Name: Mitch Stewart's review of Babylon's Ashes by James S. A. Corey
Item: Babylon's Ashes
Rating: 2
Author: Mitch Stewart

James S. A. Corey

The sixth book in the NYT bestselling Expanse series, Babylon's Ashes has the galaxy in full revolution, and it's up to the crew of the Rocinante to make a desperate mission to the gate network and thin hope of victory. Now a Prime Original series. A revolution brewing for generations has begun in fire. It will end in blood. The Free Navy - a violent group of Belters in black-market military ships - has crippled the Earth and begun a campaign of piracy and violence among the outer planets. The colony ships heading for the thousand new worlds on the far side of the alien ring gates are easy prey, and no single navy remains strong enough to protect them. James Holden and his crew know the strengths and weaknesses of this new force better than anyone. Outnumbered and outgunned, the embattled remnants of the old political powers call on the Rocinante for a desperate mission to reach Medina Station at the heart of the gate network. But the new alliances are as flawed as the old, and the struggle for power has only just begun. Babylon's Ashes is a breakneck science fiction adventure following the bestselling Nemesis Games. The Expanse Leviathan WakesCaliban's WarAbaddon's GateCibola BurnNemesis GamesBabylon's AshesPersepolis RisingTiamat's Wrath The Expanse Short Fiction The Butcher of Anderson StationGods of RiskThe ChurnThe Vital AbyssStrange Dogs

Babylon's Ashes

Matt Boegner

The sixth book in the New York Times bestselling Expanse series. NOW A PRIME ORIGINAL SERIES A revolution brewing for generations has begun in fire. It will end in blood. The Free Navy - a violent group of Belters in black-market military ships - has crippled the Earth and begun a campaign of piracy and violence among the outer planets. The colony ships heading for the thousand new worlds on the far side of the alien ring gates are easy prey, and no single navy remains strong enough to protect them. James Holden and his crew know the strengths and weaknesses of this new force better than anyone. Outnumbered and outgunned, the embattled remnants of the old political powers call on the Rocinante for a desperate mission to reach Medina Station at the heart of the gate network. But the new alliances are as flawed as the old, and the struggle for power has only just begun. As the chaos grows, an alien mystery deepens. Pirate fleets, mutiny and betrayal may be the least of the Rocinante's problems. And in the uncanny spaces past the ring gates, the choices of a few damaged and desperate people may determine the fate of more than just humanity.

Mitch Stewart

My least favorite entry into this series. Ultimately boring, climax was meh, some big events were extremely anti-climactic and unceremonious. I read it in a week and couldn't wait for it to be over.

Matt Stein

My review: https://mattstein.com/books/babylons-ashes

The sixth novel in James S.A. Corey's New York Times bestselling Expanse series--now a new original series from the Syfy Channel, coming December 14th 2015. The final war has started. The protomolecule, fairly quiescent since the opening of the gates, has identified its enemy and is arming itself for battle. Humanity is at most a tool in its post-human arsenal. When people, ships, and even places begin to disappear, Holden and the crew of the Rocinante have to face the fact that the thing they've been hauling through the depths of space only appears to be Detective Miller. The time when the protomolecule's agenda and humanity's overlapped has passed. As the protomolecule takes control of the ancient networks and relays, the final battle begins. Holden and his allies are faced with the decision of whether to blow the gates, trapping humanity in beads of disconnected worlds, or engage in a battle that they can only lose no matter who wins.

Bouke van der Bijl

** spoiler alert **
           Did not finish, stopped reading some time in May. The series just got really boring and uninteresting after half of the humans were killed in the meteor strike attack. The most interesting part at first were the powerful interplanetary governments, but those just got destroyed so now there’s just a bunch of annoying people left.

This review says it better: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

This book uses a myriad of perspectives as opposed to the handful used in previous installments. I felt that added a layer of complexity and made it really feel like events were happening system-wide. With the plot for this one I think it was important to widen the scope, as such.

Simon Crocker

Ryan LaFerney

James S. A. Corey’s Babylon’s Ashes (2016), book six in THE EXPANSE series, is the follow up to Nemesis Games, which saw the rise of the Free Navy-a violent group of Belters in black market military ships. The Free Navy crippled Earth and begun a campaign of piracy and violence among the outer planets while colony ships from Earth and Mars were heading for the alien ring gates to explore a thousand new worlds and make a better home out in the stars. Babylon’s Ashes finds James Holden and his crew dealing with the aftermath of The Free Navy's devastating terrorist attacks on Earth that happened in Nemesis Games. The beginning is focused on picking up the scattered shards of where Nemesis Games left us. The plot of Nemesis games essentially revolves around Marco Inaros’s (leader of The Free Navy) attempts to further his plans of a multi-system utopia with him at the governmental head, and the Earth/Mars/OPA combined efforts to knock the psycho out of the ever-loving sky. James Holden and his beloved, rag-tag crew once again are called upon to reach Medina Station (which lies at the heart of the gate network) to confront Inaros and his Navy.....except, as Holden's crew mates note:
"So. Martian coup. Free Navy killing the shit out of Earth. Pirates stripping down all the colony ships that were heading out. Medina Station’s gone dark. And we-don’t-know-what eating some of the ships going through the gates… One damned thing after another… When it ain’t a whole bunch of damned things at once." YEP. You heard that right...the major battle takes place near a space-portal gate thing where there is a deep alien mystery happening. Try to guess how this ends.
Babylon’s Ashes is a more military sci-fi/political affair than previous entries and feels less intimate than its predecessor (not that there aren't many intimate moments here). Nemesis Games just kept us really close to our favorite crew members (they almost feel like my personal family): Holden, Naomi, Amos, and Alex. Babylon’s Ashes greatly expands the number of POVs in a mix of the familiar and the new, including but not limited to: Chrisjen Avasarala, Clarissa Mao, Bobbie Draper, Filip (son of Marcos and Naomi), Michio Pa (a captain in the Free Navy), Fred Johnson, Anderson Dawes, Salis (on Medina Station outside the gates leading to the colony planets), a family of Earth refugees, and others. Almost 20 in total. You really have to keep up with story-line of each individual character but the writing and story is engaging, it isn't hard to do. So, the story mostly revolves around political machinations in the aftermath of The Free Navy's terrorist actions, which is fine but I found this entry to be the least engaging entry so far. Perhaps the stakes just didn't feel high enough at the beginning or it lacked the mystery of some of the other books in the series or it lacked the Alien meets Blade Runner storyline of Leviathan Wakes or the Space Western vibes of Cibola Burn. I don't know. I guess political maneuvering isn't a hundred percent my thing. However, don't get me wrong, this is still a damn good story and an excellent book. It's just not my favorite in the series. Plus I wanted more of the stolen protomolecule! But all signs point to the mysterious alien monster emerging from the gates once again. Side-note: This is the book that really solidified for me that James S.A. Corey is writing sci-fi that directly parallels some of the concerns/problems of our age such as terrorism (The Free Navy/OPA), refugees crises (Earth and Mars fleeing to the newly discovered worlds after having their homes destroyed), populist ideologies (The Free Navy), racism (exhibited in the Earth's view of Belters), etc.

Janice Hopper

Another worthy entry in my favorite SF series. I confess I put off reading this for a bit. The last book in the series ended with some Dire Events. With the political situation and other stuff going on right now, I really didn't want to read about anything dreadful happening to characters I like very much. But I made it through, and everything was (more or less) ok.

This time we're still dealing with the people who set the Dire Events of the last book in motion. One thing this series does that I like is pull people from previous books in to have small or large roles. It's like they're real people with read effects on the world. Their stories don't stop just because we don't see them for a while. That's kinda cool.

We don't see a lot of the Rocinante crew this time, mostly just James Holden. Alex the pilot gets to have a good time. Amos and Bobbie Draper and Clarissa Mao are mostly lurking in the background. But there's lots of action and adventure. 

You'd be forgiven if this book felt like the end of the series. I think they're contracted to write 3 or 4 more. It'll be interesting to see where the authors take the story from here. There are a couple of ways I can see it going, but I'm happy to be surprised.

As a side note: so far, I'm pretty impressed by the way the first novel has been adapted into The Expanse series on SyFy. It doesn't contain all the details of the story, but it has enough. The compression of some story elements and the elision of others makes sense. Well done, guys!

The sixth book in the NYT bestselling Expanse series, Babylon's Ashes has the galaxy in full revolution, and it's up to the crew of the Rocinante to make a desperate mission to the gate network and thin hope of victory. Now a Prime Original series. HUGO AWARD WINNER FOR BEST SERIES ​ A revolution brewing for generations has begun in fire. It will end in blood. The Free Navy -- a violent group of Belters in black-market military ships -- has crippled the Earth and begun a campaign of piracy and violence among the outer planets. The colony ships heading for the thousand new worlds on the far side of the alien ring gates are easy prey, and no single navy remains strong enough to protect them. James Holden and his crew know the strengths and weaknesses of this new force better than anyone. Outnumbered and outgunned, the embattled remnants of the old political powers call on the Rocinante for a desperate mission to reach Medina Station at the heart of the gate network. But the new alliances are as flawed as the old, and the struggle for power has only just begun. Babylon's Ashes is a breakneck science fiction adventure following the bestselling Nemesis Games. The Expanse Leviathan Wakes Caliban's War Abaddon's Gate Cibola Burn Nemesis Games Babylon's Ashes Persepolis Rising Tiamat's Wrath ​Leviathan Falls The Expanse Short Fiction The Butcher of Anderson Station Gods of Risk The Churn The Vital Abyss Strange Dogs Auberon

Manuel Grabowski

Still captivated by the overarching story – I think some perspectives in this one were not as great as the others and sometimes made it a bit harder to follow than necessary.

Ben Nathan

It's definitely a book that had things happen. Lots of big things that felt like a prologue to future action. Hopefully the next book are going interesting places

Heather Killeen

This one really dragged in the middle, but the end definitely delivered!

Liz Griffin

It was fascinating to have so many POVs and see every angle of the conflict... but it caused a little more confusion when new characters were introduced. Still love this series and need book 7 now!

Michael Hessling

Hard to remember what happened in book #5, and that made it hard to really get into this one. But still a good book and series.

Alex lee 

Jasper

Paul J Robinson

Marie

geri

Ronán Connor 

Samuel Solon

NOW A PRIME ORIGINAL SERIES Babylon's Ashes is the sixth book in the New York Times bestselling Expanse series. The Free Navy - a violent group of Belters in black-market military ships - has crippled the Earth and begun a campaign of piracy and violence among the outer planets. The colony ships heading for the thousand new worlds on the far side of the alien ring gates are easy prey, and no single navy remains strong enough to protect them. James Holden and his crew know the strengths and weaknesses of this new force better than anyone. Outnumbered and outgunned, the embattled remnants of the old political powers call on the Rocinante for a desperate mission to reach Medina Station at the heart of the gate network. But the new alliances are as flawed as the old, and the struggle for power has only just begun. As the chaos grows, an alien mystery deepens. Pirate fleets, mutiny and betrayal may be the least of the Rocinante's problems. And in the uncanny spaces past the ring gates, the choices of a few damaged and desperate people may determine the fate of more than just humanity. The Expanse series has sold over two million copies worldwide and is now a major television series. The Expanse series: Leviathan Wakes Caliban's War Abaddon's Gate Cibola Burn Nemesis Games Babylon's Ashes Persepolis Rising Praise for the Expanse: 'The science fictional equivalent of A Song of Ice and Fire' NPR Books 'As close as you'll get to a Hollywood blockbuster in book form' io9.com 'Great characters, excellent dialogue, memorable fights' wired.com 'High adventure equalling the best space opera has to offer, cutting-edge technology and a group of unforgettable characters . . . Perhaps one of the best tales the genre has yet to produce' Library Journal 'This is the future the way it's supposed to be' Wall Street Journal 'Tense and thrilling' SciFiNow

Matt Boegner &
Babylon's Ashes by James S. A. Corey

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