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May 17, 2017clflemin rated this title 2 out of 5 stars
Books one and two were entertaining, if flawed, but the third is a complete let down. Weak characters coupled with a slow pace and thin plot tied together by a string of unlikely contrivances. The authors failed keep a rather basic story entertaining and plausible for the first three books which leads me to doubt the story will be coherent or fresh later. Once again the solar system's luckiest crew of likable, scrappy, cliches find themselves in the thick of the plot and the only ones managing to interact with the protomolocule on any meaningful level. The continued connection between the crew and the protomolocule is fairly obvious and explained to a certain extent, but how the crew physically find themselves at the crux of things this time around is both contrived and transparent... and this is just the first few chapters. A few hundred pages of exposition later and one is left wondering why most of the characters made the decisions they did - when they were clearly in contravention of EVERYTHING the stood for or did previously. The two biggest let downs the preacher's absolutely improbable EVA suit escapade and Ashford's decision to let a prisoner out of jail. Absolutely ridiculous and their respective outcomes completely transparent. The story plods along throughout and is strung together by a series of events that just would not happen given the way the characters have been established and the demands of the situation. The overall setup for sending the solar system's luckiest crew (in terms of survivability) into the fray yet again and how the machination of the primary antagonist play out is implausible - even for those that accept the basic premise of the story, the boundaries established thus far, etc. The characters have always been cliched, but likable enough to be ignored. However by book three that is stretching very thin. How many times can the crew forgive and forget, go all in and have it still remain believable. At this point I will even settle for entertaining... Will reserve final judgement for book four.