biggest failing is that Fugitive Telemetry is chronologically set before the events of Network Effect. Once you get over that disappointment, Murderbot will narrate you through his challenges dealing with humans for a long enough time that I didn't mind the shorter novel. It's like everything was sized down perfectly to fit the page count, and I appreciate that since the previous novella didn't do it for me.

Recommended.

Not going to lie - I completely blanked on the mystery and how to solve it. It was just a bit too complicated and rooted in the technology of the future... which I liked because crimes use modern flaws to succeed, and Martha Wells appears to have grokked her world enough to find those flaws. But for us readers, it's not so easy to understand the limits of SecSys and the like.

I think it's possible to guess at the mystery earlier, but I'm not sure. When the solution was revealed, I was like "huh" instead of "oohhhhh". And that's where I knocked a star off the book.

The Desert Spear is the story of Jardir, a brand new main character into the world of the Demon Cycle. As excited I was to continue Arlen's narration, I was drawn into Jardir's backstory that was finely interwoven with events that were told in the Warded Man.

I don't feel this is a spoiler, but it's worth warning fans that the story starts anew instead of continuing from the cliffhanger of the previous novel. I hated this at first, but grew to love Jardir and I think you will too. The rich world-building and escalation of the scale of the story, as well as the changes to human society are your rewards in this fine novel once we pick up the 'present day' storyline.

Unfortunately, Peter Brett is still terrible at writing romance and family drama, and yet he keeps inserting these as subplots that deter from more thrilling and enjoyable elements of Arlen and Jardir's lives. I detested those subplots in the Warded Man, and they aren't written any better (nor more enjoyable) in The Desert Spear.

As such, this is a case of less is more. An editor that shortened those sequences and streamlined the story would have resulted in a perfect 5 star novel. Instead, I urge you to skim-read the secondary characters and shamelessly skip background (or Leesha's mother doing anything). You'll enjoy this a lot more.

I do find that Peter Brett's non-traditional story structure to be really challenging - we're very far from the Three Act pattern. The sudden climax at the end was exactly that: sudden. It was abrupt with little build up, with neither Arlen or Jardir even aware of the Calling Princes until they were fighting them.

I don't mind that the Calling Princes got the drop on our heroes, but I would have preferred the narration to build up to the attacks. For the majority of the book (in the present day), the Calling Princes were just spies. They added flavour and a sense of impending doom, but the sudden switch to active antagonists was too abrupt.

That said, their attacks also saved the book for me. The last act of both storylines showcased the author's weakest skill: writing romance. I could not care less for the relationship Jardir wanted to build with Leesha, or the new character Reina (whose backstory was unwelcome and insertion into the story sudden and jarring). I was close to giving this book 3 stars, despite a fantastic start, but the battles at the end upped the stakes appropriately.

My review of Murderbot Diaries was that 1-4 should have been released as a single novel. Together they form a fantastic story instead of underwhelming novellas. Network Effect is exactly that -- a long-form Murderbot adventure that showcases what Martha Wells can do when not restricted by word count.

Network Effort is fantastic. Murderbot's distinct narration and voice is still the highlight, but combining it with a unique mix of science-fiction action and detective mystery really makes Murderbot something special. There is a fantastic mix of energy weapons flying around while your brain is engaged with the intellectual challenges, barely keeping up with the AI/construct characters as they try to get ahead of their antagonists.

And finally, the not-friend's return is perfect.

That said, the novel itself isn't. The sense of suspense is never there, and it's mostly a light-hearted romp through a surprisingly grim view of the future. Basically, I'm not emotionally invested. It's fun, but it won't hit me in the feels, and so it's a recommended 4-stars but nothing truly spectacular.

ART's return basically makes this book. Murderbot always needed more characters and ART was the only one that was ever very interesting. The Corporate Rim is absent so you get less of that tongue-in-cheek criticism, but instead we get exposed to Alien Remnants (literally) and while thought provoking, didn't ever feel like much of a threat.

Finally, Three's character was a bit of a fail for me. I appreciated how it was foreshadowed via the flashback chapters, but Three was very boring. Murderbot 2.0 was actually more interesting, but of course, a copy of your MC should be!

This novel fell far short of my expectations - I'm not entirely sure it even had a coherent plot, but there were a number of subplots that were forgotten, and zero attempts to build a climax and conclusion. This is almost entirely a character-driven novel. There are some bright moments when Maturin is absolutely ridiculous, and Aubrey's rashness reminds you why the first novel was so great, but without plot, the novel is aimless and an utter waste of time.

Well over half the novel is dedicated to scenes on land, and while others seem to enjoy the introduction of Sophie Williams and Diana Villiers, I found them tiresome, irrelevant, and un-engaging. I didn't pick up "Post Captain" for a 1900s romance simulation.

This novel has convinced me to stop reading this series. I've read in other reviews that Patrick O'Brian doesn't actually write novels, but rather wrote 10000 pages and then just cut them up into 20 volumes and called them books. I can't imagine how I'd get through another book where there's no real villain, no major plot, and just characters going about their lives.

I'm out.

Incredible. Plots within Plots. There are stories that age poorly over time, but this maintains its complexity and depth and avoids dating itself. I have been exposed to so much of Dune that I thought I had read the novels when I was younger, but as I started my ‘re-read’ after watching Dune 2021, I realized this is my first read!

The world-building is phenomenal - where we are shown but not told about the impacts of the past, with hints about Spice, the Guild, Mentats, the Great Convention, stagnation, the Bene Gesserit and more. The novel definitely skips over scenes that I think should have existed, but given how long it already is, I understand why we have major time skips and clever little scenes that imply what has happened to the many characters.

So much of Dune has become basis of modern science-fiction that there are ‘twists’ that you were already aware of. Much like everyone knows who Darth Vader really is, what Spice is used for and how it’s made was already known to me. And yet… reading this was still incredibly enjoyable. I can’t explain it. Even if you know everything, it’s still a masterpiece.