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Caliban's War

The Expanse, Book 2

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Caliban's War

By: James S. A. Corey
Narrated by: Jefferson Mays
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About this listen

For someone who didn't intend to wreck the solar system's fragile balance of power, Jim Holden did a pretty good job of it. While Earth and Mars have stopped shooting each other, the core alliance is shattered. The outer planets and the Belt are uncertain in their new - possibly temporary - autonomy.

Then, on one of Jupiter's moons, a single super-soldier attacks, slaughtering soldiers of Earth and Mars indiscriminately and reigniting the war. The race is on to discover whether this is the vanguard of an alien army or if the danger lies closer to home.

©2012 Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck (P)2015 Hachette Audio Adventure Fantasy Hard Science Fiction Science Fiction Space Opera

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Critic reviews

"This breakneck tale will have readers itching for book three." (Publishers Weekly)

"Great characters, excellent dialogue, memorable fights, freakish experiments, and twisty-turny mysteries... Only an excellent book series can pull them all off, and the Expanse will definitely be added to the shortlist of science fiction tales that manage to do so" (Wired.com)

"Those who enjoyed the first book will enjoy Caliban's War as much, if not more... A crackingly enjoyable read." (SFF World)
All stars
Most relevant
Excellent second entry in the Expanse series following the discovery of an Alien Proto-Molecule in our Solar System and the effects it has on individuals, on politics and on the military.
Many of the original characters are back alone with a few new ones. I especially liked the potty-mouthed Politician and Granny Avasarala.
Very well read by Jefferson Mays, I’m really looking forward to the third book.

Excellent sequel to Leviathan Wakes

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As soon as I had finished reading Leviathan Wakes there was no question that
I just had to get the follow-up, Caliban's War. Leviathan Wakes left me
hungry for more and this second instalment in James S.A Corey's Expanse
series delivers in spades.

Caliban's War picks up some 18 months after the end of events in the
previous book where Holden and crew are now working to rid space of pirates. In
the meantime tensions between Mars and Earth are at an all time high it
seems despite the efforts to bring Mars, Earth and the belt closer together
to face the looming and unknown Venus proto molecule situation.

Three new key characters are brought into this story; A botanist, a high
ranking politician and a tough female Martian marine, Roberta Draper. All
these new characters are very different and interesting and Corey has
written them superbly. In particular, the tough no nonsense foul mouthed and
direct politician in the form of a diminutive Indian woman is written with
great intelligence, wit, sagacity and humour. At first she appears rather
too abrasive to be likable but it soon becomes apparent that if all
politicians were like her that we'd have a much better society I think. By
the end of this book I liked her a great deal and would like to see more
from her character in a future instalment to this series.

Prax, the botanist, is looking for his kidnapped daughter who has been taken by the group experimenting with the proto molecule with the aim of using the child along with others in their hideous plans. Prax elicits the
help of Holden and crew to this task and this story element provides the main driver to the narrative. Prax has all the vulnerability and desperation
of a father who has lost his child under the most dangerous of circumstances
and of course, the proto molecule threat is yet again manifested by an
experimental soldier that our Martian marine heroine gets involved in a fire
fight with. It seems fairly obvious to me that the Draper character is
basically modelled on the famous Ripley strong female lead in the Alien
series of movies and in this story it's the Ripley seen in the second of
those films, "Aliens". There's even a scene where Draper is brought along to
a high level bureaucratic meeting and has an outburst of disbelief when no
one is even talking about "The Monster". Very reminiscent of Ripley's
outburst to similar board-types in "Aliens".

As this is the second act of the Expanse series the pace is noticeably quicker than the previous book. With the Draper character and the proto molecule soldiers it reminds me of "The Thing" meets "Alien" but that sufficiently different which keeps the story engaging and fresh. This was a real page turner for me or should I say in the audio form a real hard to stop listening book. Corey's writing skills have already improved since Leviathan Wakes with more elegant and flowing prose which makes this book basically as perfect as one might ever hope to find. Corey has already proved with Caliban's War that he can stand toe to toe with the giants in this genre.

The only thing I haven't figured out yet is who is Caliban as I don't recall such a name being mentioned in the book. Oh well, perhaps I missed something subtle but that doesn't matter at all. As with books that form a series, Caliban's War leaves us with a tantalizing cliff hanger at the end and serves to wet the appetite of the hungry reader for the next instalment of this excellent and enthralling saga.

Great sci-fi and a superb read.

Superb Second Act

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Epic space opera, narrator does a great job. I look forward to the next installments.

Great story well read

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I am now addicted to what happens to Holden,Niaomi,Amos and Alex..This is not just a crew they are family.
The most enjoyable space yarn I have read/listened to for some time.
I will be getting the other books in the series and if any of the main cast are killed off,I will be gutted.
Special shout out to the narrator,who's name I forgot at the time of writing this but he has these characters down to a tee..Love Christeen's constant foul mouth. A lot to love in book 2 and makes me want to rewatch the tv show..Book 3,here I come.

Better than book 1

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the story continues with even more pan solar adventure, politics and intrigue. .
love Avasralan & the whole crew of the Rosie and their new additions. .
Gimme book three NOW! !!!

Wow! Even better than the first book!

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