Fantasy Hardships

Read by recommendation. Leviathan Wakes is a space horror novel (though light on the horror part). There are two PoVs here, each with their own chapters and opposing personalities. I did found them both to veer a bit too close to a stereotype, but it never became an issue.

The pacing and the descriptions of the world are excellent, and there are no points in the book where you might get bored. The action begins swiftly, and with a mystery, which then drives the plot forward until the big bad is revealed around half way in the book.

And that bad, is also big in the problem I have with it.

It lacks originality and because it's such a big bad, the plot has to bend into almost improbable angles to give our protagonists a way to deal with it.

This is reinforced by the fact that the 'tech' is soft, which allows these things, though luckily not to the point that it might as well have been magic. This is not a hard science fiction novel, something the author himself admits in the afterword.

Final verdict

All that said, the story never becomes dull, the various characters are interesting, and there are twists that keep the story from devolving into a standard plot seen a hundred times before. All in all, a solid read.