Cibola Burn - The Expanse (Book 4)

Expanse titles are always a little
unrelated to their content.

June was 'good sci-fi month' apparently, with two of my favourite authors each putting out a new "first of a new trilogy" in their established universes. Next week is Kevin J Anderson's return to the Saga of Seven Suns universe with the eagerly anticipated The Dark between the Stars, Book 1 of the Saga of Shadows. This week, however, is the start of a new Expanse trilogy by James SA Corey.

The first in this new trilogy, Cibola Burn, returns readers to the world of The Expanse, a few years after the events of the last trilogy (ending with Abbadon's Gate). Jim Holden is still puttering around the solar system on his stolen Martian fighter, the Rocinante, and is drawn in (this time deliberately on the part of Earth's government) to what I imagine will undoubtedly become another system-spanning conflict.

First, a little background to this world created by Corey (a pen name for writers Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck, who is George RR Martin's assistant and brings a certain degree of that gritty brutality to his own work). This is (or was up until events of the last trilogy) "hard" science fiction. There are no wormholes - all transport is by burning fuel and nuclear fission. Artificial gravity is either spin gravity on space stations or thrust gravity of accelerating space ships. Communication is limited by the speed of light and the vast distances between life-supporting objects has put humanity back into a world not unlike Earth before jet engines and emails. If a ship wants to make good time, it has to subject its crew to high-g thrust. If a ship-mounted railgun fires a metal pellet at another ship, that slug will go through anything and anyone until it goes out the other side of the target. It is brutal, it is gritty. It works.

Without going too much into details of the last trilogy, the introduction of a mysterious alien race has somewhat complicated the above logical universe. Humanity (previously made up of Earth, Mars and the Asteroid Belt "Belters") has found its way through the cracks of the universe to thousands of unsettled worlds and it is on this frontier that Cibola Burn takes place. ("Cibola" is the name of one of the legendary Cities of Gold, like El Dorado. I am hoping that "Burn" here is a pun on the city itself burning to the ground, and on the engine burn of ships.)

In this case, the crew of the Rocinante find themselves "down the gravity well" of Ilus (a planet so-named by its first settlers), mediating a conflict between said settlers (and the terrorists in their midst) and the scientific team sent by an Earth corporation to study the planet. A series of unfortunate events have escalated tensions and bloodshed seems imminent. There are some pretty clear influences of our current social climate here, as 'terrorists' move from unquestionable villains (post September 11) to a more post-modern questioning of who they are and why they do what they do. The setting of this particular book gives it a very "frontier-like" feel, as if Holden were a roaming lawman bringing justice to the Old West. Concepts of chivalry are drawn to the subtext foreground, embodied mostly in Holden and his crew. In past books, Holden's actions in following his particular Code led to system-wide war. Despite this, Corey managed to portray him as the aggrieved party and "good guy" (not just as a protagonist). In this book though, Holden is basically the embodiment of virtue, trying (and not always succeeding) to talk the clashing sides out of a war.

The "Roci", named for Don Quixote's
horse, is a perfect mount for Holden's
constant windmill touting.

One of the things I like most about Corey is that they imagine a universe as it is in the future, feeling no need to justify the social changes inherent in that universe to readers. It is a sort of "take it how it is" approach that pushes those issues (such as polygamy, homosexuality and modern approaches to welfare) to the background and normalises the society they create. In Cibola Burn, this is given greater effect by its deliberate contrast of the Earth and Belter-turned-Ilusian cultures. By focusing strongly on the differences between their ways of life, it normalises even more the society that they both take for granted. In that way, Corey has drawn their readers to a new world without giving it an obvious "sci-fi for societal change" agenda. At the same time, the book does question the increasing power of corporations and the impact that may have on the world. It does this through its presentation of the Earth forces through the lens of (not only scientific exploration but also) corporate greed.

In past books, there have been three main protagonists (if they can be called that): Holden and his crew, Detective Miller, and Bobby Draper. While Holden has always been the focus of The Expanse (and actually I had wondered whether Corey would continue with his story in this new series), the other two have alternately coloured its pages.

Bobby appears in the prologue and epilogue, giving a sense that she will have greater contributions in the final two books as the ramifications of Cibola Burn ripple out to the universe at large.

Miller, on the other hand, has a very good reason for not giving a viewpoint past the first book, Leviathan's Wake. He is replaced in Book 4 by the aptly named "The Investigator" in chapters reminiscent of the fake Hodor chapter or the "missing" chapter from Words of Radiance (see my review here). These chapters get a little indulgent at times on part of the authors, following a stream of consciousness approach that is confusing at first but begins to make sense as the book continues. By the time they make sense, it is too late and everything has gone to hell.

Miller becomes a bit of a self-referential trope in this book.

The pre-climax of the book is a little disappointing, and feels more like the Corey couldn't figure out how to deal with the long setup that the rest of the book spent so long building. If it feels like a reverse deus ex machina moment, that is probably because it is. The fact that the book then presents a rationale for the moment does not diminish how it feels at the time. I realise, of course, that it is intentional and serves to add another layer of environmental brutality to a book already full of human harshness. It also serves to show just how vulnerable humanity can be in the vast emptiness of space, and so reinforce that "frontier" feeling. Still, the result of said event brings up new challenges and seems to cut the book in half in terms of plot consistency. It almost feels like two self-contained television episodes in one, with a short story arc connecting the two. Luckily, this is a very small hitch in an overall wonderful plotline. The end of the book brings the viewpoint characters back to their protagonist destinations, where a reader can finally identify them all as 'good guys' in a way, and (were it not for the epilogue) one might be mistaken in hoping that everything will work out okay.

The Ups: Beautifully written in sparse but clear story, Corey really knows how to get into the heads of their characters. The way that humanity comes together and deals with their own bullshit is inspiring if a little optimistic.

The Downs: My retail copy of the book was not well-polished, with a few typographic errors cropping up. Some of the villains in this piece had simplistic motives and were a little one-dimensional, which is unusual considering the care Corey usually gives to all of their characters (black, white and grey).

The Verdict: 4 nuclear reactors out of 5

Overall, the book is an excellent return to The Expanse. Characters from the first trilogy return in evolved forms and the situation has developed such that I am excited to read the next two books. At times it feels a little rushed, and not just in pacing, but that is easily forgivable.