Book review: By Schism Rent Asunder
A good critic of any book always includes “I couldn’t put the book down” and this was definitely one of those books. Although from pre-reviews of the book, I got the impression that like book 1, we were to see some kind of reference to the days before Safehold, it turns out that no such references were actually included. While not horrible, I think it best if fans of the series know this going in to the book. There was a bit of disappointment on my part with the “missing chapters” flashing back to the fight with the Gbabba. However, in the end, I think the story worked brilliantly.
Unlike in book one of this series, female characters play a more central role in the story, which I think is a good thing. The lack of female characters in even secondary role was noteworthy in the first book, with the exception of one character. What’s even better is that women are portrayed in a variety of ways, but most are strong in both personality and ethics, while some are just background. I felt it brought a bit of balance to the second book that was noticably lacking in the first. (Never mind that the primary character of the story is a PICA, or human looking android, filled with the consciousness of a long dead female soldier.)
The one thing that I’m not really happy with, well… two things: One is that the book ends rather abruptly, as if it was the only place the author could find to break up a far larger story in to two sections. So the second book is not so much stand alone as the first book had been, and you’re left with something of a cliff hanger. The other thing I don’t like is that since the entire book ends after less than a year transpired in the story (half of what took place within the first story) it seems as though the entire story will be limited to only what happens within the lifetime of the co-primary characters in the story.
To me, this leaves a huge burning question of “what happens when humanity returns to the stars and faces the Gbabba again?” And quite frankly, I think that question is going to burn a hole right through me. Don’t get me wrong, I think this story is an immesurably important tale within the history of the larger conflict, but with such a huge story element hanging over the plot, without a proper resolution (and I don’t mean epilogue quickly wrapping up a much larger story by doing a flash forward to the end of the Gbabba-Human conflict, or even somewhere in the middle of that future conflict implying human victory) I’m going to be left wanting more.
Although, that certainly leaves room for a complete story within the current timeframe of the fictional universe and a completely new trilogy for the completion of that future story ark. And that leaves me very hopeful indeed. As much as I’d love another Honor Harrington book, I feel that Weber has successfully created another fictional universe in which I care what happens to the characters that populate his story.
If only the 3rd book was due out soon!
***** (5/5) stars
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[...] review touches on other concerns that I agree with, like the limited time frame apparently precluding a [...]