*Twice* he pulled the 'reader thinks character is dead but they're actually *not* dead! Haha!' trick (and again, the fact that the second character is 'technically' dead doesn't change the fact that their consciousness lives on, kinda bespoiling the whole 'dead' thing). And no, lampshading that they were doing just that didn't 'fix' it. Almost everything else? Multiple times we would sit inside a character's head for multiple pages while they either 1) recapped the plot of previous books or 2) monologued like Saturday afternoon z-movie villians. It's a quick read, at no point did I feel like it bogged down (I mean hell, I finished the whole book in less than 24 hours). The good things: Scalzi still has good dialogue. This is conjecture on my part (that more time would have saved the book) but the 'turning it in at the last possible second' certainly didn't help. The summary of my review is: I wish John has finished his part in time to give the editor time to save John from some pretty big mistakes. I initially rated the book at three stars, but dropped it down to two as I sat with my reactions over night.

Will Grayland become the savior of her civilization… or the last emperox to wear the crown? Grayland and her thinning list of allies must use every tool at their disposal to save themselves, and all of humanity. But “control” is a slippery thing, and even as Grayland strives to save as many of her people from impoverished isolation, the forces opposing her rule will make a final, desperate push to topple her from her throne and power, by any means necessary. This collapse was foretold through scientific prediction… and yet, even as the evidence is obvious and insurmountable, many still try to rationalize, delay and profit from, these final days of one of the greatest empires humanity has ever known.Įmperox Grayland II has finally wrested control of her empire from those who oppose her and who deny the reality of this collapse. Entire star systems-and billions of people-are becoming cut off from the rest of human civilization. The collapse of The Flow, the interstellar pathway between the planets of the Interdependency, has accelerated.

The Collapsing Empire by John Scalzi