[Book Review] The Mercy of Gods (The Captive’s War 1) — James S. A. Corey
Embark on the new journey from the Expanse masterminds
A story highlighting humankind’s struggle against an alien foe so beyond our capabilities, that they are Gods to us. They may seem benevolent, but merciful, they are not.
The new book from the masterminds behind The Expanse phenomenon is upon us, known as The Mercy of Gods, the first book in their brand new space opera series The Captive’s War. If you are anyone like me, who devoured the nine mainline entries in The Expanse series and was an ardent fan of the TV Show, you have the authors Daniel Abraham and Ty Frank (together stylized as James S. A. Corey) on your watchlist. So when they announced a new space opera series, you bet your sci-fi tokens, I was at the head of the line braying for an advanced copy. Fortunately, these gods were merciful!
This is more than can be said about the Carryx!
The Mercy of Gods is a modern spin on the classic invasion tale popular in the early 80s. The humans on the planet Anjiin are the latest victims to fall prey to the hegemonic hivemind empire of the Carryx, a race of aliens bent on winning the war against all sentient life across the galaxy by conquering them and bringing them into their hegemony.
Our protagonists are a group of elite bioscientists and astrophysicists who survive the initial invasion and are absorbed into the alien empire, after an eighth of the Anjiin population is wiped out, merely as a show of dominance of the Carryx. Among the survivors, the major protagonist is the research assistant Dafyd Alkhor and his team of scientists. They are thrust into their new roles as captives and forced to prove their intellectual utility to the Carryx in a benignly hostile environment or face summary deletion.
The Mercy of Gods has a unique spin on the classic invasion trope because though the Carryx are shown to be vastly superior to humankind and the other species they have captured, they treat their enslaved races with a kind of mundane indifference, painting the setting with dread very few stories of this kind capture well. In this regard, The Mercy of Gods is very much a world-building-driven story rather than a character-driven or plot-driven narrative.
This is a significant departure for people who, like me, were expecting a similar tone, albeit in a different setting, with different characters as The Expanse. While The Expanse series had that blockbuster action-flick nature to its fast-paced high-octane writing and push-forward plot pacing, The Mercy of Gods opts for a much slower burn, focusing on setting up the world, with minimal plot beats, and focusing much of its time creating more emotional heft than bombastic action sequences.
It’s difficult to not continuously compare the new series to their massively successful predecessor, but compare we shall. It is also apparent that the character work on even the first book, Leviathan Wakes of The Expanse was far superior to The Mercy of Gods. Characters like Jim Holden, Amos Burton, Christjen Avasarala, Bobbie Draper, Winston Duarte, etc. quickly became sci-fi icons because of how strong their character insertions were, subsequently becoming mainstays because of their rewarding story arcs. In that regard, there was very little purchase to be found with the characters in The Mercy of Gods, Dafyd is positioned to be the leading protagonist, at least for the initial push, and his character brief doesn't nearly have the same kind of pull as any of the aforementioned icons. The other characters of note were the femme fatale Else Yannin who is thrust into a pseudo-romantic relationship with Dafyd, albeit in a roundabout way, and Jessyn, another scientist in the research team, who struggles with mental health issues, continuing to deteriorate as the humans are inserted into the new strange environment of the Carryx research mileu.
What The Mercy of Gods managed to nail down really well was creating a compelling antagonist in The Carryx, with snippets of their perspective through one of their library sub-units. The sheer superiority of the conquering species and their effect on their captives is superlatively written. The diversity of the other alien species mentioned is beautifully crafted and reminds us of the mastercraft that was Bank’s Culture series. Right from the get-go the worldbuilding proves to be the strong suit of the Captive’s War series. I can only hope that an increased focus is put into the development arcs of the characters that have survived by the end of the first book, and there is more interplay between strong character decisions into the plotting of future entries.
The Mercy of Gods has an interesting premise, a fresh coat of paint on a very played-out alien invasion narrative, with incredible worldbuilding, a compelling setting, and a menacing antagonist but is held back by lackluster character work, and slowburn pacing. For people expecting a pace-for-pace rehash of The Expanse series, The Captive’s War is an entirely different beast, and only future entries will tell if this series will reach the same heights. A solid but rocky start!
