The Collapsing Empire (The Interdependency)

The universe-building was a good start, and the into of the two main characters was cool. However, it went downhill from there.

-Cool universe with dozens of human settlements on asteroids and space stations. Why then is the one habitable planet a backwater no one cares about? Wouldn't distinct cultures develop over a thousand years on all these far flung place? What about physical changes?

-Bad guys weren't really bad. If the good guys are so incompetent maybe change isn't so bad.

-Very little actually happens. I didn't care about any characters fate.

-Author is pretty clearly 'woke'. The male characters are largely feckless beta males and every character seems to question their sexuality relative to whoever they're interacting with. Kept waiting for a Trump reference.

-The way the universe is set up doesn't make sense, and the notion that a theocratic oligarchy could survive that long seems implausible.

Very disappointed with this book, not worth the money. This is more like 'The View' in space than Game of Thrones.

Within just a few pages, I was hooked on this new series and universe that Scalzi had created. It's got memorable characters and a plot that keeps me flipping pages to see what's going to happen next!

This was my first and my last John Scalzi book. I felt as though I paid $12.99 for the privilege of being able to read a trailer for a book. I've read some of the reviews here on the store, and I find it hard to believe that this book got so many 4 and 5 star ratings. Even the current top positive review (with 4 stars?) complains that it's only half a story. Scalzi may be, as the current top critical review (with 2 stars) states, "A terrific author", but this book has made it a sure thing that I have no desire to verify that.

So I loved his Old Man's War series and this is a very good book, just much different than that series. I had to admit that I was fascinated by so many things in this book, first off the setting way way way in the future of course, but it could have been ancient Rome with updated weapons and travel it seems to me. Then his take on interstellar travel, all authors use their take on worm holes and stuff like that to travel, along with warping space and time. I thought his take on it, The Flow, was pretty inventive. The plot was pretty good, rich people fighting over control of assets and their place in the pecking order. But who'd have thought that 3000 years in the future, society would be more feudal than Olde England in the 1500's, and the Guilds sounded a lot like the great trading companies like the Dutch East India Company and the British East India Company. And where did he come up with the title Emperox? For humans thousands of years removed from Earth they had a lot of odd names for him to think up, I would like to ask him where he came up with some of those names, is there a random character name generator app?

Anyway once I got rolling it was a hard book to put down. The flow of the plot was fast paced and kept you looking forward to what was soming next. The ending of course sets things up for at least 1 follow up book, maybe more if the future his galaxy was facing at the end can be changed. Also I did find it odd that in this Universe there were no Aliens.

Characters with a limited vocabulary are much like a stand-up comic constantly dropping the F-bomb during their act -- at some point the shock value wears off and you begin to pay closer attention to the content of their act (or the lack thereof).

That's the big problem that I have with this book. I think that Kiva' s character and dominance (as well as her mother's) could have been established without the language.

I enjoyed the "Old Man's War" series and I appreciate the author exploring a different universe with this book. I'm not sure that there is enough here to compel me to continue reading this series, however.

In spite of being described on its cover as an "interstellar epic" this book is anything but. At best it is a slim introduction to said epic, bound to go to who knows how many volumes before it reaches any sort of conclusion. Each volume at thirteen or fourteen bucks a pop for a digital version you can't even lend to a friend.

I've enjoyed Scalzi's work enough that I pre-ordered this novel. Having read it (and enjoyed what there was of it) I feel profoundly cheated.

The problem has nothing to do with length -- plenty of excellent complete novels have been written in fewer pages. Here though, critical elements of the story are left undeveloped at the end of the novel. I don't want to spoil what there is of the plot, so suffice it to say that there are no meaningufl resolutions of conflicts facing any of the main characters except, I suppose, for the one who dies and another relatively minor villian. The resolution of the only interesting plot question that is revealed is blindingly obvious half way through the book. So no payoff there either.

I have no objection to setting a plot line that sets up a sequel. The series seems to be almost an imperative in sci-sfi publishing these days. But that's quite different from a novel that basically ends with a "to be continued" on all fronts that anyone cares about.

I'd hold off on buying this until the rest of the novel appears in a sequel at which point perhaps the price will have dropped.

John Scalzi is one of my absolute favorite authors going right now, and I really enjoyed this book, but it's very obviously meant to be part one of at least two. I know the trend is multi volume sagas that you have to buy each part to get the whole story, but up to now Scalzi has avoided that particular pitfall, you don't actually have to have read Old Man's War to enjoy the series. This story, as good as it is, isn't finished. Even if I didn't already know there was a part two coming I would have known part two was not just coming, but required to get the complete story for this book and for that I have to knock off one star.

Scalzi has apparently forgotten that entertaining his readers is more important than entertaining himself. Although the book was reasonably well paced, most of his characters, as drawn, were not particuarly likable. And the ending of the book [NOT A SPOILER ALERT!] stinks! For the first time in the Acknowledgements section at the end of the book, Scalzi reveals, in a childish, crowing manner, that this book is the first in perhaps a TEN part series. I'm sorry, but if your book represents the first in a series of books it should say so on the cover of the book or in the the store description. I'm really not interested in "franchise" books that enrich everyone except the reader. The overall tone of this book and Red Shirts is such that Scalzi comes off as some sort of pre-pubescent adolescent who enjoys playing with himself mentally rather than challenging or entertaining his readers.

So save yourself some money and some grief and find a more mature author.

Scalzi started his career writing books that were smart and had a certain whimsical joy to them. This book lacks the joy, and quite honestly isn't as smart as it thinks it is. It's a bit of a stretch to even say that there are any original characters besides possibly one foul mouthed person who is unapologetic. I hope his next book doesn't follow this trend

I was really looking forward to reading another book by this author after thoroughly enjoying his Old Man War series. This book is so vastly disappointing it makes me feel like it is not even written by the same author. There is a very thin story line and more F-words than I can count really for no reason. Not a satisfying read. Save your money.

I bought this on Kindle right after it came out, because I just couldn't stand waiting for a hardcover copy to arrive. I love Scalzi's other books, and was highly anticipating a great read with this one.

Like others have already said, this book is disappointingly short. With his Old Man's War series, The End of All Things (I believe) was cut up into smaller chunks and sold almost as short stories. When you bought those, at least, you knew what you were getting. With this, though, I was really expecting an entire stand-alone story, complete with denouement. Sadly, that's a bit lacking in this book. It felt enough like it ended before it was over that I actually went and made sure that I bought the full copy, not a preview.

I'll probably buy the next book, because Scalzi, but I'm really disappointed that this one was so lacking.

I'm a big Scalzi fan, but to be honest this book felt phoned in. I didn't really particularly like any of the characters, the plot was a little thin, and the sci-fi part of science fiction really wasn't there. This book could have just as easily been written about 1800s sailing ships with a shift in the trade winds.

The one area I did think he tried hard at was throwing in some twists in the plot, but again, it just didn't come off as science fiction. Maybe I just don't like books that have a majority of thier "action" taking place in boardrooms.

Scalzi has fallen prey to the new commandments that all new books can have no strong male characters, must mention at least two homosexual relationships, and can only cover subjects deemed safe by the SJW crowd. Maybe I'm just old school, but I preferred my sci-fi where humans cohabitated with aliens and it wasn't made a big deal of- it was just taken for granted that it wasn't​ a big deal. Pushing agendas in your writing will lose you many readers as it gains you, and drive you into a corner that you'll find yourself trapped in.

I'm giving this one star not because I did not like the book. The book itself is "OK"....What I HATED was the PRICE of this short little set-up book. Because that is all it is....a very short background setup story to begin a long and no doubt very profitable series (at those kind of prices, how can it fail!!) It's just an obnoxious money grab by TOR AND Scalzi whom I like......as a writer....his politics and opinions of current world events.I could care less about. But his stories are entertaining and enjoyable. And I'm sure this series will be entertaining and enjoyable....if I ever choose to read it because right now I am totally ticked for allowing myself to pay the store 12.95 for a DIGITAL copy of this extremely short book. Heck they are selling the PAPERBACK version for 7 bucks.If they had sold me this book at $5 I'd have been fine with it but truthfully there are hundreds of great SciFi Indi writers out there that sell wonderful SciFi....for $2.99 and theirs are WHOLE books. Not this kind of short little teaser crapola....

Short Review: Many different technical and narrative problems combine with a slow, heavy-dialogue story to create an easy but boring read that leaves you largely apathetic about reading the next installment, and for that matter, about anything you just read.

Long Review: I'm really bummed out about this. I've read several "Old Man's War" stories (but lost interest after the 3rd book), and I actually gave 4 stars to "Lock-In", so I was expecting something a little more streamlined and compact than an "Old Man's War" novel, but more expansive and imaginative than "Lock-In". Unfortunately, this novel is neither of those things, and suffers from both technical and narrative issues that left me ready for the story to conclude when I was still about 25% out from the ending.

First, don't think of this as a sci-fi novel; it's really not. In structure and pace, this reads more like a 19th century society novel. Indeed, the political and social structures in this Empire, which are only loosely explored, sound more like a feudal system of some kind, with all of the Dukes and Lords and Ladies and other obscure titles. And while I recognize that Scalzi's style has consistently been dialogue-heavy with little emphasis on exposition or scene-setting, here it just does not work well. Elsewhere, it's fine; I enjoyed "Lock-In" and "Old Man's War". But for a story that takes place multiple thousands of years from now in a completely new setting, leading with long bits of dialogue and throwing in the occasional narration does not work and often leaves the reader wondering what to picture is happening at any moment.

Speaking of which, I found it highly improbable that 2,000+ years from now, people would still be speaking modern English. There was no indication this was a sort of retro-translation for the benefit of the reader, and in fact, with the use of some very specific slang and profanity, it's clear that the characters are in-fact using modern English. There was no real attempt to portray an evolution of language in this story, and with the use of some already outdated idioms, it really broke the idea of this being set thousands of years into the future.

Ironically, I deduct points for Scalzi not doing a lot of, or even a satisfactory, amount of exposition and non-dialogue narrative, because when he DOES engage in exposition for the benefit of the reader, it tends to be long after a question of setting or an unexplained in-fiction reference occurs. Further, the narration in this story tends to be some kind of hybrid between focused 3rd person and 1st person, in that the tense is 3rd person, but the unnecessary use of slang and profanity in non-dialogue narration tends to break the narrative lines and read like a nearly lazy attempt at story writing. I want to be clear I'm not being insulting for the sake of being insulting; to me, it literally felt lazy, like Scalzi couldn't be bothered to cleanly separate dialogue from the background narrative. It's one thing to do some tongue-in-cheek bit of narrative humor, it's another thing entirely to have the non-dialogue narrative full of profanity.

The story itself also suffers from problems. The nature of "the Flow" is never clearly explained in the novel, and after a few paragraphs that hand-wave some cliché jargon around in a way that almost literally says "it's really complicated, no one understands it, so just go with it", we never learn anything else about it. Odd, considering the entire premise for this novel is built upon this one idea. (this is to say nothing of the fact that, personally, I think the concept of the Flow is illogical, inconsistent, and impractical, and the idea that, after literally 1,000s of years, no one has figured out another way to travel is just weird)

Finally, none of the characters in this novel were relatable or even more than two-dimensional. Just about no one receives any physical description. A few primary characters become something approximating an idea of a real person, but other than that: one of the villains is a villain in name only; another is weirdly incompetent but in such a way that they are neither evil nor confused about what they're doing; another villain is pretty much just a name and an idea with a few bit parts; another character that is of little consequence to anything but is focused upon nonetheless is just cartoonishly profane, forthcoming, and brash, if not petulant (they would have been more appropriate as a pirate, not a legitimate businessperson); and most other characters are largely just titles or ideas, but not PEOPLE. It's weird, because I seem to recall Scalzi's other works doing a much better job of creating relatable, human characters. Here, though, by the end of things, I really didn't care about what happened to anyone, because I really wasn't made to care. A few high-level existential threats are not enough to make you care about INDIVIDUALS.

As novels go in general, this is neither a difficult nor interesting read. This will sound weird now, but I do enjoy Scalzi's easy-to-read dialogue-centric narrative style. His writing in this respect is snappy, fun, witty, and entertaining. But in my experience, that's not the kind of style that lends well to sci-fi, at least not what is supposed to a serious "the sky is falling" style of sci-fi. In "Lock-In", it worked well. But for a story with so many hinted new world concepts, it leaves the reader wondering when the story will start moving forward. In this case, you're nearly done with the novel and you realize "wait, you mean the story is all of these people just talking and yelling at each other and events happen in the background when then they're not talking and yelling?"

The one and two stars reviews correctly assess this novel. This is no more that a long winded introduction to a new series. The problem isn't that this novel is the first of a series, after all, The Fellowship of the Ring for example was the first of a series. The problem is that the novel is boring with not particularly likeable characters and a central story line that is not at all engaging. In other words I could live with the fact that this novel is only a set up to a larger story if it introduced compelling characters and a teased a fascinating story to come but that is not the case. Save your money, believe the bad reviews and give this one a pass. Pick the book up in the discount rack a year from now, you'll have missed nothing.

As a standalone novel, it's mediocre at best. It's one thing to end with some plot lines dangling for the sequels; it's another to leave all of them dangling. I listened to the audible version, and had a lot of trouble getting into the book because the setup took a long time to really get interesting, and then I checked my progress, only to find I was 40% done already. This leads to rushing through the final acts, resolving nothing, and generally leaving readers with a profound sense of disappointment at having wasted their time reading this obviously incomplete work. Maybe it will get better with a sequel, but there's no way I'm preordering that one.

I was eagerly awaiting the release of this book. I'm a sucker for anything about space empires and I do generally enjoy Scalzi's work. This book completely met my expectations. It was a quick read, I was able to read it in four days, I'm normally a much slower reader but as Scalzi works are usually dialog heavy, they read quickly. The characters were interesting, though I think some were a little over the top with the profanity and coarseness. My only frustration is that this is clearly half of a book. The story is not finished and it ends just after 300 pages. Based on Scalzi's writing schedule, it will be at least two years before we find out how this very interesting story ends. That's a long time to spend thinking about how these characters are going to get out of the situation Scalzi has created for them.

I was a huge fan of the entire Old Man’s War series, but hungry for more Scalzi after that I turned to Red Shirts and was pretty let down by the second half (in which it became entirely too meta/self-aware and stopped being fun). So I went into this skeptical, but hopeful, as I suspected crunchier sci-fi/space opera is where Scalzi really shines. What I got was better than I feared, but still somewhat less than I hoped for.
We’re introduced to a new universe that in some ways resembles the socially liberal future of Old Man’s War (which is good). We get some strong female and male leads, distinct personalities (though not necessarily dynamic ones), believable social mores, and its clear reasonable early on that characters can and will be sacrificed for the sake of plot. All of that is good. However, while the book was fun and rapid to digest, I found myself somewhat unsatisfied. I have seen other readers suggest that it felt a bit like information and developments might be being held back as this was intended as the first book in a fairly long series from the outset, and perhaps that’s part of the problem...but story felt almost rushed to me. For all this is meant as a galaxy spanning empire with complex political and social systems and scheming (perhaps a send up to Dune as others have said), it feels curiously light on details concerning what are undoubtedly intricate plots and socio-political and business connections, even where they would be directly relevant to the plot. We get some straight up exposition about it from the adorably vulgar Kiva Largos and the eminently hateable Nohamapetans, as well as from the memory room, but I feel like other major houses are largely ignored, as is the role of the Church. Why have such a rich and varied socio-political system if we aren’t going to explore its intricacies a bit?
And maybe it’s just because I loved Old Man’s War so much, but the storytelling as a whole seems rushed...at least until the end of the book which seems to stop too abruptly in media res.
However, at least I found myself interested in and curious about what was going to happen, something I couldn’t say for Redshirts. So i’ll Likely read the next book when it comes out and see if taken together the series seems to be more promising. I’ll definitely want an improvement over this to go beyond book two though.

A fun read. The novel moves at a rapid pace, weaving stories together expertly, racing to a somewhat satisfying conclusion, and leaving you wanting more. It's very much in the style of the Old Man's War saga, but seems more robust in structure and plotting to me.

I enjoyed this modern riff on how empires end, which given our current climate seems particularly timely. I can't wait to see where Mr. Scalzi takes this, and I especially want to read more about Kiva Lagos.

First off; I've enjoyed all of Scalzi's work. I'm a fan. I like the wise-ass characters and the way they interact, the coherent plots, and the action. New readers who want a stand-alone book, like all the books in the Old Man's War series, should read his other books. This one is, admittedly, the first in what will probably be a 13-book series, and the word "serial" pops into mind because the end has a lot of open threads. So, go in with your eyes open. There is *some* closure, but it's portentious. So, taking the book for what it is meant to be, I rate it a 4. I did enjoy it, and will likely shell out for the next 12 books.

Having that out of the way, readers may also note that there are a lot of "1" votes on the book. It's worth noting from the "verified purchases" that very few of these reviewers (3 or 4 at this time) actually bought the book. Scalzi has a bit of a feud going on with someone (you can Google it) where that someone preloaded his reviews with fake bad reviews produced by his evil minions. Anyway, if a review has no content to speak of, it's probably not real. A shame idiocy like this has to infect the book review process.

This was painful to read. The characters are obsessed with sex, the houses are nothing but virtue signalling, and the dialogue is all in one voice. I thought he could write dialogue? The copyediting is good.

I keep reading books by Scalzi, and I keep finding them underwhelming. He has interesting ideas and can develop a good plot and good characters, but everything strikes the same tone: tongue-in-cheek and crass. It worked for me in Old Man’s War because it came across as the narrator’s point of view and suited his character. Here, as well as Redshirts, it just comes across as the author holding the story at a distance, like I don’t take this very seriously and neither should you. The character of Kiva Lagos is case in point: we are long past the point where a character dropping f-bombs in every sentence is shocking or bold, and here it comes across as parody, but then why should I take this novel or it’s characters seriously? As I think of it, this is very much the same issue I had with Redshirts. Scalzi shows glimpses that he can really write some moving scenes, but he buries it all with this crass style that is just overdone, and frankly seems lazy for an otherwise talented author. A little but of that can really work to lighten the mood, but this novel dwells so heavily there but isn’t comedic. I found it detracted from my enjoyment.

BTW the headline for my review is inspired by the name of a spaceship in this book, which inexplicably is the title of a Cat Stevens song. One of these little things that makes you scratch your head and say, did I just read that? Anyway I think Scalzi has decided he wants to live low (or lazy) with his recent writing.

Meh.

A big fat 'meh' is all I can muster for Scalzi's latest, The Collapsing Empire. There's potential here, interesting concepts and creative ideas, and even some clever plot twists. And yet, it feels like Scalzi is mailing it in.

Due to a discovery of the Flow, humanity has managed to overcome the light speed limit and has colonized the stars, or at least some of them. Still, the planets that can support life without a habitat are few and far between. Most still live in habitats, on planetoids, on asteroids, in orbit around gas giants...but rarely in the open air of an Earth-like planet. In fact, Earth has been lost to the changes in the Flow, disappeared a millennium ago. In the centuries since, the Interdependency has risen. An empire comprised of corporate, religious, and royal families controls the whole of known space, dividing it into monopolies and regions of control.

Then, unexpectedly, The Flow begins to change, and with it the balance of power.

Scalzi's strength is his ability to imagine a universe of competing interests and alliances and to develop a politics between those players. His weakness, in contrast, is a story that shows as much as it tells. The Collapsing Empire felt weighed down with info dump after info dump, and even if some of the dumps came during the natural flow of conversation between characters, Scalzi doesn't have any problem with breaking the fourth wall and directly informing the reader about a detail or piece of information. On the rare occasion that he does this, it feels like the third person omniscient is about to slide into first-person narration.

That said, the book might as well have been told in the first person. So much of it takes place in dialogue that I was hard pressed to find anything happen at all that doesn't occur outside of the course of a conversation or is recounted between two characters. This might not even be so bad, but all of the characters sound like clones of each other--essentially, just like Scalzi himself. The few exceptions are when he adds a few more f-bombs to a character's dialogue and has another character comment how the first character's dialogue is distinguished by how much she swears.

Super annoying. It's like reading a whole novel in one voice. And that voice is Scalzi's, for better or for worse. 

Oh, and sex. Like so many of his books, Scalzi seems to have a fixation with free love and easy sex and no concept of romance or the ramifications of easy sex. It's nauseating. 

So, to sum up: there's potential here, but the book is severely overrated. I'd rate it a 2 and a half stars, barely three.

I am a big John Scalzi fan, and his latest book doesn't disappoint- interesting characters that you learn to care about (or despise), a larger than life problem that they have to deal with, ending with a cliffhanger. I'm sad I read this right away, I should have waited until the second book was published so I could continue the story. Keep them coming, John!

I've been a John Scalzi fan since I first stumbled across "Old Man's War" almost a decade ago. This novel reminds me once again why I enjoy Scalzi's work. The characters are interesting, the plot is interesting, the writing is engaging, and the science fiction appears to be internally consistent with the rules that Mr Scalzi defines.

If I hadn't had to go to work, I would have finished the book in one sitting. My only complaint came at the end when I realized that there was no more story to read, and that I had to wait until the next novel in the series comes out next year to continue the story. Patience comes hard for me when waiting for the next novel in this series.

I recommend this novel. If your a fan of John Scalzi's writing, you'll enjoy this book. If you're new to Scalzi, I think that this book is a good introduction to his writing.

‘The Collapsing Empire’ was a perfectly serviceable space opera. It has intrigue and excitement; plucky heroes and dastardly plans; explosions, spaceships and hand-waving physics; sex, swearing, and even the occasional abrupt exit via airlock. Do you like cool snarky banter? How about a young, unready Emperox thrust onto the throne, about to face an unexpected threat to her Empire? If so, you should stop and go read this book, because I’m just going to complain about these things for the rest of the review.

This isn’t to say it’s a bad book, by the way. Just that these are disappointing things that are more so because they were also, in a way, expected. The first is that Scalzi still only has one voice for his characters – they’re all cool, collected snark machines with a quip for every occasion. The story opens with a mutiny aboard a spaceship, and after the mutineers cut their way onto the bridge, they engage in a minute of banter before another unrelated emergency interrupts them. I seriously thought that it was a setup that was going to turn out to be a drill; after all the talk about how all the loyalists were going to be killed so that they could sell their cargo of arms to rebels, the first thing everyone does is exchange wry remarks about their past service together, and how regrettable it is that they had to engage in a spot of bloodshed. This wouldn’t be quite so bad except that everyone else in the book has this personality as well, and so it’s less that this captain is a cool cucumber, and more that there’s only one Scalzi ‘voice’ that all the characters speak with.

The other disappointment is more existential – we’re seeing the collapse of this empire entirely through the eyes of its uppermost echelons. Our viewpoint characters are sons and daughters of nobility, at the very peak of the social ladders; the most ‘relatable’ characters are the son of an exiled nobleman with secret scientific knowledge (who is also watched over by imperial guards) and the new Emperox herself, who was her father’s bastard and raised away from the throne because she was never supposed to be heir. This did not, however, take her far enough away that she appears to have any criticisms of the way things are run, or any desire to _change_ the empire in any way; until this current crisis, she was mostly trying to avoid an arranged marriage so as to not dilute the power of the throne. At one point she confronts the memory of the first Emperox about the myth of the founding of the empire, and how it was all a scam to gather and control power… and all I could think of was that her University education had failed her. Everything we’re shown about the social structures of her world are about power and control, from the explicit noble monopolies on goods and services to the not-quite prison planet in near-constant revolt against its Ducal overlord. Perhaps her education avoided this sort of thinking – I might be wary about what I was allowed to teach an Emperox’s daughter, whether or not she was actually in succession – but there’s no hint in the book that this was deliberate. And so when talk turns to how the empire has to save its citizens from the coming collapse, I have to wonder, do they even know who the citizens are?

Space opera is about the power of individuals to change the fate of a galaxy, but also about those individuals who don’t _seem_ to have the power to do so. Luke was a moisture farmer on backwater world; Leia a princess, but a princess in exile from an empire that no longer recognized her; Han was a smuggler with a price on his head and a ship held together with duct tape. The ruling head of an empire, the heirs of noble estates so powerful that they are above the law and can threaten to ruin lives on a whim, aren’t the sorts of heroes that I’m looking for in this sort of book.
(Contrast with, eg, The Goblin Emperor, by Katherine Addison, which is also about an unprepared heir suddenly elevated, but who actually _has_ opinions on their new political situation. It’s also not at all trying to be the same sort of book, so this might be an unfair comparison, but I’m going to make it anyway because if you’ve read this far, you deserve a good recommendation…)

John Scalzi's trademark blend of wit, interesting (if sometimes outrageous) ideas, and bang-up plotting is fully on display here. The main outrageous idea is that a small number of star systems are connected together by "the Flow," which lets ships travel between them in reasonable (months) periods of time without exceeding the speed of light. This is convenient, because none of these systems individually has what it takes to sustain human life, so they are heavily interdependent. Indeed, the "Empire" is formally referred to as the Interdependency, and is ruled by a triple detente of the Guilds, the Church, and the Emperox.

As the story begins, the Emperox is dying, and his daughter, Cardenia, is coming to terms with the reality that - due to the death of the Emperox's intended heir in a racing accident - she is about to become the ruler of the Interdependency.

In the meanwhile, trouble is brewing among the Guilds. The House of Lagos, in the person of their matriarch's daughter, Kiva, has just arrived at the planet End. End, I hasten to say, is the one exception to the above statement about inability to independently sustain human life; it is a highly Earth-like planet. It is also subject to constant (one or two per decade) attempted revolutions against whoever is currently the Duke, because End is also - being literally the far point of the Interdependency - where the dregs and political exiles are sent by a merciful government.

Kiva finds that her house's trading privileges at End have suspended, due to a virus that got into some of the fruit Lagos had previously sold to End farmers; but in reality due to the presence of rival Guild Nohamapetan's Ghreni, one of the three leading members of that family, and well-ensconced with the Duke of End.

Also in the meanwhile, an obscure noble on End has received proof of his theory - that the Flow is about to collapse. He sends his son to warn the Emperox, but things happen.

This is a story of multi-layered betrayals, with pirates, rebels, nobles, Emperoxes, dead Emperoxes who can advise the living one, and much more. It is a great deal of fun.

Physics rules us all, and physics means faster than light travel is impossible--until the discovery of the Flow. It is, more or less, an interdimensional field that can be accessed at certain points and make something that at least functions as faster than light travel possible. The Flow makes possible an interstellar empire, the Interdependency, whose ethos requires that each inhabited system be dependent on the others for some essentials.

It's a hedge against interstellar war.

It's a guarantee of power and control for the rules or the empire.

And now the Flow is proving to be less stable than long assumed. In fact, it's collapsing, and the empire can't survive.

We follow the increasingly alarming event from the viewpoints of three different people: Emperox Grayland II, the brand-new Emperox, who will also be the last Emperox; Marce Claremont, a Flow physicist who has been working on project secretly funded by the newly deceased Emperox, Grayland's father; and Lady Kiva Lagos, a profane, profit-driven businesswoman who discovers she has ethical feelings about intentionally leaving trillions of people to die when their access to essential supplies ends with the collapse of the Flow.

Every inhabited system will be cut off fron every other inhabited system.

It has already begun, and will be over in no more than a decade. That's how much time they have to find a way for humanity to survive the collapse.

This is told in Scalzi's typically fast-paced, funny, easy-reading style. It's a lot of fun.

And it's about the impending extinction of humanity, when no inhabited system, except possibly the exile system of End, will have the means to keep its inhabitants eating and breathing after the Flow collapses.

I love Scalzi's characters. They feel real and likable, with flaws and virtues and insights and blind spots. His storytelling is clean, and simple, and always more complex than it looks at first.

The Interdependency is a brilliant means of preventing interstellar war, by ensuring everyone knows they depend on everyone else. The Interdependency is a scam, created to enrich the ruling class and keep them permanently in power. Both things are true. The first is not made less true by the fact that the second thing was the founding purpose of the creation of the Interdepency and the Church of Interdependence. The collapse of the Flow will end the scam, but also quite possibly wipe out humanity.

And for all the light, fun feeling of the storytelling, it gradually becomes clear that Scalzi isn't going to give anyone any easy outs.

While several plot threads are brought to satisfying conclusions, there is a substantial cliffhanger here, and there will be at least one more book. I say buy it now, and don't wait to read it, but be aware that not everything is resolved in this book.

Recommended.

I bought this book.

John Scalzi has done it again in "Collapsing Empire" he produces a universe where interplanetary travel is facilitated by a vast river in space called the Flow that allows the Interdependency to travel to other planets but it is beginning to change as it did once before cutting humanity off from Earth. It is discovered by a man on the last planet on the line called End. Who sends his son to warn the rest of the Plutocracy that is the Interdependency and it's new Empresse.
Whether you see this tale as an allegory for the Earth and Global Warming or just a Space Opera it is good fast reading I read it in 2 days and I left wanting more. So if Mr. Scalzi is planning a series of books on this or just this one this book is on a par with Early Heinlein and Asimov it might even be on a par with the Foundation Series.

Like the last couple Old Man's War books, this book had high spots and low spots. The opening chapter was a wonderful reminder of why I like Scalzi's early books. Action, humor and science interwoven in a delightfully told tale. The next few chapters were a reminder of why I don't like Scalzi's recent books. Deliberately unlikeable characters, politics and plodding plot line. As I continued I started to warm up to the unlikeable character. Then we finally hit about 40% in. I knew from reading reviews that this book was kind of an analogy for climate change and climate change deniers, but at least one review assured me that that analogy was easy enough to ignore. And for the first 40% of the book it was. Then we hit our section where Scalzi digs out the Acme brand sledgehammers and pounds us over the head with it. And that's when I stopped reading. The book was only so-so up to that point, and I read to get away from my anxieties about the world, not to be dragged into a world where my face is rubbed in them.

‘The Collapsing Empire’ is the first book in Scalzi’ new series. We are in the future. Humans have spread throughout the universe using ‘the Flow’ as the only means to travels the large expansion of space between the colonies. The Flow is a number of conduits connecting locations in space. No is quite sure how the Flow works. Because of the Flow the people have created a form of government. Families or Houses are given control over a product. A monopoly. Each families monopoly gives them a means of control and they supply the other colonies their product. Earth, once connected via the Flow, has since been lost. Earth’s Flow conduits have disappeared.

As we are introduced to this universe, we learn that the ruler or Emperox is dying and his daughter is taking over control of the Interdependency. We are introduced to the Nohamapetan family who have been working to gain control or get a prime position of power. The drama unfolds as the Emperox stuggles with what she is moving into. Dealing with this new role and the plans of the Nohamapetan’s. We are also taken to the other end of the Flow system, called End.

The book is a good introduction to what will be a series of books. I have read a few of Scalzi’ books. While this is not my favorite I did enjoy it. There is a major shift coming to the Interdependency. Who will survive? The characters are enjoyable and I look forward to seeing Cardenia grow into her rule. I did find the names of the ships to be annoying. I still don’t understand why this was necessary.

I've been reading SF for over 50 years and this is the first Scalzi novel I have had the pleasure to read. Fast-paced with a 1000 year empire based on archaic principles beginning senescence just in time to start losing wormhole-like FTL access to all of its far-flung habitats.
How the protagonists and villains deal with the upcoming isolation of the empire promise to be even more entertaining than this first book in the series. I look forward, eagerly, to the next installment--and hope it is available in less than a year.

This book starts out really well, I especially like how Scalzi establishes that this is a diverse future, full of people from all races, genders, and sexuality. The Emperox is a great character, and the global warming parallel is excellent.

Unfortunately, it goes down hill fast after that. Beside's the Emperox, the book has two other POV characters, and they are both pointless. They spend the entire book trying to reach the Emperox and tell her something she already knows. Meanwhile, the book's villains are incompetent and constantly failing at everything they attempt.

Even though there's an urgent problem of hyperspace lanes collapsing, the book's plot feels slow and meandering. Things don't really get interesting until the very end, and by then it's too late. Scalzi's writing style also seems to have been heavily influenced by Red Shirts, his previous book, but not in a good way. Red Shirts was a parody, Collapsing Empire is not, but they have very similar style. At one point, a main character brutally tortures a captured enemy, and the scene is written like it's supposed to be funny.

The book is still enjoyable if humorous scifi is your thing, or if you really like Wil Wheaton's narration, but otherwise I can't recommend it.

This was an excellent story with some great female characters. Kiva is a character I look forward to in the next book. I haven’t liked a character in a novel that much in a long time. She’s hilarious, strong, and borderline psychotic at times. In The novel itself, the emperox takes over from her dying father who thinks she will do a poor job. He doesn’t tell her why he feels this way, he just leaves her with one clue in the name he tells her to select when she takes on the role of Emperox. It is a dire warning of things to come.

This novel, like many science fiction novels, suffers from an annoying problem...it stops dead in the middle of the story. It cuts off at a point where you feel you should be able to turn the next page and find the next chapter or even a paragraph to wrap up the comments in the last sentence, as is the case in this book. I don’t know if this is part of a trilogy as many science fiction books are or not. It may just be a two part set. However, this is a frustrating problem amongst science fiction writers. There is simply no reason that a novel cannot be self-contained. It does not need to end in a cliff-hanger to have readers read the next book. If that’s the only way you can get them to come back, your book is poor. This novel was excellent and should not have put its readers through such a farce.

John Scalzi's latest novel "The Collapsing Empire" is another complex political space opera, in the best sense of the term. Although it has spaceships and battles and Imperial guards and all that, it's really about people and organizations reacting when scientists discover an impending catastrophe. The catastrophe itself doesn't fully manifest by the end of this novel but that's almost beside the point, as our protagonists struggle more against competing plans to turn this to advantage than against the problem itself.

The lead is an Everyman (female) thrust by circumstance into greatness and getting by, mostly by letting the professionals around her Do Their Job. I'm not sure that she makes any decisions other than to prioritize the safety of humanity, which is after all Her Job.

The liveliest character is a Merchant Prince(ss) in the role of a young Nicholas van Rijn (more profane and less restrained) whose firmly established sense of priorities includes working hard and partying harder. After one rather violent crisis she woos a survivor who objects that how can they get together after she was prepared to sacrifice him; she replies why complain about something that didn't happen, and let's get busy.

Never before have I seen a plot point hinge on whether a political faction relied upon a scientific paper that was not properly peer reviewed. Ha!

Scalzi is a master of his craft and if you expected a story that runs solidly and urgently from an explosive opening to a climactic world altering ending, you got it BUT it's obviously the beginning of a series - it sets up several problems and then doesn't resolve them. The very last spoken line points to an unwritten story to follow (or else is the author's prank.)

Don't leave readers hanging , brother Scalzi. Let's see the sequel soon!

When an Empire is built on certain things, like regular crops, the backs of serfs, or an intragalatic Flow (think gulf stream or jet stream - where people used the quick travel benefit long before they understood how fluid dynamics on a global scale worked), and the certain things break, The Collapsing Empire results.

John Scalzi has nailed this tragic tale with his normal snide humor (toned down just enough for the disaster about to ensue).

It's a tale as old as time. Viking populations grew doubling and tripling during a couple centuries of warm weather and active crops in the north; when the weather changed stopped, Vikings started raiding instead of trading as their people starved to death and eventually escaped to warmer climates except for a few hardy souls unable to leave their home. The Incas, Fedual Europe, and the Roman Empire all fell because plague wiped out communication (messengers) and food production (serfs/slaves) - it didn't matter if the healthy rich remained when all the fields are fallow.

Now the Interdependency will fall as the Flow slows and stops.

The results will be hideous for a culture artificially sustained for a thousand years by forcing interdependency between systems - no single system can survive on its on by design. A far-flung gestalt of independent (yet interdependent) space stations and bio-domes on inhospitable planets are about to be cut off from everything. Machines will fail as unavailable parts will prevent maintenance; food unable to grow in certain bio-spheres will mean rampant malnutrition as various required nutrients are not consumed (like citrus/vitamin C and scurvy); ... the list goes on.

Mr. Scalzi has done an excellent job of setting up the world of The Collapsing Empire. I'm almost scared to follow this dark rabbit hole, even though I think he will concentrate on the areas where humanity will survive and succeed rather than the systems doomed to failure. The fact remains the world-building setup of this first novel of the series establishes the second and third world-building levels of the collapse and I will know what is happening "off-stage" without him needing to show it. (Great job!)

The question I hope will be asked by someone in book two is "If the Flow's collapse can be tracked, can we predict where and how it will turn back on again?"

Note: One of the main characters speaks nearly exclusively with the f-word. I've run into this in about three or four books now by different authors. I really hope it is a phase the publishing industry gets over soon, because *tiresome*.

Note: One of the main characters uses money and position to force people into a situation where saying "no" to sex is impossible - people who work for this particular MC's family mostly (think skanky boss). If the MC was male, readers would be up-in-arms. It should be no different because the MC is female. But she isn't the sympathetic part of the MC cast (another female and male hold those slots).

The cast has two sympathetic, compassionate people (who you hope end up with each other). And two power-hungry monsters (and their clans) who hate each other and will be using the chaos of The Collapsing Empire to continuing their long-standing feud.

This book both presents a method of interplanetary/interstellar travel... and immediately destroys it!

Gotta love a book that sets up a premise and rips it down, so it can create a universe that is already used to "how things have always been" and see what happens when that comfort is suddenly shaken.

Scalzi does another good job of world-building, while also including his usual doses of humor, although this time with a little more bawdy/lewd language than usual. (A point off for that - he's better than mere sex scenes and f-bombs.)

Curious to see what the next book in the series holds, but I'm still much more of a fan of the "Old Man's War" series.

Side note: He may be "off his game" with this book, as the acknowledgments section of the book points out, because of the election in 2016. If his work has suffered this much just because of an election season, I can't imagine how much TDS is going to impact the quality of his follow-up books. These may get worse, people!

With THE COLLAPSING EMPIRE, John Scalzi starts off (I believe) his new contract with Tor in typical Scalzi fashion. The first book in The Interdependency series contains everything the reader has come to expect out of a John Scalzi novel: snappy dialogue, engaging characters, a good dose of action...and something to think about. Scalzi takes a space opera and makes it relevant to our day, filling it with commentary that fits with what's going on in the world today while at the same time not hitting the reader over the head with it. The novel is entertaining and fast paced while at the same time giving us some pause to think about how an interdependent society - not unlike ours - would survive a catastrophic event.

The Interdependency - not only the title of the book but the titular empire - is a group of planets that are connected by the Flow. The Flow is what allows travel between star systems. Yes, it's yet another way to get around the FTL problem, but it also provides the mechanism by which the story is driven. The Flow is not a two-way tube like your local subway might be; it's actually a series of tubes (I call them tubes, for a lack of a better word, I guess) that travel in a single direction. Thus, there are two tubes between planets - one outgoing and one incoming. A ship enters and exits the Flow via "shoals". There are entrance shoals and exit shoals. However, there is no choice as to where the shoals are placed. In fact, most shoals are near planets that are uninhabitable; the residents of the planets life in artificial habitats. Since the residents of planets cannot provide everything they need for themselves, the Flow is not only used as an interplanetary highway carrying passenger ships, but as trade routes.

The action of the story takes place on two planets: Hub, where a vast majority of the Flow routes converge, and End, the planet furthest away from Hub. Hub is, naturally, the seat of the Empire; End is the dumping ground for criminals, malcontents, undesirables. It is important to note that in order to make the Interdependency work, the Empire is made up of a system of, for lack of a better term, royal families, who negotiate trade deals, fight amongst themselves, and of course, with each other. The system as set up is ripe for political intrigue, power struggles (both within and between families), and plots within plots within plots.

Sound familiar? Sure, there's a bit of an homage to Dune in this book (and since Scalzi has said that he started writing the book in a Dune-like tone as he wanted to try that kind of writing style, but eventually abandoned it as not working this time around, this makes a bit of sense). Royal houses, scheming, backstabbing, and plots to take over the Empire are all either Dune or, as I now think about it, Game of Thrones elements. But unlike Dune, which really doesn't, at least in my opinion, have an impending major catastrophe on its hands, THE COLLAPSING EMPIRE has one big problem on its hands: what happens when the Flow begins to shift, changing the travel and trade routes, abandoning some planets altogether? All right in the middle of one family trying to wrest the Empire from another? In Dune, the resolution to the problem at hand is which house is stronger than the rest. In THE COLLAPSING EMPIRE, the issue is how is the human race going to survive, as the connections between the planets of the Interdependency as they are known are going to disappear? Will humanity find a way to cooperate, or will it go down in a blaze of not so much glory?

This book is fun. There is a wide range of characters, from solemn to profane, from buffoons to cunning schemers. This book made me laugh - not in the out loud non-stop laughter one gets at a stand up comic's performance, but at the situations and the characters' reactions to them. By the time we get to the end of the novel, we like the people Scalzi wants us to like, dislike the people he wants us to dislike, and maybe, just maybe, feel sorry for the buffoons.

The book is masterfully narrated by Wil Wheaton. This is not the first of Scalzi's books that Wheaton has narrated. He changes voices well enough so that the listener can readily tell the difference between characters as the story goes on. His pacing seems accurate, and he certainly doesn't do anything to throw the listener out of the story.

Almost.

I've gone to conventions and listened to John Scalzi perform - and anyone who has seen him live understands that it's a performance (and even he will admit to that) - enough times to know what he would sound like in certain situations. Mentally, I can replace Wil Wheaton with John Scalzi and not miss a beat. I can sense Scalzi in not only what Wheaton is reading, but how he is reading it. To my ear, Wheaton sounds like Scalzi. And for some reason, that threw me out of this book just a little. It certainly didn't deter from my enjoyment of the book, it just unnerved me now and again.

In any event, Scalzi continues his high quality of writing with THE COLLAPSING EMPIRE. I expect no less out of the next installment of The Interdependency.

Physics rules us all, and physics means faster than light travel is impossible--until the discovery of the Flow. It is, more or less, an interdimensional field that can be accessed at certain points and make something that at least functions as faster than light travel possible. The Flow makes possible an interstellar empire, the Interdependency, whose ethos requires that each inhabited system be dependent on the others for some essentials.

It's a hedge against interstellar war.

It's a guarantee of power and control for the rules or the empire.

And now the Flow is proving to be less stable than long assumed. In fact, it's collapsing, and the empire can't survive.

We follow the increasingly alarming event from the viewpoints of three different people: Emperox Grayland II, the brand-new Emperox, who will also be the last Emperox; Marce Claremont, a Flow physicist who has been working on project secretly funded by the newly deceased Emperox, Grayland's father; and Lady Kiva Lagos, a profane, profit-driven businesswoman who discovers she has ethical feelings about intentionally leaving trillions of people to die when their access to essential supplies ends with the collapse of the Flow.

Every inhabited system will be cut off fron every other inhabited system.

It has already begun, and will be over in no more than a decade. That's how much time they have to find a way for humanity to survive the collapse.

This is told in Scalzi's typically fast-paced, funny, easy-reading style. It's a lot of fun.

And it's about the impending extinction of humanity, when no inhabited system, except possibly the exile system of End, will have the means to keep its inhabitants eating and breathing after the Flow collapses.

I love Scalzi's characters. They feel real and likable, with flaws and virtues and insights and blind spots. His storytelling is clean, and simple, and always more complex than it looks at first.

The Interdependency is a brilliant means of preventing interstellar war, by ensuring everyone knows they depend on everyone else. The Interdependency is a scam, created to enrich the ruling class and keep them permanently in power. Both things are true. The first is not made less true by the fact that the second thing was the founding purpose of the creation of the Interdepency and the Church of Interdependence. The collapse of the Flow will end the scam, but also quite possibly wipe out humanity.

And for all the light, fun feeling of the storytelling, it gradually becomes clear that Scalzi isn't going to give anyone any easy outs.

While several plot threads are brought to satisfying conclusions, there is a substantial cliffhanger here, and there will be at least one more book. I say buy it now, and don't wait to read it, but be aware that not everything is resolved in this book.

Recommended.

I bought this book.

John Scalzi has done it again in "Collapsing Empire" he produces a universe where interplanetary travel is facilitated by a vast river in space called the Flow that allows the Interdependency to travel to other planets but it is beginning to change as it did once before cutting humanity off from Earth. It is discovered by a man on the last planet on the line called End. Who sends his son to warn the rest of the Plutocracy that is the Interdependency and it's new Empresse.
Whether you see this tale as an allegory for the Earth and Global Warming or just a Space Opera it is good fast reading I read it in 2 days and I left wanting more. So if Mr. Scalzi is planning a series of books on this or just this one this book is on a par with Early Heinlein and Asimov it might even be on a par with the Foundation Series.

Like the last couple Old Man's War books, this book had high spots and low spots. The opening chapter was a wonderful reminder of why I like Scalzi's early books. Action, humor and science interwoven in a delightfully told tale. The next few chapters were a reminder of why I don't like Scalzi's recent books. Deliberately unlikeable characters, politics and plodding plot line. As I continued I started to warm up to the unlikeable character. Then we finally hit about 40% in. I knew from reading reviews that this book was kind of an analogy for climate change and climate change deniers, but at least one review assured me that that analogy was easy enough to ignore. And for the first 40% of the book it was. Then we hit our section where Scalzi digs out the Acme brand sledgehammers and pounds us over the head with it. And that's when I stopped reading. The book was only so-so up to that point, and I read to get away from my anxieties about the world, not to be dragged into a world where my face is rubbed in them.

‘The Collapsing Empire’ is the first book in Scalzi’ new series. We are in the future. Humans have spread throughout the universe using ‘the Flow’ as the only means to travels the large expansion of space between the colonies. The Flow is a number of conduits connecting locations in space. No is quite sure how the Flow works. Because of the Flow the people have created a form of government. Families or Houses are given control over a product. A monopoly. Each families monopoly gives them a means of control and they supply the other colonies their product. Earth, once connected via the Flow, has since been lost. Earth’s Flow conduits have disappeared.

As we are introduced to this universe, we learn that the ruler or Emperox is dying and his daughter is taking over control of the Interdependency. We are introduced to the Nohamapetan family who have been working to gain control or get a prime position of power. The drama unfolds as the Emperox stuggles with what she is moving into. Dealing with this new role and the plans of the Nohamapetan’s. We are also taken to the other end of the Flow system, called End.

The book is a good introduction to what will be a series of books. I have read a few of Scalzi’ books. While this is not my favorite I did enjoy it. There is a major shift coming to the Interdependency. Who will survive? The characters are enjoyable and I look forward to seeing Cardenia grow into her rule. I did find the names of the ships to be annoying. I still don’t understand why this was necessary.

I've been reading SF for over 50 years and this is the first Scalzi novel I have had the pleasure to read. Fast-paced with a 1000 year empire based on archaic principles beginning senescence just in time to start losing wormhole-like FTL access to all of its far-flung habitats.
How the protagonists and villains deal with the upcoming isolation of the empire promise to be even more entertaining than this first book in the series. I look forward, eagerly, to the next installment--and hope it is available in less than a year.

This book starts out really well, I especially like how Scalzi establishes that this is a diverse future, full of people from all races, genders, and sexuality. The Emperox is a great character, and the global warming parallel is excellent.

Unfortunately, it goes down hill fast after that. Beside's the Emperox, the book has two other POV characters, and they are both pointless. They spend the entire book trying to reach the Emperox and tell her something she already knows. Meanwhile, the book's villains are incompetent and constantly failing at everything they attempt.

Even though there's an urgent problem of hyperspace lanes collapsing, the book's plot feels slow and meandering. Things don't really get interesting until the very end, and by then it's too late. Scalzi's writing style also seems to have been heavily influenced by Red Shirts, his previous book, but not in a good way. Red Shirts was a parody, Collapsing Empire is not, but they have very similar style. At one point, a main character brutally tortures a captured enemy, and the scene is written like it's supposed to be funny.

The book is still enjoyable if humorous scifi is your thing, or if you really like Wil Wheaton's narration, but otherwise I can't recommend it.

This was an excellent story with some great female characters. Kiva is a character I look forward to in the next book. I haven’t liked a character in a novel that much in a long time. She’s hilarious, strong, and borderline psychotic at times. In The novel itself, the emperox takes over from her dying father who thinks she will do a poor job. He doesn’t tell her why he feels this way, he just leaves her with one clue in the name he tells her to select when she takes on the role of Emperox. It is a dire warning of things to come.

This novel, like many science fiction novels, suffers from an annoying problem...it stops dead in the middle of the story. It cuts off at a point where you feel you should be able to turn the next page and find the next chapter or even a paragraph to wrap up the comments in the last sentence, as is the case in this book. I don’t know if this is part of a trilogy as many science fiction books are or not. It may just be a two part set. However, this is a frustrating problem amongst science fiction writers. There is simply no reason that a novel cannot be self-contained. It does not need to end in a cliff-hanger to have readers read the next book. If that’s the only way you can get them to come back, your book is poor. This novel was excellent and should not have put its readers through such a farce.

John Scalzi's latest novel "The Collapsing Empire" is another complex political space opera, in the best sense of the term. Although it has spaceships and battles and Imperial guards and all that, it's really about people and organizations reacting when scientists discover an impending catastrophe. The catastrophe itself doesn't fully manifest by the end of this novel but that's almost beside the point, as our protagonists struggle more against competing plans to turn this to advantage than against the problem itself.

The lead is an Everyman (female) thrust by circumstance into greatness and getting by, mostly by letting the professionals around her Do Their Job. I'm not sure that she makes any decisions other than to prioritize the safety of humanity, which is after all Her Job.

The liveliest character is a Merchant Prince(ss) in the role of a young Nicholas van Rijn (more profane and less restrained) whose firmly established sense of priorities includes working hard and partying harder. After one rather violent crisis she woos a survivor who objects that how can they get together after she was prepared to sacrifice him; she replies why complain about something that didn't happen, and let's get busy.

Never before have I seen a plot point hinge on whether a political faction relied upon a scientific paper that was not properly peer reviewed. Ha!

Scalzi is a master of his craft and if you expected a story that runs solidly and urgently from an explosive opening to a climactic world altering ending, you got it BUT it's obviously the beginning of a series - it sets up several problems and then doesn't resolve them. The very last spoken line points to an unwritten story to follow (or else is the author's prank.)

Don't leave readers hanging , brother Scalzi. Let's see the sequel soon!

When an Empire is built on certain things, like regular crops, the backs of serfs, or an intragalatic Flow (think gulf stream or jet stream - where people used the quick travel benefit long before they understood how fluid dynamics on a global scale worked), and the certain things break, The Collapsing Empire results.

John Scalzi has nailed this tragic tale with his normal snide humor (toned down just enough for the disaster about to ensue).

It's a tale as old as time. Viking populations grew doubling and tripling during a couple centuries of warm weather and active crops in the north; when the weather changed stopped, Vikings started raiding instead of trading as their people starved to death and eventually escaped to warmer climates except for a few hardy souls unable to leave their home. The Incas, Fedual Europe, and the Roman Empire all fell because plague wiped out communication (messengers) and food production (serfs/slaves) - it didn't matter if the healthy rich remained when all the fields are fallow.

Now the Interdependency will fall as the Flow slows and stops.

The results will be hideous for a culture artificially sustained for a thousand years by forcing interdependency between systems - no single system can survive on its on by design. A far-flung gestalt of independent (yet interdependent) space stations and bio-domes on inhospitable planets are about to be cut off from everything. Machines will fail as unavailable parts will prevent maintenance; food unable to grow in certain bio-spheres will mean rampant malnutrition as various required nutrients are not consumed (like citrus/vitamin C and scurvy); ... the list goes on.

Mr. Scalzi has done an excellent job of setting up the world of The Collapsing Empire. I'm almost scared to follow this dark rabbit hole, even though I think he will concentrate on the areas where humanity will survive and succeed rather than the systems doomed to failure. The fact remains the world-building setup of this first novel of the series establishes the second and third world-building levels of the collapse and I will know what is happening "off-stage" without him needing to show it. (Great job!)

The question I hope will be asked by someone in book two is "If the Flow's collapse can be tracked, can we predict where and how it will turn back on again?"

Note: One of the main characters speaks nearly exclusively with the f-word. I've run into this in about three or four books now by different authors. I really hope it is a phase the publishing industry gets over soon, because *tiresome*.

Note: One of the main characters uses money and position to force people into a situation where saying "no" to sex is impossible - people who work for this particular MC's family mostly (think skanky boss). If the MC was male, readers would be up-in-arms. It should be no different because the MC is female. But she isn't the sympathetic part of the MC cast (another female and male hold those slots).

The cast has two sympathetic, compassionate people (who you hope end up with each other). And two power-hungry monsters (and their clans) who hate each other and will be using the chaos of The Collapsing Empire to continuing their long-standing feud.

I bought this on Kindle right after it came out, because I just couldn't stand waiting for a hardcover copy to arrive. I love Scalzi's other books, and was highly anticipating a great read with this one.

Like others have already said, this book is disappointingly short. With his Old Man's War series, The End of All Things (I believe) was cut up into smaller chunks and sold almost as short stories. When you bought those, at least, you knew what you were getting. With this, though, I was really expecting an entire stand-alone story, complete with denouement. Sadly, that's a bit lacking in this book. It felt enough like it ended before it was over that I actually went and made sure that I bought the full copy, not a preview.

I'll probably buy the next book, because Scalzi, but I'm really disappointed that this one was so lacking.

This book both presents a method of interplanetary/interstellar travel... and immediately destroys it!

Gotta love a book that sets up a premise and rips it down, so it can create a universe that is already used to "how things have always been" and see what happens when that comfort is suddenly shaken.

Scalzi does another good job of world-building, while also including his usual doses of humor, although this time with a little more bawdy/lewd language than usual. (A point off for that - he's better than mere sex scenes and f-bombs.)

Curious to see what the next book in the series holds, but I'm still much more of a fan of the "Old Man's War" series.

Side note: He may be "off his game" with this book, as the acknowledgments section of the book points out, because of the election in 2016. If his work has suffered this much just because of an election season, I can't imagine how much TDS is going to impact the quality of his follow-up books. These may get worse, people!

With THE COLLAPSING EMPIRE, John Scalzi starts off (I believe) his new contract with Tor in typical Scalzi fashion. The first book in The Interdependency series contains everything the reader has come to expect out of a John Scalzi novel: snappy dialogue, engaging characters, a good dose of action...and something to think about. Scalzi takes a space opera and makes it relevant to our day, filling it with commentary that fits with what's going on in the world today while at the same time not hitting the reader over the head with it. The novel is entertaining and fast paced while at the same time giving us some pause to think about how an interdependent society - not unlike ours - would survive a catastrophic event.

The Interdependency - not only the title of the book but the titular empire - is a group of planets that are connected by the Flow. The Flow is what allows travel between star systems. Yes, it's yet another way to get around the FTL problem, but it also provides the mechanism by which the story is driven. The Flow is not a two-way tube like your local subway might be; it's actually a series of tubes (I call them tubes, for a lack of a better word, I guess) that travel in a single direction. Thus, there are two tubes between planets - one outgoing and one incoming. A ship enters and exits the Flow via "shoals". There are entrance shoals and exit shoals. However, there is no choice as to where the shoals are placed. In fact, most shoals are near planets that are uninhabitable; the residents of the planets life in artificial habitats. Since the residents of planets cannot provide everything they need for themselves, the Flow is not only used as an interplanetary highway carrying passenger ships, but as trade routes.

The action of the story takes place on two planets: Hub, where a vast majority of the Flow routes converge, and End, the planet furthest away from Hub. Hub is, naturally, the seat of the Empire; End is the dumping ground for criminals, malcontents, undesirables. It is important to note that in order to make the Interdependency work, the Empire is made up of a system of, for lack of a better term, royal families, who negotiate trade deals, fight amongst themselves, and of course, with each other. The system as set up is ripe for political intrigue, power struggles (both within and between families), and plots within plots within plots.

Sound familiar? Sure, there's a bit of an homage to Dune in this book (and since Scalzi has said that he started writing the book in a Dune-like tone as he wanted to try that kind of writing style, but eventually abandoned it as not working this time around, this makes a bit of sense). Royal houses, scheming, backstabbing, and plots to take over the Empire are all either Dune or, as I now think about it, Game of Thrones elements. But unlike Dune, which really doesn't, at least in my opinion, have an impending major catastrophe on its hands, THE COLLAPSING EMPIRE has one big problem on its hands: what happens when the Flow begins to shift, changing the travel and trade routes, abandoning some planets altogether? All right in the middle of one family trying to wrest the Empire from another? In Dune, the resolution to the problem at hand is which house is stronger than the rest. In THE COLLAPSING EMPIRE, the issue is how is the human race going to survive, as the connections between the planets of the Interdependency as they are known are going to disappear? Will humanity find a way to cooperate, or will it go down in a blaze of not so much glory?

This book is fun. There is a wide range of characters, from solemn to profane, from buffoons to cunning schemers. This book made me laugh - not in the out loud non-stop laughter one gets at a stand up comic's performance, but at the situations and the characters' reactions to them. By the time we get to the end of the novel, we like the people Scalzi wants us to like, dislike the people he wants us to dislike, and maybe, just maybe, feel sorry for the buffoons.

The book is masterfully narrated by Wil Wheaton. This is not the first of Scalzi's books that Wheaton has narrated. He changes voices well enough so that the listener can readily tell the difference between characters as the story goes on. His pacing seems accurate, and he certainly doesn't do anything to throw the listener out of the story.

Almost.

I've gone to conventions and listened to John Scalzi perform - and anyone who has seen him live understands that it's a performance (and even he will admit to that) - enough times to know what he would sound like in certain situations. Mentally, I can replace Wil Wheaton with John Scalzi and not miss a beat. I can sense Scalzi in not only what Wheaton is reading, but how he is reading it. To my ear, Wheaton sounds like Scalzi. And for some reason, that threw me out of this book just a little. It certainly didn't deter from my enjoyment of the book, it just unnerved me now and again.

In any event, Scalzi continues his high quality of writing with THE COLLAPSING EMPIRE. I expect no less out of the next installment of The Interdependency.

I am fan of John Scalzi's work, his voice, his sense of humor, and his knack for revealing the inner workings of his characters. This first book in a new series continues his tradition of bringing a fresh look at a tried-and-true SciFi motif. We have a far-flung, space-faring, human civilization spanning dozens of systems, and everything is about to change. If that was all this was, this book would be one of hundreds like it. But, it is more. Scalzi brings his unique talent of bringing characters to life, showing their weaknesses, their potential, and their growth. In the end, we don't read these things to obsess about the rivets in the hulls of ships; we read them to learn about the people that man them. Scalzi brings us likable, and profoundly unlikable characters that are believable and fun to watch as he puts them through one bit of trouble after another. Books like this won't change your life. You'll just smile more while you're reading them. That's still something.

Take the trade guilds and emperors and mysterious navigation through weird space-time of Dune; throw in funny ship names (oh yeah, and brilliant turns of phrase and intricately plotted writing) from Iain M. Banks; toss in some nods ("Hub" and "End", and much spiritual heritage) to Foundation, some of the clever just-snarky-enough dialogue and lovably wily characters reminiscent of Stross's sadly-discontinued (I'm'a talkin' to you, CS!) Special Circumstances books, some of the roll-the-dice unpredictability of space travel of Gateway, and a few nods to too many other brilliant lights - and you'll still not equal John Scalzi's genius, wit, and rich tapestries of characters, plot, universe, and dialogue. The cliche'-addicts would use words like 'rollicking', 'romp', 'delight', 'laugh-out-loud', etc. - they'd be spot-on, but fall short. Scalzi's a joy to read, as always, and The Collapsing Empire is no exception.

The plot MacGuffin and underlying 'science' are solid and interesting - others have summarized it but basically "the mysterious intergalactic highway - the "Flow" - is shutting down and the empire will soon collapse" ("title!"); see the Foundation and Gateway parallels there? but I don't mean that it's a crib, either - it's novel in its own right). The interwoven storylines and characters are masterfully juggled (I especially like the reluctant empress), the wink-wink nods to other masterworks just right, the villains just dastardly- and the heroes just flawed- enough - this is delicious, unctuous reading.

[Scalzi's one of those rare *(&#@~! writers who, whenever you deign to think you too might be able to pound out a respectable first novel, makes you feel that while you *might* be able to craft *one* paragraph that good, after a few days of agony - that you'll *never* manage 50k words'-worth that's THAT good, in a decade and that you might just as well throw in the ("don't panic") towel and just keep writing marketing copy. (Disclaimer: I actually own a "Don't Panic" towel. Disclaimer #2: I'm a recovering Silicon Valley tech marketing VP - and now I make chef's knives. Rather than write. :-) If you even think you can match Scalzi, even for a short story's worth of words - geez I'd love to read that. :-) ]

Rated 4.25 of 5

We’re many years in the future, but the laws of physics still hold true and it is not possible for anything to travel faster than the speed of light. Still, mankind has managed to cobble together an empire spread throughout the galaxy. Some are on planets, some inside planets, some in space stations. Earth is no longer in the picture. At the heart of the empire is “Hub” and furthest away from Hub is “End.” Aside from an Emperox, what keeps the empire together is a natural(?) phenomenon known as “the flow.” The Flow is a slipstream of sorts, carrying ships from one location to another in faster than normal (though not FTL fast) speeds. The Flow has natural entry and exit ports and the locations for the empire were based on where these ports were.

But something is happening … the Flow is changing – something that only happens every few thousand years – and the collapse has been predicted by a ‘flow physicist’ on End. That physicist needs to get the information to the Emperox quickly because the entry to the Flow from End will be one of the next things to change. Unfortunately, there’s a coup going on at End, with another family looking to replace the Emperox. What they don’t know on End, because it still takes a long time to travel through the Flow, is that the Emperox has died and because his son, the heir, had died before him, the new Emperox is the daughter, Cardenia Wu-Patrick, who has not been prepared for the role.

Cardenia takes command of the empire just as the Flow is collapsing and a rival family is looking to take over and her best friend and confidante is killed in an attack on her.

Author John Scalzi knows how to tell a tale and this first book in a new series really zips along with lots of action, enough intrigue to tantalize, and characters that are pulled from a catalog of stock characters but made interesting with Scalzi’s style.

Scalzi has a legion of fans and more than a few detractors. He falls into that category where he is either a writer you really like, or one whose work you won’t touch. Me…I like his style. It’s direct and fun. He offers plenty of humor, more than a little cursing, and characters to love and characters to hate and you never wonder which is which.

Scalzi also does a really tremendous job of bringing something new into the sci-fi world with each of his books and this is no different. In fact it may be his world-building at which he most excels.

I listened to the Audible version of this book, as read by Wil Wheaton, and enjoyed Wheaton’s narrative. Wheaton knows how to read the book with some energy and excitement, offering the listener the full thrill of the story.

But there is a down-side… this first book has no ending. Just as every other author seems to be doing, Scalzi has written an adventure that leaves the reader with more questions than answers and finishes right at the moment of rising action. I definitely prefer a book that has a beginning, a middle, and an end. Still – it’s a Scalzi adventure, and that’s worth more than the price of admission.

Looking for a good book? The Collapsing Empire by John Scalzi is the first book in a new series by one of the most entertaining of voices in the sci-fi community. It’s worth reading.

The Interdependency is the group of far-flung habitats that humanity has established throughout space. They are connected by the Flow, an anomaly of physics somewhat similar to a river, that allows faster than light transport along its currents. Those currents have been known to shift- once, long ago, when Earth was cut off from the rest of humankind, and once more, when another planet was lost to contact forever. But those were isolated incidents, spanning thousands of years. In main, the Flow is constant. Except that it isn't. It is shifting again, and this time, it looks as though the entire system is changing, threatening to cut off all of the Interdependency from each other. Which is bad news for an empire that bases its existence on the fact that no one outpost can survive without the rest.

As usual, Scalzi delivers a clever, enjoyable, quite readable story. The idea of the Interdependency, where all the members rely on each other for various necessities of survival, and the rise of individual Houses, each controlling one aspect of those interrelated needs, creating a kind of hierarchy and nobility among the ruling class is, if not exactly new, given a shiny new coat of paint. And the Flow is a nifty concept- sort of like the idea of hyperspace, but not quite. It isn't well understood, even by those experts who study it, making the possible disruption more pressing as an over-arcing storyline. Future books in the series are set up, and this one leaves you with a number of ideas on where the next books could go. There is resolution to the inner conflicts of this single story. It does remain to be seen whether those knots stay neatly tied up, without being unsatisfying to this book.

There are some issues. Pacing gets a bit dragged down in the middle section of the book. There's a lot of talking, which serves the necessary building of the foundation for this and future books, but it does seem as if the action all but grinds to a halt for a bit. Luckily, Scalzi has a knack for clever and quickly moving dialogue that offsets the lack of action to good effect. His rather quirky sense of humor is evident throughout the book, from the ships' names (Yes, Sir, That's My Baby and No, Sir, I Don't Mean Maybe , for example), to the many one-liners and cutting rejoinders from all of the major characters. There is a lot of cursing, particularly the f-word, but that's not unusual in this sort of story these days. Just be aware if that sort of thing bothers you.

Another thing that stopped this from being 5 stars for me was that all the characters seemed a lot the same. Oh, they had their differences, sure, but they all seemed to be sarcastic, quick-witted, without a lot of patience, and suspicious of everyone around them. It made too many of them seem cut from the exact same mold, and then painted differently. It didn't kill the characters as far as liking (or disliking, as the case may be), since they are also fun to read. But a bit more depth here and there would have been nice.

At the end, the flaws here are minor, and didn't make me stop and worry about them while reading. The book is well-written, has enough action, especially once things get really rolling, and a very healthy dose of laugh out loud humor, all wrapped around an intriguing premise and storyline that leaves me eager to see where this new series will go.

When it comes to writing SF novels, Scalzi doesn’t always hit it out of the park, but he does have a very good batting average. I’ve seen some highly critical comments recently about this opening volume of a new space opera from apparently disappointed fans, so I approached it with some caution. Damned if I can see what they’re complaining about, though. It’s an action-packed adventure with bigger-than-life (and frequently off-the-wall) characters, a supporting cast of billions, creditable pseudo-science (and some of the real stuff, too), and a skein of plotlines that will definitely hold your attention.

The setting is the Holy Empire of the Interdependent States and Mercantile Guilds (“the Interdependency,” for short), which is exceedingly far-flung, has been around for a thousand years, and is absolutely dependent for its existence on the Flow -- the entirely natural system of interdimensional shortcuts from one location in the universe to another without having to cross the intervening distance. They come in pairs, one in each direction, and they’re always close to stars, but other than that they appear to be completely random. Which means that when expanding humanity came out of the Flow into a new star system, they had to adapt to whatever planets they could find, which also means most of them live underground. All except End, the world in the Interdependency farthest from anywhere else, which is very Earthlike and you can live very comfortably on the surface. The Flow isn’t entirely trustworthy, though; mankind has already lost access to Old Earth when it lost access to the Flow at the very beginning of the imperial system. This whole quasi-physics construct is very nicely handled, by the way, and it plays a key role in the storyline.

So, Attavio VI, the 87th Emperox, is on his death bed, waiting patiently to get it over with, and his daughter, Cardenia Wu-Patrick, is not looking forward to becoming the new Emperox. Her brother was supposed to succeed, which was why Cardenia was able to be raised by her mother in relatively ordinary circumstances well away from the palace complex. But then Rennered went and got himself killed in a racing-car accident, and Cardenia has suddenly had to change all her plans for the future. But even though she’s largely going to have to make it up as she goes along, she has great depth of character and personality.

Then there’s the Nohamapetan family, one of the great Guild Houses, which really wants to take over, whether by marrying one of its members to the sovereign or by other means, most of them illegal and/or immoral. Politics is politics. And there’s the Count of Claremont, out on End, who is an old friend of Attavio’s and also one of the best physicists and experts on the Flow around. He has strong evidence that the entire Flow is about to fade away, forever, which means all the interdependent worlds in the empire will be cut off from each other. And his son, Marce, also a physicist, is being sent to Hub to explain all this to the Emperox. But Lord Ghreni Nohamapetan, managing his family’s affairs on End, has his own plans, and they don’t bode well for Lord Marce.

Finally, there’s Lady Kiva Lagos, younger member of a rival Guild House, and possibly the most profane young woman ever to cut an interstellar business deal. She’s having fits at End because there’s another revolt in progress (End has those once or twice every decade) and the Duke of End is grabbing every penny he can including the cargo Kiva has just landed. But Kiva, the most uproarious character in the book, is very much not someone you want to get on the wrong side of. And she’s not going to just walk away without taking a profit. She’ll also smile while tossing people out the airlock when it’s necessary.

Scalzi obviously had a lot of fun with this one and it’s heavily cinematic in flavor. The plot is complex but well designed and this is only the first volume. And there’s a helluva cliffhanger. Okay, I know some people hate cliffhangers, but maybe they should learn to practice patience in the pursuit of delayed gratification. I will definitely be waiting impatiently for Vol. 2.

Yes, the Collapsing Empire is formulaic.

Yes, there is a clueless Princess summarily made Queen with a quick-witted advisor destined to a tragic fate.

Yes, there is an offensive merchant (why do all of them have to be females?) and record holder of the F word abuse.

Yes, there is a villain, who can perhaps be saved in the next installment.

Yes, there is a FTL cop out.

Yes, yes and yes.

But, never has formula tasted so good and never has it been so entertaining. Do not let some 1 star reviews misguide you – what were these folks waiting for, Finnegan’s Wake in space? This is John Scalzi, winking at you from every page and paragraph, with his unique captivating style, manipulating you into reading well past your bedtime. Mutatis mutandis, John Scalzi is the equivalent of super star Robbie Williams in science fiction.

Let him entertain you.

Feels Ike a setup to for three more books, maybe not, also very predictable and way too easy for our heroes. Still great writing, great characters, and yet another interesting universe. Don't know if John will be able to finish another book for a while, he was distracted by the election and this one book took a hit for it, the presidency must have him both apoplectic and completely incapable of focusing on a novel.

I’m going to try and do this as spoiler free as I can. I think everyone with a sense of humor and a sense of the absurdity of modern life should read it.
The book’s humor is sometimes subtle and often blatant. The characters are diverse, ranging from crazy to almost normal. Most of the dialogue (banter) is very amusing, you may have to stifle a chuckle or two. The world is interesting, and I’m looking forward to more books about this world and the characters. There is enough unexpected to make the book more than enjoyable.
When a vast empire that spans billions of miles of space depends on “Flow” for faster than light-speed travel as well as commerce and the “Flow” begins to collapse, as it’s done before, “things fall apart” might be an understatement. Every possible bad thing that could go wrong does! This world has some very interesting bits that I won’t spoil by giving them away.
The crazy characters range from smart to fairly stupid, just like life. For me, they are the reason I couldn’t wait to find time to read. I don’t really want to say much about the plot because it might dilute the story for some readers. I’ll say this: the story is told from shifting points of view. I found all the point of view characters engaging and didn’t have any desire to shim though any character’s chapters. I actually, looked forward to getting back to each character’s story.
So, if you like science fiction with humor, satire, and crazy characters, go get the book and read it.

John Scalzi has written some absolutely amazing military science fiction books between his Old Man’s War series and Redshirts. However, I completely understand that it can be intimidating to know where to jump in when an author is six books deep in a series, as is the case with The Old Man’s War series. And thus, brings us to one of the first great things about The Collapsing Empire, it is a brand-new series and perfect for readers who have never read a word of Scalzi in the past.

That said, while I mentioned his previous books are military science fiction based, this is not your typical science fiction escapism book (very few spaceship battles and ray guns and so forth), however, it is still absolutely filled to the brim with tension and excitement that is sure to keep any reader glued to their seat. Which, considering this is more of a political space thriller, discussing the interplays of inter-space merchant ventures, the pains and struggles of installing a new emperor, and the political ramification of dealing with a collapsing empire (I phrased it that way in an attempt to not give anything away, since that is after all, the title) which just goes to show how impressive of a writer Scalzi really is.

As for the other things that I enjoyed about the Collapsing Empire, I honestly loved the characters best of all. Not only were the characters likable, but the villains were understandable in their motivations, in fact, because of this and the situations that they were placed in, many of the “villains” could turn out to be much more likable characters, or at least quasi “good guys” in later books, based purely on a change of circumstances. That said, I think I loved Kiva Largos the most out of all of the characters. She is smart, kickass, and most importantly doesn’t care what anyone else thinks about her. She has her own agenda, but doesn’t try to hide it. While she is smart, she is not trying to proclaim how much smarter she is, she just wants to get what’s best for her, if she can add in revenge on top of that, then bully for her. And on top of that, she was hilarious to read from as a POV character. Kiva is just one example of where Scalzi’s strength truly resides, in creating dynamic interesting characters who readers will absolutely fall in love with.

As for the pacing, The Collapsing Empire never felt slow. In fact, while there is very little physical violence to push the story’s inciting events along, the tension that Scalzi sews throughout the book will keep readers positively mesmerized.

All in all, I loved The Collapsing Empire. It ends in a way that promises more, and I hope that Scalzi delivers soon, because I can’t wait to get my hands on the next book in this exciting series. A great book for Scalzi fans and new readers alike.

I like Scalzi's work best when he is world-building and has a sweeping story (so I like his Old Man's War series better than his satire or one-off books). This novel begins a new series where humanity has spread out through space via worm-whole like "Flows" and are interdependent and under the rule of an Empero. The book plunges right into action and keeps the pace up throughout, jumping from one point of view character to another, and working to build the political intrigues of a far flung empire. The book has snappy dialog (though if you are squeamish about strong language or sex, this is likely not for you), likable (if simplistic) characters, and a good dose of humor. It lacks a real feel of gravitas -- this is no Dune, and the machinations of the various Guild houses are mostly tame when compared to the great Houses in Herbert's series. This is not necessarily bad, the book reads like something readily translatable to TV and is smart enough to be interesting, but won't seriously tax a reader. I look forward to continuing the series, even if some of the twists are a bit predictable and the characters a bit underdeveloped.

For my first Scalzi book, The Collapsing Empire was out of this world!

Yes, I intended for that to be super cheesy.

I try.

ANYway, I don’t tend to read a lot of science fiction. I used to, back in middle school, then the years after seemed to be the paranormal marathon, followed by lots of heavy fantasy, and now a bit of everything and The Collapsing Empire is the first adult sci-fi novel I’ve read in a while. And it was excellent. 11/10 would recommend.

The first hook was, by far, the humor. One of my absolute favorite sci-fi novels (well, series if you want to get technical) is Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and the books that followed (even though the first book is my favorite). And a lot of that comes down to the humor. Science fiction can get dense (looking at you Revelation Space) but the humor lightens things up and makes the story a bit more… digestible. Something Scalzi definitely achieved with this one.

Now a lot happens in this 300-some page book, too much to really cover in a review of a length that won’t put y’all to sleep but I’ll do my best to summarize what I can.

First: characters. Gods I loved these characters. Each is so distinct and interesting that it’s hard to pinpoint a favorite. Probably Kiva for the swearing. Woman after my own heart. Marce for his scholarly nature. Cardenia for how she faces everything thrown at her with wit and grace. Don’t get me wrong, the rest of the cast is great too but I loved these three the most. Yes, I’m picking favorites. Deal with it.

To the world… I mean, I think my draw to that element falls to my love of intricate fantasy worlds. Give me good world-building and I’m a happy reader. Now, there were some info dumps. Like straight up characters explaining to other characters how something worked to show the reader. Normally that drives me INSANE. I don’t like blatant and semi-frequent info dumps. But in this case it didn’t bother me and I’m not sure if that comes down to my background in science (and accompanying interest in understanding it, even if it is fictional) or the general tone won me over. So while it might not bother some, it could be an issue with others.

I want to jump back to the writing for a moment because it comes into the actual storytelling. This plot is so focused on the different characters and the web they weave around each other that they’re ingrained in the very plot, their conversations crucial to the story moving forward. Okay, that probably sounds silly because all scenes in a book should move the story forward, right? I would agree but I don’t always see books achieve that and this one did, definitely doing a lot more “showing” vs “telling.”

Upon finishing The Collapsing Empire, I came to the realization that I will have to wait some time for the next one which doesn’t quite sit well with me because I’m far too curious to know how the gang solves their latest crisis. You know, the one where an empire is collapsing (no, you’re not getting a spoiler warning for that, it’s in the title, come on y’all). So yes, yes I very much recommend this book to fans of epic science fiction stories with plenty of action and humor. Or anyone, really. Yes, let’s go with all readers.

Buy this book used. It has some clever dialog, but is not worth the hardcover price I paid. Learn from my mistake.

This book covers the beginning of the end of an interstellar empire, as a shift in local conditions in the galaxy temporarily ends their ability to use faster than light travel to navigate between the 47 worlds of the Interdependency. Temporarily on a cosmic scale. The humans have no idea how long this change will last, and they scramble madly to save what they can.

It's an interesting idea, and a great setup for intrigue and double dealing, but the execution falls flat. Stop here if you want to avoid mild spoilers.

There are some gaping plot holes. This civilization is space based and more than a thousand years old. And yet we are supposed to believe that the systems of this empire are so interdependent that their life support will fail and they will die out in a few years when trade stops. This is difficult to believe. The size of the empire is too small, in terms of population. Almost fifty worlds that have never known external threat nor dark ages, yet their total population is half that of Earth today. They are not energy constrained, they are not space constrained, they started with 26th century technology and never lost it. There is no need for anyone to fear death from the collapse of the empire. Political power will shift, but life support should be fine.

Everything in this book is small. They are still using tablets two thousand years from now. The political crisis could be solved by one electronic order to the marines at End ordering the execution of one person. The pirates should not exist, given the often stated premise that Imperial forces ignore local politics but ensure trade revenues flow smoothly. Civilian starship captains must be hired by lottery, it's really the only explanation. How can the technology in use in a "tenner" starship possibly be so limited that life support will only last ten years? Why can't the pressor field tech be used to shield a slower than light starship?

Scalzi needs serious retconning in the next book to save this nonsense. Or shift to the YA market.

There is a classic and recurrent problem with almost any story of intrigue, be it sci-fi or fantasy or even just mainstream fiction. The problem is that as a reader with the same information that most of the characters have, one can usually figure out what's going on before the protagonists do. Then, a bad writer makes the reader suffer while their unbelievably dumb main character puzzles it out.

My favorite moments in "The Collapsing Empire" are when someone says 'cut the $%&@.' Indeed. Get to the good part. There is none of that sense of waiting on a dullard to catch up in this book.

This book is all good parts. The people are as smart as their station and wealth would suggest. They are decisive and funny and always working on the next step. The only less than satisfying thing about this book is that I can't wait for the next one.

Best part (minor spoiler) of the many good parts: there's an interrogation that BEGINS with a dude getting put out an airlock. I was literally screaming at this in my car as Wil Wheaton read it to me. This was so, so good. Very good read. Can't wait for more.

Let me start off by saying that I love John Scalzi and have read all of his books except "Zoe's Tale". Unfortunately, I feel like Scalzi's last few novels have been slipping from amazing to average/below average. This book has a few too many plot holes that trip over themselves and can't make up for the enjoyable dialogue. With that, here are my Pros/Cons for this book (listened to the audiobook):

SOME MINOR SPOILERS AHEAD - YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!!!

Pros
- Snappy dialogue (overall there was pretty good banter between the characters. Had a few laugh out loud moments)
- Interesting overarching premise (liked the concept/space opera idea)
- Decent flow through chapters/character POV's

Cons
- Storylines (I did not care at all about the Emperor storyline on Hub. There was nothing that kept it going for me and it felt like placeholder dialogue)
- The reasoning behind why Kiva was not allowed to sell her hayverfruit on End is never resolved and (as of right now) it doesn't seem to be anything other than a plot device to get Marse off of the planet. I don't see Scalzi going back to it because the entire interaction was used to introduce Grenny and his control of the Duke. but, it doesn't make any sense why he would stop Kiva from selling her fruit or why a virus in the fruit even matters considering he knows that in a few months the whole power dynamic will shift throughout the entire Empire. All it would have done is give him more money to fund his war. In fact, the only reason Marse was able to leave was because Grenny stopped the sale of Kiva's cargo (and she needed to make money in order to offset her losses from the lack of fruit sales)...Completely unexplained plot hole that pretty much allows the rest of the story to proceed
- The entire concept of "the flow" did not make any sense to me at all, specifically how at the beginning of the novel the narrator spelled out how nobody really understood the flow but the entire plot on "End" revolves around somebody understanding the flow...
- Every time I read the words "The flow" I thought of "Finding nemo" and the underwater expressway with the turtles. I wish Scalzi had come up with a better name for this plot device
- The murder of the Duke. Just so I am clear, we are 600ish years in the future, where humanity has the ability to create push fields and space/time bubbles to protect ships crossing vast distances; humans can create fake iris's out of genetic material and pump somebody else's blood into another human without the hosts body freaking out...But, murder is just as easy as it is in the 21st century and detective skills haven't moved past a gun wiped of fingerprints...I completely get the need to explain things away in SciFi (push fields, space/time fields...whatever, don't care) but I hate when this is done so regularly that it impacts the story in a meaningful way. It is lazy writing (no offense to the author, just giving honest feedback)
- Biggest plot hole is right after the Duke is shot, specifically, how the Imperial Officer just accepts Grenny's account and appoints him as the Duke (FOR NO REASON AT ALL OTHER THAN IT IS NEEDED TO KEEP THE STORY GOING). It doesn't make any sense because it is repeatedly emphasized that the Empire does not care if the Duke is overthrown since it happens every decade (which contradicts how the current duke received the title from his Father). So if the Empire doesn't care who becomes the new Duke, why not just let the Rebel Commander take over after the Dukes forces surrender? The reasoning in the plot is extremely thin and doesn't mesh with anything else that is written.
- The passage of Time: Don't even try to wrap your head around hwo time passes in this novel. It literally makes no sense and none of the chapters give hints of if occurences are happening prior to/after/during other occurences in the book. On top of that, adding in the 9 month time lag between End and Hub just makes things more confusing, specifically when the bombings on hub are being blamed on the rebels on End, which leads to...
- Blaming the bombings on Hub on the rebels on End: This literally makes no sense at all, especially since the Interdependency has made it very, very clear that they are not supporting the Duke of End in any way. So, why would it make sense that these rebels (who are noted many, many times to be running out of weapons and are locally oriented) begin a campaign of terrorism against the Empire that could crush them? Even for a young Emperox that is not knowledgeable about court politics, this should stick out like the Universes biggest and brightest red herring!It is just another failed plot device that doesn't hold up under the most basic logic (and I get it, it is Sci Fi, things should be taken with a grain of salt...however, said grain cannot be a boulder).

END SPOILERS

For me, here is the bottom line: I like Scalzi but I really don't know if I will continue this series. I purchased this book as soon as it was available because I was looking forward to it. However, here are a few reasons why I will probably hold off on buying the next few installments until i can listen to/read them back-to-back since:

1.) they are so short (only 9 hours 16 minutes on audiobook; Compare that to the Expanse series whose shortest book is 16 hours 44 minutes).
2.) The plot holes referenced above
3.) The huge amount of exposition in the most random places of the novel...I mean bizarrely random places
4.) The cursing just to curse. I lvoe Westword and GoT, but, when the cursing happens in those series it feels natural. 90% of the cursing in this book feels forced and actually (to me at least) detracts from the story

If you are a Scalzi fan this book will be passable (barely...doesn't compare to Old Man's War...Maybe comparable to Red Shirts or End of all things?) and if you are a new reader, you will probably find this book lacking and wonder why Scalzi is regarded so highly. I can say that I have listened to Old Man's War at least 3 times and i will never read/listen to this book ever again.

This one seems like a quick read - it's 90k words, but it's tight, keeps moving, and is thoroughly enjoyable. Scalzi sets up an interesting world 1500 years in the future that's well thought out and completely plausible given the parameters he's set up. The science, while not explained deeply, appears to be pretty solid as well. Nothing's more distracting in a scfi novel than bad science. The only exception on the science being The Flow which is closer to fantasy than science, but so is pretty much any FTL you care to name, so there's that.

Scalzi tends to go heavy on characters in most of his books and this one is no exception - well drawn out, lots of dialog, interesting people for the most part. The character Kiva - who definitely makes this a book for adults and not kids more than any other - is probably my favorite Scalzi character to date. She steals most of her scenes easily just by force of will and a creatively wonderful foul mouth (I actually had to look up one word!). Hopefully, if Scalzi sells the video rights to this one, it's to HBO so Kiva can keep that mouth!

Now, all that being said, this is very deeply the first book of a series - just when it really, really starts to get rolling, you're at the end with pretty much everything hanging off a cliff, so don't be surprised by that. So if that annoys you wait until there are more books in the series and then read - you will be glad you read it.

A friend of mine mentioned this book to me. I checked it out from my local library and enjoyed it quite a bit.

I liked the plot idea, and I think John Scalzi's writing style is clear and tight. He is rigorous about character point of view, and his characters feel very distinct to me. One or two of his characters felt a little bit cartoonish, but that didn't detract from the story. I found one key scene, involving three men on the most remote planet in the Empire, to be a little bit contrived. I felt like a thousand years in the future, forensic science would be further along than it seemed in the story. But that's a minor complaint. The story's worth reading for the sheer enjoyment of it.

As other reviewers have mentioned, he definitely seems to be setting us up for a series (or at least a sequel). That's okay. His subtitle certainly tells us as much.

I would have given 6 stars if possible, what a great book! It has all the ingredients. Palace intrigues, pending doom, violence, vicious murders, f-ing, humor. Great protagonists, you even sort of like the bad guys & girls. Now the long wait for part II.

his was a terrific read based on a terrific premise, with very enjoyable characters, zingy dialogue and brisk plotting. (Caveat: if cussing bothers you, so will this book. One of three main characters and several minor ones cuss a great deal.) One big problem, however: the next book or two (Scalzi apparently hasn't decided whether the series will stop at two or at three) won't be available for more than a year, I believe. That is WAY too long to wait.

Oh, and if Scalzi has the human race go extinct at the end, I will be royally ticked off.

Good read, some of the plot was predictable, yet the characters kept it interesting which was good. Hope the series is continued to it conclusion. I have enjoyed the author's writings for several years and hope he continues until I depart this world.

I've been a fan of John Scalzi for a long time. I think the first book of his that I read was "Redshirts" and I was hooked. Thanks to the store and my Kindle, I'm pretty sure I own all his books now, including purchasing Audible versions for the ones I like the most. (Wil Wheaton ROCKS as an Audible narrator, BTW!)

The premise here is that travel between planets can only be accomplished by something called "The Flow", which are like currents that only connect certain planets. Otherwise, FTL travel is not available.

The book begins with an action sequence of a mutiny in progress, albeit a mutiny with actual rules. This manages to set up the author's worldbuilding in an entertaining way without the sort of infodumps that tend to stop the flow of a story.

The rest of the story is told from the POV of three disparate characters, one of whom is the supreme leader of this empire. The exposition of the problem they are facing moves seamlessly between the three of them, and we are never at a loss for which person's POV is in play. This takes an excellent writer to pull off, as a character's 'voice' must be clear for the reader to actually care about that character.

Events progress and leave the book at a point where we are wishing that volume 2 was already in the pipeline.

Excellent start to what I hope is a mult-volume series by one of my favorite authors.

The only bad thing I can say about this title is that now I have to wait a year (or so) for the next title in the series! I don't think I can stand to wait that long, to see what will happen next. :)

If you love classic science fiction and/or Scalzi, then you will love this one. He has done it again. What a terrific story! And as always, Wil Wheaton does an excellent job reading it. I enjoy him more and more with every one of these titles he reads. He has certainly come a long way since Midshipman Crusher.

I would love to go into some detail about why this story is such an excellent metaphor of what is going on right now, but I do not believe in spoilers. So it must suffice to say that, like all great science fiction, this is also a great social and political metaphor. It is a great way to look at social science as though we could conduct an experiment in my discipline, in a laboratory, in a vacuum.

Good job guys! And please don't take your time in putting out the next one. The waiting may just kill me. ;-)

I like John Scalzi, and enjoy his books and characters, but this book is frustrating. The book simply ends, leaving everything in the air. I feel like he has a three book deal, and he simply took out the scissors at page 256 and published it. Ok, sure, set things up for the sequel, but maybe have a complete plot in each book as well, please?

John Scalzi once again delivers with a complex and highly enjoyable mystery that spans galaxies. This will be a great pick up for any fan of space opera, as The Collapsing Empire introduces us to an empire on the verge of losing its faster than light travel system. We have a new Empero, a likable young woman who'll have to uncover a murderous plot rooted in a coup for control of the universe. She was the most likable of the characters, but there weren't many others that really struck an emotional resonance. This book is mostly a whodunit with some pretty funny parts, a bit of sexual humor that might offend some, and an interesting race against time mystery to see what will happen to the travel system. I enjoyed it, and will get the next book, but I hope to find more characters to care about in the next installment. The mystery and world building was top notch.

I listened to the audiobook produced by Audible Studios and narrated by Wil Wheaton. Standard excellence from one of my favorites. No complaints there. Far from it. He and Scalzi are a perfect tandem, so it was with great excitement that I could enjoy this book with Wheaton's vocals.

Just finished John Scalzi's The Collapsing Empires. Disappointing. I literally had to force myself to finish it. Scalzi needs to learn from Orson Scott Card who has this same problem -- when a science fiction novel becomes mostly about politics with nothing else tying it together, it loses its appeal (witness the post-Ender's Shadow novels about the hegemony, some of the most boring novels ever). If I have to invest myself into a new "universe" and learn all sorts of strange names, and am then just subjected to nothing but the politics of conspiracies, rebellions, and am offered little to draw me in in terms of meaningful story, it becomes very hard to remain engaged.

Moreover, Scalzi relies on much of his snarky language and humor that works in books like Red Shirts, but doesn't really offer much in this political space drama with weird names. Stick with the Old Man's War universe, that world is expansive, and the stories have been engaging. This was truly a disappointment.

The only positive, in the audible version, was the narrating by Wil Wheaton. But that wasn't enough to save this book.

I LOVED this book. I loved the characters, I loved the plot. I loved the adventures and the ideas and the rhythm. This book is every thing I love about science fiction. It's wonderful.

Scalzi writes the best dialogue I've read in a long time. I had to stop several times and savor some of the exchanges.

Really great book! Just wish it kept going

As much as I enjoyed the characters, writing style and humor, I wasn't thrilled by this book. John Scalzi is a very capable writer, but reading this book, you feel more like your reading a few chapters from a much bigger narrative, which has been (in a rather sadistic way) taken away from the readers. Scalzi builds an impressively coherent universe, along with a dozen planets and a complete civilization (culture, religion, laws, customs, honorary titles.... even the character names are well-thought) but still manages to only skim the surface. Out of the Interdependency (the empire's name), only two planets are ever described in details. Planetary systems have no importance, and despite the fact that most of the narrative revolves around the human-colonized systems' mutual dependency in terms of resources, no details are given on what is missing from systems and what is produced by those. I mean... everything is set for an epic, Dune-sized space opera, but the novel fizzles and reads like a novella. Plus, the ending twist can be smelled a few parsecs in advance.
(Minor spoilers below)
Then there are a few loose ends. They have lost access to Earth, but there are no reasons why they couldn't keep answering Earth (unless the Terran civilization has been completely obliterated from the whole Solar System and nobody is emitting anything). Why? And how come planet End was inhabitable but had no native lifeforms and doesn't seem to have required extensive terraforming? Why couldn't humans thrive in orbital environments or in domed habitats in any of the systems, given that they have the WHOLE planetary system to provide for resources and energy, and very efficient space travel technology at the local level?

The Collapsing Empire was intriguing & fun. The men were around and a major part of the story. The woman, on the other hand were what made this world turn. They were wild, strong, tough, angry, smart but above all determined to survive. I don't know if that was the plan but whatever I liked it. This is my first time reading this writer and I like his style. I'm bummed there are no aliens but that's just an obsession of mine.
Last month, I read a Syfy that had a cliffhanger and I was completely bent out of shape. Now this is the way you end a science fiction with an honest sense of to be continued....

I am very happy to have bought this book, and at $12.99, it's not just a a bargain, it is seriously under priced.. I look forward to the next in the series.

An enjoyable roller coaster ride space opera. Not everyone will think it enjoyable. Either you like Sclazi or you do not. If you like Scalzi, you will love this. I liked this better than Old Man's War. The villains in this trilogy, as in the Old Man's War stories, have been planning and preparing for years. There are many surprises in the plot, and it's great seeing how the good guys handle the resulting difficulties. The ending took the good guys and me by surprise. Then they settle down and look again at the real problem, to be solved in the sequel(s).

It's not too hard to see the similarities between Collapsing Empire and Foundation-- if you've read both. However, you can't say "I read one-- no need to read the other". Though the circumstances have similarities, the difference are much greater. For one thing, Asimov wrote in the idiom of sixty years ago! Scalzi writes in the contemporary idiom, complete with Carlon's SEVEN WORDS YOU MUST NEVER SAY ON TELEVISON, or put in print. (I once actually tweeted a comment to Mr Scalzi on this very matter. He was willing to let it be my problem.) Kiva uses these words with wanton and reckless abandon. It's very much who she is. I never saw that type of language until I read Farmer's "Riders of the Purple Wage". (If your sensibilities are easily offended, I do not recommend Farmer.) So I've overcome my sensibilities and enjoyed the book in spite of them.

I think some of the similarities are really cool-- a vast human empire is faced with an unavoidable collapse. Signs of impending trouble have been there to be seen, but have been ignored because they are inconvenient. (No parallels to our current situation, eh?) Much of the action takes place on a planet named "End", at the opposite end of the empire socio-politcally from its capital, "Hub", as were Terminus and Trantor. In Foundation, "All roads lead to Trantor, and that is where all stars end." In Empire, that role is filled by Hub. For now. FTL is accomplished by means of some physics-based legerdemain. In Foundation, transit is instantaneous; in Empire there is a time lag as in Cherryh's Cyteen/Compact Space stories. In Foundation a psycho-historian goes to the Emperor with his calculations. In Empire it is a Flow-physicist that presents his calculations to the Emperox. These are obvious on the first reading,

There also differences, most strikingly in characterization. I can guarantee you would not be able mix the lines of characters of the stories together and be confused as to who said what. It's been a while since I read Foundation, but I cannot imagine anyone from one story saying the same things as anyone form the other. The plotting is also different. Seldon has fifty years to begin to build his Foundation. No one in Empire has fifty years. Ah, the myriad differences between the two polities! The moribund Galactic Empire of Foundation is about to crash down under its own weight. The thriving Interdependency of Empire is endangered by a natural disaster. There are billions of worlds in Foundation-- and those are just the vivfers. Guess how many vivfers there are in Empire. Guess! hah, that would spoil the play. Asimov wrote in a different idiom from Scalzi. Scalzi, while as witty in his writing as Asimov is said to have been in person, is much more economical with his words, more down to earth, less grandiose. In other words, easier to read. His characters, for all their faults or because of them, are less stilted and more real.

I don't like Kiva. I don't know how anyone could. (O.K. her mother likes her. Both the same.) She's a greedy, mean, obnoxious, pushy bully. The only differences between her and the villain of the piece is a matter of preparedness, and probably she's not as smart. Most of the characters are much more likable, The new Emperox is very well done. Not raised to the job or trained to the job, she is nevertheless growing into the job at the worst time to hold the job. I see a future for her and her Flow-physicist-- another nice person and a kindred spirit.

I am very happy to have read this under priced book. Tor should give Scalzi a raise. I look forward to the next book in the series. I enjoy comparing and contrasting Asimov's Foundation with Scalzi's Empire. And unless he comes up with a telepathic Mule, the differences will just keep coming.

Politics, profanity and physics.

I enjoyed this book and am very interested to see where the sequels take us. The first installment in the series does some interesting world building and poses some questions I look forward to exploring, but it also feels in some ways set up for more--so it will be interesting to see if the rest of the Interdependency delivers on the promise of this book.

The book is mostly about political machinations and maneuvering, and the empire and guild system reminds me a little bit of Dune (in terms of the political structure, not the tone or themes of the book) but with a more modern and sometimes sarcastic tone. The book has a lot of profanity, which doesn't bother me but there were times that I felt like the cursing tirades were distracting rather than amusing. That said, the book is pretty witty and there is plenty of Scalzi's usual sarcasm and wit throughout.

The plot revolves around faster than light travel and how it has shaped the Empire, which relies on something called the "flow" and it's a relatively unique take on FTL. Without getting too spoilery, some smart people realize something is about to go wrong with the flow, but because different players buy into different theories, chaos ensues.

Most of the POV characters are interesting and likeable, and the dialogue is fast and witty. The action is sporadic but well written when it appears, and I found myself getting drawn in to the world building and the political/economical scheming going on. The book raises questions and answers some of them, and I enjoyed how some twists took me by surprise while others were telegraphed well enough that readers can spot them on their own.

Dune it isn't but this is a nice readable romp with adventures and politics in about the right ratio. There are some convenient coincidences and contrivances to move the plot along but overall it's well-executed.

This was a story with potential that failed on final delivery. Halfway through, the story begins to fall apart; plots that had been set in motion just crumble without merit, without substance, and without intrigue. I had the feeling that this was one of those projects that was pushed to the finish line for the sake of finishing at the expense of the story. It appears that no effort was put into completing the story. Very simply, the story fails to deliver an ending.

I really like Scalzi's writing- he is one of the more gifted writers in the Sci-Fi operating today. Having said that, this book continues a trend I saw with his previous book Lock In- it doesn't feel like a complete work. Both books have a decent first act, but by the time the first act end your kindle shows you've read 50% of the book. The second and third act feel very rushed and not complete. This book is even worse- as it doesn't seem to end at all. It's very clear that most of the plot points opened during this book don't come to a close at all.

Here is what I think happened- Scalzi signed a long term book deal in which he has to produce a number of books. The deadline comes and the book is not finished. So, what do we do? Oh I know! Let's ship half a book.

The infuriating part is that due to his standing, Scalzi sells his books at a premium. As someone who has a been a loyal fan for almost 10 years, this feels like scam. I hope he picks up his game going forward and won't settle for money.

Would round up to 7/10 but to prevent review inflation gotta' go with 3/5. It was an entertaining, if slightly predictable, plot. I loved Wil Wheaton as a narrator despite the number of female characters, and unlike some folks I can't complain about the price since I got it on sale.

But the only main character that didn't at least slightly rub me the wrong way for some reason was the new Empero.

Overall I'll be happy to listen to the next one in the series if I can find it cheap but wouldn't be motivated to pick it up full price.

The Collapsing Empire marks the beginning of what is sure to be another great sci-fi series by John Scalzi. Amazing characters coupled with a compelling universe, with a bit of that hallmark Scalzi humor and vulgarity, make The Collapsing Empire a can’t-miss this year.

The Interdependency is a multi-star-system empire, led by an Emperox and run by noble Houses and their Guilds. The empire is able to function due to the existence of The Flow, an artifact of the universe that exists outside traditional space-time that links parts of the universe together. It still takes time to traverse it - up to 9 months to travel from Hub (the center of the Empire) to End (the last stop) - but that time is greatly reduced from the hundreds or thousands of years it would take to move around via traditional methods.

Known only to a small handful of people, though, the Flow is about to collapse, spelling the end for not just the Interdependency, but for humanity itself. Along the way we meet several really memorable characters, like Kiva Lagos (a favorite of mine), Ghreni Nohamapetan (not a nice person), and the Emperox herself, Cardenia.

Most fascinating of them all, though, is the Interdependency itself. The world-building is truly top notch in The Collapsing Empire, and I can’t wait to get more of it in the years to come. Seriously, it is kind of killing me that I’ve gotten into what looks like a great series on the ground floor because now I’m as beholden to the publishing cycle as everyone else! Book two can’t come soon enough!

The book felt like a VERY poorly done "Foundation" fan-fiction, the author seems to have not thought out the consequences of a lot of his world-building choices, there's a lot of just CRAP storyline, and one of his main characters is only barely tolerable for the simple fact that she's fun to listen to (despite being pretty much a serial sexual abuser).

Would not recommend, would suggest that the author sit down with somebody competent and review all of his ideas first.

This is a very solid read. Clearly the first installment in a new series, The Collapsing Empire, still manages to deliver a satisfying story, and effectively builds a new universe to explore. It details a conflict between powerful families and worlds with serious consequences, yet zips by at an entertaining pace thanks to Scalzi’s penchant for great characters, dialogue and humor. Recommended!

Took a while to get on board with this theme. Always have a hard time with royalty. Like the naming conventions. Suspect if i put them thru an amalgam translation they'll make sense. Also surprised at the afterword, and learning it was completed in late 2016. I read somewhere else that there are no coincidences. So, all the machinations in this novel are... a present-tense history book?

Solid story and lots of Scalzi snark and fun. I am not (so far) a fan of Kiva, but maybe she will reveal more depth as the story evolves. If she were a man I would most certainly be repulsed by her behavior to subordinates as she exploits her position of power...I know, because she is female I am supposed to think she is "kick ass" and powerful, but it doesn't work for me..yet anyway.

However, I find the other characters relatable and complex and am looking forward to seeing their stories unfold. Can't imagine how the universe will get out of the mess they are in, but trust Scalzi will have answers for me in the next book or two.

Good concept, decent story. Some of the characterizations seemed inconsistent and a little off (Amit in particular, and Kiva's sex obsession was a bit much), and the story felt like it ended a little abruptly (I later realized it was part of a new series - and that's fine. I'll read book two). The whole idea of sending "bad people" to End was never really fleshed out or explained. But positives - Ghreni's comeuppance was earned and enjoyable. The Emporex was well-developed, as was her storyline (the Memory Room was a cool idea). The pace was good, and I'm intrigued to learn more about this universe.

From the very first page, I was hooked by these characters and the setting. I loved all the political intrigue mixed with action, and Lady Kiva might be one of my new favorite characters. I've found mixed results with Scalzi's other books (loved Redshirts, Lock In not so much), but this is definitely one of the better ones from an entertainment value perspective.

I liked Scalzi's "Old Man's War" series and thought "Redshirts" was an interesting take on Star Trek, so I was really looking forward to this new universe. When all was said and done, this was the most fun I've had reading a Science fiction novel in years and I devoured it in about 2 days.

In "The Collapsing Empire", we are introduced to the Interdependency, a human Galactic Empire founded on the shoals of "the Flow". The Flow is basically a network of wormholes in spacetime, allowing faster than light travel. Unfortunately, they are one way, cannot be controlled, and have set entrance and exit points. This means that as humans colonized the galaxy, they were limited to star systems near a kind of network node, allowing travel both to the system and away from it. One planet became known as Hub and became the Empire's capital because it was situated near a nexus of Flow points, allowing easy travel to and from multiple planets.

Hub is also, basically uninhabitable, so humans live in advanced structures and on space stations. In fact, due to the nature of the Flow, most planets colonized by the interdependency cannot support life. So a system of mutual aid and trade was put in place so the Interdependency could flourish, with each planet supporting the others. Only one planet allows human life, End, so-called because it is the furthest from Hub.

The Flow has been steady, although not always so. Earth was lost when the Flow changed, as was an early planet in the Interdependency. Now, however, data indicates that the Flow is going through a radical shift and the Interdependency will fall, taking all humans except those on End with it.

There are three main storylines in "The Collapsing Empire": That of Cardenia, newly coronated Emprox of the Empire. Her Father's second choice, she rises to the throne on his death after her brother is killed in an accident and has little time to prepare. Kiva Lagos is a shipping magnate, stuck on End during a revolution who must piece together some of the intrigues swirling around her to survive. And Marce Claremont, son of the scientist who discovered the collapse whose mission is to alert the Emprox of the danger to the Empire.

The story gets some time getting started, and for the first quarter or so I wasn't impressed. The Scalzi Snark is in effect, often throwing me out of the book, the palace intrigues are Dune-Lite, and the plight of Citrus traders on far-off planets didn't grab me.

But somewhere along the way, it just started clicking. Kiva Lagos is a foul-mouthed, over-sexed badass, and has dethroned Skua September as my favorite Sci-Fi character of all time. The book moves at a rollicking pace, and there's danger and tension on every page and with every plotline. The intrigues make sense when revealed, and are difficult to guess at. I never felt that Scalzi was withholding important clues, nor did I figure it all out before any big reveals.

I do have a minor quibble with the way the Flow is presented, however. It doesn't seem that there had been any exploration of Flow or expansion of the Empire since losing Earth. Marce mentions during an early infodump, that there are 47 inhabited planets, out of 5,000 systems connected by Flow. The 47 are all connected to each other through Hub--Which is convenient to the story, but doesn't make much sense.

But, if you give it that one thing, this is an enjoyable romp through a brand new universe.

I love scifi, complicated ensemble casts, snappy dialogue, political intrigue, and John Scalzi, and this is the best of all of these. Somehow I managed to snag a free copy of Collapsing Empire from Audible and, above all, I recommend the audio version. Wil Wheaton did an outstanding job . . . as always. (Just pronouncing the characters' names was an accomplishment, and Wil managed to also create a separate voice for each one.) Woot! Woot!

I was recommended this book by my husband. Not really knowing what to expect I found myself totally drawn into the fiction. I thoroughly enjoyed it and could hardly put it down. It's wonderful to have strong, smart woman depicted who are still realistic along side a capable men. I will say the Dynamics are somewhat stereotypical, but the story was unique enough to make it easy to ignore that small shortcoming. Looking forward to my next book by this author!

Another great novel from one of my favorite authors. Scalzi has started off a new series with a bang. From the opening prologue to the cliffhanger ending I was captivated by the story. My only wish was that the book was longer.

As with most of Scalzi's work, well written and interesting.

The last quarter or so feels a bit rushed... Clever characters comiting stupid actions to move the story along. Combined with the whole "blatantly first book a series" feel, I'd give that section 3 or 4 stars.

Not his best but still better than 95% of what I (at least try to) read these days. Definitely five stars despite its faults.

Fantastic start to a new series by Scalzi. good pacing, great dialog and with all things Scalzi wonderful characters.

something that might be off putting for some is I think this is the most times the "f-bomb" has appeared in one of his novels (I had no problem, but did find it surprising, but endearing to the character)

beautiful universe, cool technology system for travel, dynamic political system.

I cannot wait for the next one!

Great world building, interesting story with a few twists, being let down by formulaic characters in general and too much of a cliffhanger ending to be a stand alone epic. The last part will be remedied once the next book(s) in the series appear. Character-wise I do hope things will be shaken up in future. Some are interesting; I like both Marce and Cardenia. But still, so far among the leading characters all men are wimps and all women strong. Basically John Scalzi took classical cookie-cutter characters and exchanged “he” for “she” and vice-versa. Kiva is the best example thereof: Think Han Solo with sex and female instead of male, that’s it. That Scalzi is overly proud of this character (as per an interview) makes things only worse, you can rest assured that she will go on win every challenge, as she does – alone among leading characters – in this book. Say good-bye to any suspense here. Maybe Scalzi should talk to George R. R. Martin for example on how character development is done well.

Dialogue is witty and filled with blistering sarcasm (and profanity). Many surprises.

I've just noticed that several of the books I've enjoyed in the past few months were written by Mr. Scalzi; now I look for them. Dialogue like a ping pong tournament slaps you repeatedly. Interesting story with a well-developed background describing the evolution of an alien society. I want to know where the story goes from where this book ends.

I'm generally a big fan of Scalzi's work, but this particular work is weak. It appears that Scalzi is trying to create a specifically adult work, distinct from his generally PG-13 style of writing of Old Man's War. However creating a story that is compelling to adults requires more than just lacing it with profanities, and gratuitous sex, It requires a more complex plot, and more complex characters, which are sadly lacking in this work. Scalzi spends a great deal if time in the creation of scenarios where the bad guy overextends his grasp, and gets a righteous smackdown from one main characters. This occurs so many times in the book that it becomes not only predictable, but tiresome.

Well, I finished it in a couple of hours. It's pretty clear that this is the beginning of a series, but that can be either good or bad depending on how impatient you are. I'd like to see the characters fleshed out, and the base motivations for the various groups are believable. Everyone is working for their self interest. The reason why I'm giving this four stars instead of three is because it made me laugh out loud a few times. That's a definite plus.

What a thoughtful end to book one! I liked that Gardenia, Emperox of the Interpedency had to assume command with her father's death. It was a position that she never wanted, but she took on for her people. Book one, with its twists lies ,and evil plots left me itching to read the next.

Just finish the Collapsing Empire, first of its not John Scalzi Best, Old Man War still remain that title, but still its a new universe, new set of people and problems and they are really refreshing and interesting, some people complain about been short novel. its not it just so easy to read its ends before you realize it, am sure he is going to do 2 or 3 more books around this universe and i will be there to read them.

This is only the second Scalzi novel I've read but I've truly enjoyed them both. With THE COLLAPSING EMPIRE, I fell in love with the man's work. It's fast-paced, funny, tense, and a strangely appropriate metaphor for the current world (the acknowledgments at the end allow you to understand why "strangely appropriate" is the correct phrasing). I highly recommend the novel and can't wait for the second volume.

The characters save this story through and through. Their richness, diversity and humor really propel the story forward because otherwise there's not much going on. I came into this book expecting something a bit more epic and didn't quite get that. I wasn't totally dissatisfied with what I got instead, but I will need something more in future installments to really stick with the series.

Do you ever get hold of a story that you thought looked pretty good, but then it turns out to be this fantastic experience that you couldn't have possibly predicted from the outset? That was how this one hit me. I was in the mood for sci-fi so I saw this first in a new series by an author I've been meaning to try again after my first satisfying outing with a short story of his. Then, how could I not be excited when I saw Wil Wheaton was to narrate?

I confess there is a part of me that gets nervous picking up on audio books I know will have complex world building and large casts of characters simply because I struggle to keep it all straight when I'm first getting used to matters. And that was a little of the case with this one. However, that disoriented feeling didn't last long and it actually added to the experience I had encountering this new sci-fi world of humans in space.

There are a handful of narrators and situations going on representing people in key places and offering up different facets of the story. It is easy to follow the change in scene and narrator. There are a couple times there are jumps in time when the narration changes, but its not hard to keep up. All the narrators and plot threads are deeply intriguing in their own way. There is the feisty and irreverent representative of one of the trading guilds who is all about advancing her family's wealth and her own advancement. She is brazen and open, but oh so cunning and not the person you want to screw with. There is the newly made young Empress who never wanted the job and struggles with all the politics and working the system because she is just not Machiavellian enough and she sees this time as the waning days of the Empire her family has ruled for centuries. There is the conniving sociopathic scion of an ambitious trading guild who is at the far end of the Empire working with his family to take advantage of the situation and work a sweeping coup if they bold enough to pull it off. And there is the straight-shooting scientist who was content to study the Flow and only cares to use his knowledge to bring about the survival of his race though he truly wishes the task fell to someone braver and more capable like his twin sister.

I enjoyed this creative sci-fi world all built around the natural flowstream in space and also the new dire straights caused by this natural wonder shifting away so that all the various human outposts of the Empire will find themselves separated and forced to figure out how to survive when they were built to depend on each other for goods.

The author is gifted with the ability to marry cool sci-fi elements with an engaging human nature story. The reader is made to feel a part of their struggle to survive, but also understand the varying motives that might be similar or different from his or her own.
But I get ahead of myself, the struggle is not so much survival as it is to get people to see the problem. Some work to suppress while others work to educate and still others work to use the changes to their advantage. I can't wait to see how it all goes down. This was just the intro and opening shot. I suspect its going to get pretty intense when all's said and done.

Wil Wheaton as narrator was spectacular. He had a huginormous cast of characters to keep straight and several plot threads. It was amazing. I saw each individual, the setting, the situation and all the elements that make up this complex story so easily with him at the narration helm. This will be a series that I can't imagine with any other voice and will seek to get all in audio as a result.

All in all, this was quite the experience and I whole-heartedly push it at sci-fi lovers as a 'you must'.

Scalzi is a great voice in science fiction, many series in fiction try to have the a protagonist "save" a dying empire, but this is the first I've seen the lead character just wants to manage the empire's collapse to the least destructive way possible. It's an interesting concept and I'm looking forward to more.

I liked Scalzi's "Old Man's War" series and thought "Redshirts" was an interesting take on Star Trek, so I was really looking forward to this new universe. When all was said and done, this was the most fun I've had reading a Science fiction novel in years and I devoured it in about 2 days.

In "The Collapsing Empire", we are introduced to the Interdependency, a human Galactic Empire founded on the shoals of "the Flow". The Flow is basically a network of wormholes in spacetime, allowing faster than light travel. Unfortunately, they are one way, cannot be controlled, and have set entrance and exit points. This means that as humans colonized the galaxy, they were limited to star systems near a kind of network node, allowing travel both to the system and away from it. One planet became known as Hub and became the Empire's capital because it was situated near a nexus of Flow points, allowing easy travel to and from multiple planets.

Hub is also, basically uninhabitable, so humans live in advanced structures and on space stations. In fact, due to the nature of the Flow, most planets colonized by the interdependency cannot support life. So a system of mutual aid and trade was put in place so the Interdependency could flourish, with each planet supporting the others. Only one planet allows human life, End, so-called because it is the furthest from Hub.

The Flow has been steady, although not always so. Earth was lost when the Flow changed, as was an early planet in the Interdependency. Now, however, data indicates that the Flow is going through a radical shift and the Interdependency will fall, taking all humans except those on End with it.

There are three main storylines in "The Collapsing Empire": That of Cardenia, newly coronated Emprox of the Empire. Her Father's second choice, she rises to the throne on his death after her brother is killed in an accident and has little time to prepare. Kiva Lagos is a shipping magnate, stuck on End during a revolution who must piece together some of the intrigues swirling around her to survive. And Marce Claremont, son of the scientist who discovered the collapse whose mission is to alert the Emprox of the danger to the Empire.

The story gets some time getting started, and for the first quarter or so I wasn't impressed. The Scalzi Snark is in effect, often throwing me out of the book, the palace intrigues are Dune-Lite, and the plight of Citrus traders on far-off planets didn't grab me.

But somewhere along the way, it just started clicking. Kiva Lagos is a foul-mouthed, over-sexed badass, and has dethroned Skua September as my favorite Sci-Fi character of all time. The book moves at a rollicking pace, and there's danger and tension on every page and with every plotline. The intrigues make sense when revealed, and are difficult to guess at. I never felt that Scalzi was withholding important clues, nor did I figure it all out before any big reveals.

I do have a minor quibble with the way the Flow is presented, however. It doesn't seem that there had been any exploration of Flow or expansion of the Empire since losing Earth. Marce mentions during an early infodump, that there are 47 inhabited planets, out of 5,000 systems connected by Flow. The 47 are all connected to each other through Hub--Which is convenient to the story, but doesn't make much sense.

But, if you give it that one thing, this is an enjoyable romp through a brand new universe.

I love scifi, complicated ensemble casts, snappy dialogue, political intrigue, and John Scalzi, and this is the best of all of these. Somehow I managed to snag a free copy of Collapsing Empire from Audible and, above all, I recommend the audio version. Wil Wheaton did an outstanding job . . . as always. (Just pronouncing the characters' names was an accomplishment, and Wil managed to also create a separate voice for each one.) Woot! Woot!

I was recommended this book by my husband. Not really knowing what to expect I found myself totally drawn into the fiction. I thoroughly enjoyed it and could hardly put it down. It's wonderful to have strong, smart woman depicted who are still realistic along side a capable men. I will say the Dynamics are somewhat stereotypical, but the story was unique enough to make it easy to ignore that small shortcoming. Looking forward to my next book by this author!

Another great novel from one of my favorite authors. Scalzi has started off a new series with a bang. From the opening prologue to the cliffhanger ending I was captivated by the story. My only wish was that the book was longer.

As with most of Scalzi's work, well written and interesting.

The last quarter or so feels a bit rushed... Clever characters comiting stupid actions to move the story along. Combined with the whole "blatantly first book a series" feel, I'd give that section 3 or 4 stars.

Not his best but still better than 95% of what I (at least try to) read these days. Definitely five stars despite its faults.

Fantastic start to a new series by Scalzi. good pacing, great dialog and with all things Scalzi wonderful characters.

something that might be off putting for some is I think this is the most times the "f-bomb" has appeared in one of his novels (I had no problem, but did find it surprising, but endearing to the character)

beautiful universe, cool technology system for travel, dynamic political system.

I cannot wait for the next one!

Great world building, interesting story with a few twists, being let down by formulaic characters in general and too much of a cliffhanger ending to be a stand alone epic. The last part will be remedied once the next book(s) in the series appear. Character-wise I do hope things will be shaken up in future. Some are interesting; I like both Marce and Cardenia. But still, so far among the leading characters all men are wimps and all women strong. Basically John Scalzi took classical cookie-cutter characters and exchanged “he” for “she” and vice-versa. Kiva is the best example thereof: Think Han Solo with sex and female instead of male, that’s it. That Scalzi is overly proud of this character (as per an interview) makes things only worse, you can rest assured that she will go on win every challenge, as she does – alone among leading characters – in this book. Say good-bye to any suspense here. Maybe Scalzi should talk to George R. R. Martin for example on how character development is done well.

Dialogue is witty and filled with blistering sarcasm (and profanity). Many surprises.

I've just noticed that several of the books I've enjoyed in the past few months were written by Mr. Scalzi; now I look for them. Dialogue like a ping pong tournament slaps you repeatedly. Interesting story with a well-developed background describing the evolution of an alien society. I want to know where the story goes from where this book ends.

I'm generally a big fan of Scalzi's work, but this particular work is weak. It appears that Scalzi is trying to create a specifically adult work, distinct from his generally PG-13 style of writing of Old Man's War. However creating a story that is compelling to adults requires more than just lacing it with profanities, and gratuitous sex, It requires a more complex plot, and more complex characters, which are sadly lacking in this work. Scalzi spends a great deal if time in the creation of scenarios where the bad guy overextends his grasp, and gets a righteous smackdown from one main characters. This occurs so many times in the book that it becomes not only predictable, but tiresome.

Well, I finished it in a couple of hours. It's pretty clear that this is the beginning of a series, but that can be either good or bad depending on how impatient you are. I'd like to see the characters fleshed out, and the base motivations for the various groups are believable. Everyone is working for their self interest. The reason why I'm giving this four stars instead of three is because it made me laugh out loud a few times. That's a definite plus.

What a thoughtful end to book one! I liked that Gardenia, Emperox of the Interpedency had to assume command with her father's death. It was a position that she never wanted, but she took on for her people. Book one, with its twists lies ,and evil plots left me itching to read the next.

Just finish the Collapsing Empire, first of its not John Scalzi Best, Old Man War still remain that title, but still its a new universe, new set of people and problems and they are really refreshing and interesting, some people complain about been short novel. its not it just so easy to read its ends before you realize it, am sure he is going to do 2 or 3 more books around this universe and i will be there to read them.

This is only the second Scalzi novel I've read but I've truly enjoyed them both. With THE COLLAPSING EMPIRE, I fell in love with the man's work. It's fast-paced, funny, tense, and a strangely appropriate metaphor for the current world (the acknowledgments at the end allow you to understand why "strangely appropriate" is the correct phrasing). I highly recommend the novel and can't wait for the second volume.

The characters save this story through and through. Their richness, diversity and humor really propel the story forward because otherwise there's not much going on. I came into this book expecting something a bit more epic and didn't quite get that. I wasn't totally dissatisfied with what I got instead, but I will need something more in future installments to really stick with the series.

Do you ever get hold of a story that you thought looked pretty good, but then it turns out to be this fantastic experience that you couldn't have possibly predicted from the outset? That was how this one hit me. I was in the mood for sci-fi so I saw this first in a new series by an author I've been meaning to try again after my first satisfying outing with a short story of his. Then, how could I not be excited when I saw Wil Wheaton was to narrate?

I confess there is a part of me that gets nervous picking up on audio books I know will have complex world building and large casts of characters simply because I struggle to keep it all straight when I'm first getting used to matters. And that was a little of the case with this one. However, that disoriented feeling didn't last long and it actually added to the experience I had encountering this new sci-fi world of humans in space.

There are a handful of narrators and situations going on representing people in key places and offering up different facets of the story. It is easy to follow the change in scene and narrator. There are a couple times there are jumps in time when the narration changes, but its not hard to keep up. All the narrators and plot threads are deeply intriguing in their own way. There is the feisty and irreverent representative of one of the trading guilds who is all about advancing her family's wealth and her own advancement. She is brazen and open, but oh so cunning and not the person you want to screw with. There is the newly made young Empress who never wanted the job and struggles with all the politics and working the system because she is just not Machiavellian enough and she sees this time as the waning days of the Empire her family has ruled for centuries. There is the conniving sociopathic scion of an ambitious trading guild who is at the far end of the Empire working with his family to take advantage of the situation and work a sweeping coup if they bold enough to pull it off. And there is the straight-shooting scientist who was content to study the Flow and only cares to use his knowledge to bring about the survival of his race though he truly wishes the task fell to someone braver and more capable like his twin sister.

I enjoyed this creative sci-fi world all built around the natural flowstream in space and also the new dire straights caused by this natural wonder shifting away so that all the various human outposts of the Empire will find themselves separated and forced to figure out how to survive when they were built to depend on each other for goods.

The author is gifted with the ability to marry cool sci-fi elements with an engaging human nature story. The reader is made to feel a part of their struggle to survive, but also understand the varying motives that might be similar or different from his or her own.
But I get ahead of myself, the struggle is not so much survival as it is to get people to see the problem. Some work to suppress while others work to educate and still others work to use the changes to their advantage. I can't wait to see how it all goes down. This was just the intro and opening shot. I suspect its going to get pretty intense when all's said and done.

Wil Wheaton as narrator was spectacular. He had a huginormous cast of characters to keep straight and several plot threads. It was amazing. I saw each individual, the setting, the situation and all the elements that make up this complex story so easily with him at the narration helm. This will be a series that I can't imagine with any other voice and will seek to get all in audio as a result.

All in all, this was quite the experience and I whole-heartedly push it at sci-fi lovers as a 'you must'.

Scalzi is a great voice in science fiction, many series in fiction try to have the a protagonist "save" a dying empire, but this is the first I've seen the lead character just wants to manage the empire's collapse to the least destructive way possible. It's an interesting concept and I'm looking forward to more.

Note: "read" the Audible version of this novel, narrated by Will Wheaton. Will is great as usual, except for his tendency to become too strident in the dialog portions. Dial it back, Will.

If you want to hear the whole story, wait till Scalzi finishes it. If you want to read big stories that publishers don't break into 2 or 3 parts for profit, try someone like P.F. Hamilton, who creates amazing universes and stories that almost never seem to end and your are glad they don't.
Scalzi is great, as usual: intelligent, irreverent, and these days it must be praised, even grammatical. This story is a parable of today, but let's skip that and just say that in this story Mankind is linked by a river in space called "The Flow" that serves all of humanity, most of whom live in habitats and planetoids that would be unsustainable if it were not for the trade between them. Without the flow most of Humanity will die-- sooner rather than later given our tendency to get crazy when we should all be pulling together.

The dramatic personae all have crazy Star Wars kinds of names, all of which I will misspell since I listened to the audio version: like Renni Nohammed Pita, murderous conman scion of the Pita family, his smarter eviller sister Nadashey, Sir Ontane Mount, head of security, Jiwenn Tobland, investigator, and on and on. Lady Kiva Lagos, tiresomely profane daughter of the House of Lagos, and a business rep for her family, is one of the more entertaining characters.
Anyway, humble and sweet Emperox-by-Accident (sic) Cardenia has to save humanity in the face of the Guilds who will surely stick their heads in the sand and actively obstruct because their short-term self interest is at stake. There are a LOT of politics, but fear not, this is Scalzi, not David Weber, and the machinations are clear, wittily explained, and carried through with wonderful and entertaining dialog.

Ah, and romance may be in the offing. A young scientist is giving the Emperox the data she needs to understand and verify the catastrophe and he seems kinda cute too.

Actions scenes are few but very well written. Maybe the author will throw a little more military action into the next chapters of this story, said story being cruelly and unnaturally sundered no doubt at the behest of the publisher who would rather sell two or three incomplete stories and then the whole thing combined in a single edition in 2022.

Oh, and the last paragraph of the epilogue is great! Scalzi, you know how to tempt us.

I really enjoyed the book. The story and characters were interesting and real. I really like his story line with quite a sense of humor. This is a fairly easy read and a good anyone who likes a little political intrigue will enjoy it.

This is the first work of Scalzi's I've picked up and I don't regret a second of my time spent on those pages! Fantastic and fun characters, great world building and exploration. I just wanted to spend more time in the Interdependency. Just a really fun read that happened to be just the ticket for me. :) Can't wait for another one!

This book is a fun and fast paced book to read. The science and situations presented in the book are entertaining and keep you turning the pages to the end. The ending also sets up itself nicely for a sequel. In fact, if this wasn't meant to be part of a series I would have deducted a star because of how abruptly it ends.

My only complaint is that the characters in the book are very one dimensional save for some grey area regarding the imperial line. From the moment a character is introduced you can tell if they are going to be the good guys or bad guys of the piece and predictably (WARNING SPOILER AHEAD)

The good guys win in the end. At least the collapsing empire provides a little balance and for that plus how fun a read this is I give this book four stars.

TL:DR Fun book to read but not much depth to it beyond the main characters and plot.

I have this on Audible. The story is decent and the narration is good, but the author way over uses obscenity. F*** should be an exclamation mark, not a comma. To me, this really detracts from the story telling

I have read all of Scalzi's books, enjoyed them all and am a huge fan. However, this book was just plain boring, Its about a problem with the "Flow" which is what interstellar travel depends on, and is full of a lot of political machinations and political discussions. There is almost no action other than in the beginning. Basically, a yawnfest ,and almost nothing happens. I was very disappointed.

I almost universally love Scalzi's works. I am giving it an honest 4 star review even though I'd like to give it a 5 to offset some of the negative reviews that don't have commentary.

The book is witty, sarcastic, interesting, and has solid, believable characters. It was entertaining to read, the plot hangs together, and the various points of view you follow make it interesting as you move around the universe he has created.

If I could give this a more fine tuned review, I'd give it 85/100.

A brand new concept with lots of promise for deeper understanding the human condition - selflessness vs selfishness - set against the backdrop of the collapse of a civilization. I have ejoyed every Scalzi book I've read. The humor, character development, just enough hard science to be plausable. This book is no exception. Can't wait for the next book to come out!

Entertaining enough, but a short book that spent too much time in the build up. Book ended on some major cliff hangers which was not so nice, but the second book is nicely set up. Some great characters with good development. Not bad, but having read all his other books I was expecting more.

Another reviewer stated that Collapsing Empire wasn't Scalzi's best work, and they were right. It isn't. But the rapidly accelerating pace made me put off work to read it in the space of about two days, so that pulls an otherwise 4 star book up one more level.

In the minus column, the ending felt rushed and unfinished, and there were several predictable plot elements. But all that is forgiven first by the author's cast of vastly interesting, if not always loveable characters. And then by driving the action on multiple fronts, increasing the tension with every move and counter move until I was rushing to get to the finish.

This is the beginning of a completely new series for Scalzi, and it has a lot of promise. Like me, you'll be hoping for a sequel to come along as soon as possible. Fortunately, Scalzi is better at delivering on those than Rothfuss or George R.R. Martin.

Just sayin.

Seriously, I love Scalzi's books. I've read them all--including Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded--and followed his blog. Now that he makes Vox Day, MGTOW (or whatever it is), and red pillers cry, I love him even more.

I felt compelled to write a review. I've read the entire Old Man's War series, Lock-In and the Dispatcher. I had gotten used to John Scalzi's style and was pleased that the Collapsing Empire was both fresh and written in a more conventional manner than some of his other work. Good stuff. Can't wait for the next book.

The Inderdependency is an interstellar empire that has flourished for over a thousand years, ruled by the emperoxes of Hub and built upon the backbone of the Flow – an extradimensional field that makes faster than light travel possible. Imperial bastard Cardenia Wu-Patrick has just ascended to the throne, and she is woefully underprepared, having spent most of her life out of the spotlight assuming her brother would be emperox. Just as she comes to terms with her new responsibility, she learns that the Flow is collapsing, and that means the empire will soon be gone and humanity might go with it. It’s up to her to figure out how to save the empire. with help from noble merchant Kiva Lagos and Flow physicist Marce Claremont. I’m always excited for a new Scalzi book – I think of his work as popcorn science fiction. It’s light reading and it’s usually got a pretty good sense of humour, but it’s also science fiction so it has some cool ideas. I was especially looking forward to THE COLLAPSING EMPIRE because I like space opera, and Scalzi’s other space opera universe (Old Man's War) hasn’t been doing much new worldbuilding in recent installments.

THE COLLAPSING EMPIRE met all of my expectations, but still managed to be somewhat different from Scalzi’s other work. It’s grander in scale (more operatic in space opera terms) than the Old Man’s War books, it focuses more on the empire and the larger story of humanity than it does on individual people’s character arcs. The characters don’t really grow or change, they are just the viewpoint from which we see the next great change in human history unfold. I mean, you still empathize with the characters, there are some emotional moments, particularly for Cardenia, but the focus is definitely not on those elements. This book is also a little more adult-themed than Scalzi’s usual work – there’s politics (intrigue, betrayal, plots, etc.), more explicit sex scenes (which I don’t remember Scalzi doing before), and a lot of swearing (mostly courtesy of the Lagos family.)

I had a couple of problems with the book. One of them is that I think I was supposed to like Kiva Lagos (Scalzi has called her one of his favorite characters ever), but I thought she seemed like a terrible person. I can appreciate a good greedy merchant (Quark is one of my favorite characters in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine) but Kiva didn’t seem to have any heart, even though she mostly ends up being on the side of the good guys. Another problem is that I felt like the book didn’t tell a complete story, it seemed like it was just moving things into place for the rest of the series Most of the book revolved around getting people to acknowledge that the Flow was collapsing, and it was a serious problem and the antagonists’ plans didn’t seem to make a huge difference to the grand scheme of things. Also, sometimes the characters’ propensity for quips in serious situations can get annoying, but that’s something Scalzi does in all his books and I know to expect, so it wasn’t a real problem.

There are plenty of good things about this book, though. Most of the characters are easy to root for, and the antagonists aren’t just cardboard villains. There’s some good tension in the book when you’re not quite sure what’s going to happen next. And the idea of humanity settling mostly on artificial environments like space stations and becoming reliant on interstellar commerce, then suddenly losing the ability for faster-than-light travel is fascinating. I can’t wait to find out what happens next, especially with the situation at the end of THE COLLAPSING EMPIRE.

This book have a good ending (2-3 chapters) and i think there is 2 maybe 3 chapters that grasps your interesest but its really bad.
People like me listen and read Syfi to dream away in other galaxies and stars with the dream of new technology, new races and exploration. We all are dreamers looking for the future, but this book is beyond repair. They talk just about human politics. Not any politics, but in a imaginary world with imaginary people in space. Real life politics are difficult and boring in it self, pleas dear writer. I wasted maybe 7 of 8 hours listening to this book. Dull space politics - its amazing how non interesting this book was. crazy bad from editor letting this book go without demanding more dept and juice from the writer. Editors with no spine that is probably a big fan of the writer. Pleas help this bad book become great. With small tweaks of cool technology and mystery this book/seriers could be great. Put in touch of alien twist in the beginning or a ship/planet that found a alien artifact that makes people want to fight for it. ANYTHING more than human politics in space. More about faster than light tec. ANYTHING.
The point of this revue is to tell the writer and editor to wake up.
Book deserves 1 star.

Started pretty slow. The first 30 pages were a huge drag. I put the book away twice. Then things got more interesting, and then just ended. Im not sure why the story was told from 3 character viewpoints and then ended the way it did. They did sort of come together in the end, but that would be expected. To me, it was sort of half a book, but could have used allot of deep editing to bring it to life.

If you're like me and you loved Old Man's War and The Ghost Brigades, then you probably want to steer clear of Scalzi's latest, which is short on adventure and long on interplanetary business deals and political intrigue. There's one particular character whose "hook" is that she's excessively profane, and boy does that get old in a hurry. Not recommended.

The second page (on kindle) of the epilogue I set my kindle down, grabbed my phone, photographed one paragraph and sent it to a friend with the line "Gods I love Scalzi". Right out of the gate the Scalzi I love is clearly there.

While I'd prefer more Old Man's War books, this universe Scalzi has created looks equally fun. I thoroughly enjoyed the title and look forward to (hopefully) several more books in this series. A reviewer before me said 'potty mouth', well yeah... guess what... people swear, when characters swear it makes it believable. When an author grows a pair and uses language that might offend a four year old it helps to sell the story... especially when the language is being used by the crew of a ship in a doubly tense situation (there's wearing right off the bat int he epilogue but in context it is not only appropriate but wholly believable).

If you like previous works by Scalzi, you'll enjoy this book. If your mouth doubles as a citation printer and every time you hear someone swear you find yourself uncontrollably saying 'You are fined 1 credit for a violation of the verbal Morality Statute.' then this book probably isn't for you.

Quick-paced, funny and carefully constructed, this is one of the best Scalzi novels I've read. The characters are all flawed, sharp-tongued and eminently likeable, and the plot kept me hooked right from the prologue. An excellent novel, all around.

Seriously, I loved this book. It was light, fun, had an interesting story, and fulfilled my need for some new Scalzi. Now, was it Lock In? No, but that was a much different story and a much different book. If you're looking for something that's more fast paced and funny, give this a try. Bonus: Wil Wheaton is the narrator for the audible version - and he's always an amazing narrator.

Been a fan of Mr. Scalzi since I first cracked the spine on Old Man War. Yet again, he delivers.There are hints of Asimov in this, but it is a fresh and intriguing take on the perils of intergalactic civilization. Definitely worth the read. I have to mirror the thoughts of at least one other reviewer though, in that my only complaint is I wouldn't have minded a couple hundred more pages of this story.

Oh... yeah... and ignore the Vox fanboys. Unless it's a verified purchase, I'm clicking the thumbs down.

almost bought it until I noticed the Kindle version is more expensive than the paperback! is it because of the binding or the ink or.... ??
given the choice of paperback then I bought a used one for a lot less
Having said that, I do enjoy the writing style and the story

Excellent start to a new series. Something a bit different than he's done before, grander in scope. Loved the characters. Beware of all the bad reviews being posted by Vox Day's minions. They mean nothing.

If you're like me and you loved Old Man's War and The Ghost Brigades, then you probably want to steer clear of Scalzi's latest, which is short on adventure and long on interplanetary business deals and political intrigue. There's one particular character whose "hook" is that she's excessively profane, and boy does that get old in a hurry. Not recommended.

The second page (on kindle) of the epilogue I set my kindle down, grabbed my phone, photographed one paragraph and sent it to a friend with the line "Gods I love Scalzi". Right out of the gate the Scalzi I love is clearly there.

While I'd prefer more Old Man's War books, this universe Scalzi has created looks equally fun. I thoroughly enjoyed the title and look forward to (hopefully) several more books in this series. A reviewer before me said 'potty mouth', well yeah... guess what... people swear, when characters swear it makes it believable. When an author grows a pair and uses language that might offend a four year old it helps to sell the story... especially when the language is being used by the crew of a ship in a doubly tense situation (there's wearing right off the bat int he epilogue but in context it is not only appropriate but wholly believable).

If you like previous works by Scalzi, you'll enjoy this book. If your mouth doubles as a citation printer and every time you hear someone swear you find yourself uncontrollably saying 'You are fined 1 credit for a violation of the verbal Morality Statute.' then this book probably isn't for you.

Quick-paced, funny and carefully constructed, this is one of the best Scalzi novels I've read. The characters are all flawed, sharp-tongued and eminently likeable, and the plot kept me hooked right from the prologue. An excellent novel, all around.

Seriously, I loved this book. It was light, fun, had an interesting story, and fulfilled my need for some new Scalzi. Now, was it Lock In? No, but that was a much different story and a much different book. If you're looking for something that's more fast paced and funny, give this a try. Bonus: Wil Wheaton is the narrator for the audible version - and he's always an amazing narrator.

Been a fan of Mr. Scalzi since I first cracked the spine on Old Man War. Yet again, he delivers.There are hints of Asimov in this, but it is a fresh and intriguing take on the perils of intergalactic civilization. Definitely worth the read. I have to mirror the thoughts of at least one other reviewer though, in that my only complaint is I wouldn't have minded a couple hundred more pages of this story.

Oh... yeah... and ignore the Vox fanboys. Unless it's a verified purchase, I'm clicking the thumbs down.

almost bought it until I noticed the Kindle version is more expensive than the paperback! is it because of the binding or the ink or.... ??
given the choice of paperback then I bought a used one for a lot less
Having said that, I do enjoy the writing style and the story

Excellent start to a new series. Something a bit different than he's done before, grander in scope. Loved the characters. Beware of all the bad reviews being posted by Vox Day's minions. They mean nothing.

Scalzi's characterization is rock solid. I especially enjoy the way his heroes / heroines so bluntly disparage and ridicule the bad guys and gals to their faces. It has a suspenseful plot, with many twists and turns, and the foreshadowing of the final scenes works for me.

I only wish I had the next volume so I could follow the story further. I can hardly wait!

Scalzi is an incredibly readable author. I appreciate his smooth, snarky style. I thoroughly enjoyed this fast-paced space opera. Why only four stars? I actually thought that the topic could have used a hair more gravitas. I also felt the book seemed short. Finally, the Flow itself remained unclear to me as an artifact. That said, I almost gave this 5 stars to offset the unreasoning Scalzi haters; in the end decided to go with the rating I believe the book deserved.

Wil Wheaton is an excellent narrator. I will sometimes give an audio book that he narrates a chance when I otherwise wouldn't. His talents are on display here. He manages to breath life into wooden characters, humor into jokes that would otherwise fall flat, and he manages to make a weak plot sound compelling.

Even so, I can't go on. This novel is a chore where I was looking for escape and entertainment. I'll most likely return Collapsing Empire for my Audible credit back.

Having read all of the Old Man's War series, I was excited to hear that Scalzi was starting a new space based series. This first book is great, with three terrific protagonists, as well as the occasional jumping to an antagonist who finds himself rapidly in over his head. The dialogue is snappy, and the end of chapter 12 is one of the best razor grinned "Aha, I have you now" moments I've read in quite a while. And the prologue is able to set the stakes, introduce you into the political and social framework of the setting, and give you tons of tension and action compressed into a very short span.

As for the world building, I like that John has used the technology sparingly, and with plausibility. People still use projectile weapons, spaceships obey the laws of physics, and the very high tech portions are theoretically possible. He also doesn't let the tech run away with the story. While the Flow is central to the story, it's the reactions of the characters to it's changing that drive the narrative, whether they are right, wrong, or somewhere in between.

The story ends setting up a sequel, but I can't blame the author, he would have to deliver a foot thick book otherwise, and I appreciate the portioning out of this tale so I can let my brain dine on it over time.

Don't waste your valuable time, dear reader, this author is phoning it in. Sub-par would be generous. Over-simplified plagiarism would be more accurate. The characters are cardboard-cut-out ciphers, the doughy plot obvious from the outset and worst – the work in its entirety is cribbed, borrowed and copied from greatness, and crouches, cringing in the magnificent shadow cast by those works, penned by a certain Iain.M.Banks, whose Culture novels overwhelmingly blit this piece of pasty, directionless wannabe-ware into its constituent particles and matter. Don't waste a standard earth-hour on this dim and pointless watery bilge.

This was a novella. Too short for the money I paid for it. I literally read it in a couple of hours. I'll be pirating the rest of the series to get my money's worth back. YOU'RE CASHING IN TOO SOON, JOHN.

I really enjoyed this book. it is certainly more dialogue heavy than his past work (this is more in the action level of Lock-In, than Old Mans War), but i really enjoyed it. He makes his characters very interesting, and i loved the set pieces.

With every novel John Scalzi further cements his status as the best SF writer of his generation. The latest novel, The Collapsing Empire, is the first book in a brand new series. The Empire in this case is a set of human worlds connected by a natural phenomenon known as the Flow. You can enter it and exit it at fixed points. Within the Flow you can move at faster than light speeds, connecting worlds that would otherwise be too distant to have contact with one another. The Empire is made up of ruling clans, or guild houses, which govern these worlds. The worlds, by design, are dependent on one another; none are capable of self-sufficiency. This means that losing access to the Flow is to die a slow death, and it appears that the Flow is shifting.

The best part about any Scalzi novel is the characters and he introduces some great new ones here. Cardenia, the woman who was not supposed to be emperox save for the untimely death of her brother which has left her as the only heir to succeed her dying father. Kiva, the sharp-tongued, foul-mouthed daughter of another guild who is clever enough to see that plots are unfolding and there is both need and opportunity to take advantage of them. Marce Claremont, the son of a scholar who has been studying the flow for decades and is an expert in his own right, who must take back information to the new emperox that the Flow is shifting and the Empire is in jeopardy.

Scalzi’s dialogue is filled with wit, and a healthy amount of sarcasm. The characters in The Collapsing Empire have strong motivations whether for good or for ill. There are reasons for the things they do. They may be harmful or destructive, but they are never thoughtless. All the main characters are on a journey in this first book. They may be fulfilling a destiny they are reluctant to fulfil, but ultimately are going to do the right thing. The question is, can anything be done to prevent the destruction of the Empire?

The Collapsing Empire is set up for a sequel perhaps more so than Scalzi’s previous books. While a very entertaining book, there is clearly more story to be told. This is a wonderful new universe to dive into filled with interesting ideas, fascinating characters, and intriguing and ruthless politics--another Scalzi trademark. It moves at a fast pace and will leave you wanting more. The hardest thing about reading a Scalzi book is the wait for the next one. Highly recommended read!

I was fortunate to receive an advance copy of this book.

First, I think it's important to note that because of the whinging of a tax evader, there are going to be a lot of 1 star reviews showing up. I'd recommend that you pay attention to those that are verified purchases.

Second, I think that this is a great book to kick off Scalzi's Tor deal. I was a fan of Old Man's war and the sequel, and it's nice to see Scalzi returning to space opera Sci Fi. Hopefully this series maintains it's quality. I thought some of the later stuff in the Old Man's War universe was repetitive and too "aware."

I was a huge fan of Kiva, and I liked the dancing between the different guilds. That's an avenue I'd like to see explored more, but I have a fondness of 'bureacracy porn' such as The Traitor, Baru Cormorant, The Outback Stars, and Articles of the Federation.

Well worth your time, and I look forward to the sequel

Stuff like this is why almost no one reads sci fi anymore, and people like me buy only because we idiotically thought the fact the book was on a display meant it was good. Let me count the ways this book is lousy compared to any Ludlum type novel. I'm a novice writer myself, so I see things a little differently...

1. Plot. For example, look at the preview. I didn't read the first few pages before buying, I kinda skipped around, and should not have. There's a ship mutiny. How does the writer show his sheer lack of skill as a writer? The rebels take over the ship because on a huge spaceship, all the weapons are locked up in one place, and only 5 people can get it. Suuuurrre. And only the captain has... a dart gun? None of these soldiers/sailors even carry sidearms? Second. They mutinied over... make 30% more money. Let me explain that. They killed a bunch of people, decided to risk death/prison/killing people, because instead of a $1000 paycheck they will get a $1300 paycheck. Yeah. They killed a ton of people for basically some overtime pay. This continues on, and the plot is about as well thought out as the latest Resident Evil movie.

2. WHY NO DESCRIPTIONS? Seriously dude! What did adjectives and settings do to you! I love putting beautiful settings and helping immerse readers in the story. So do most good writers. This guy somehow hates describing settings. Or people. If you're writing a fanfic where every reader has seen 30 episodes with those characters, you don't need to. This isn't a TV show. Describe the damn settings and characters, paint a picture for us.

3. Seriously? Banter is fun. Like, Charades with Cary Grant had banter sprinkled in, and was loads of fun 70 years ago. This guy evidently decided "character development? Making characters likable? Forget that, just make them snarky. That'll work."

4. I wanted the female lead to die. Seriously. Why is she a hero? She's an evil maniac. Remember the Kevin Costner Robin Hood? Remember Alan Rickman's character, the guy basically raping some poor girl by the fire when an advisor comes in to talk? Yeah. Imagine a female version.

5. Has this guy... ever met human beings? Gone to social events? Been in groups? College classes? You need to write people realistically. Like, write women... as women. Men, as men. If you could switch a female character's name for "Robert" and it would make just as much sense, you're in trouble.

What can one possibly say about a new Scalzi novel? It's funny; it's snarky; it has great characters and a fascinating plot? Yes to all that. Just give the man his Hugo and save the suspense. My only concern is that we have to wait a year for the sequel.

I got the audiobook of this and it was so boring. I like most of Scalzi's books, but this one just didn't do it for me. Wil Wheaton's narration was mediocre at best. I wish I could get my time back from listening to this, but I guess the refund will do.

Refreshingly funny Sci-fi. Look, you don't always want a depressing true to genre hard sci fi "inevitable heat death of the universe and collapse of humanity" book. This isn't that. This is a fun read with lots of swearing and a Firefly-esque sense of humor. Read it.

This book is well written, interesting and fun. What more could you want? I liked the characters and am looking forward to reading more about them. The plot was good and had the appropriate level of suspense. I'm not sure what other reviewers are complaining about. If you're looking for something that will bring you joy, read this book.

Imagine a far-future story of political maneuvering by interstellar nobility in the mode of Lois McMaster Bujold or Catherine Asaro. Season it with a touch of the Foundation universe and a nuance of John Hemry. This sounds like the ingredients for a good read. Give it to a talented “word chef” like John Scalzi, with his trademark sense of humor and skill with plots and characters, though, and he will turn it into a SUPER read.
In the Collapsing Empire multiple human-settled worlds are governed by the Interdependency. In addition to the ruling emperox (Yes, the title is emperox, not emperor. I have no idea why.), there is an executive committee composed of representatives of the main power centers: the guilds, the parliament, and the church. The Interdependency enables and controls travel between the worlds, using the Flow, “a river of space-time that makes faster-than-light travel possible”, but there is evidence the Flow may be breaking up. This would threaten the future of humanity, whose worlds are truly “interdependent”. Various forces are attempting to learn more about the phenomenon either to protect humanity’s future or to keep the Flow’s break-up secret long enough to turn the information to their own advantage.
In this environment Cardenia Wu-Patrick becomes Experox Grayland and has to figure out how to save her life, her throne, and humanity and also avoid having to marry that obnoxious Amit Nohamapetan. Young physicist Marce Clarement is trying to help his physicist father, the original discoverer of the Flow break-up, by getting accurate information to the Experox while keeping it from landing in the wrong hands. Lady Kiva Lagos, on the other hand, only wants to protect her family’s business interest, and, oh, yes, keep up her active sex life. They all have lots of challenges on all fronts. It makes for a good story.
Scalzi laces his plot with plenty of humor, some of it gentle, some of it barbed, and some of it rather broad. I enjoyed little exchanges like this one between the emperox and her aide: “
“[T]he executive committee…wants to marry me off.”
“They want to preserve an existing alliance.”
“An alliance with terrible people”
“Really nice people don’t usually accrue power.”
“You’re saying I’m kind of an outlier,” Cardenia said.
“I don’t recall saying you were nice.”
Scalzi’s characters come alive much better than is common in space opera. I enjoyed getting to know them and even to care about them, from spunky Cardenia, who had never expected or wanted to become experox, to Kiva, the potty-mouthed member of a powerful guild family. (SF readers who decry the relative deficit of strong female characters in the genre, take note. In retrospect I realize that most of the really memorable characters in the book are women.) The author takes pains to make the people of this world act human, with small touches like a moving portrayal of the grief of a family whose daughter is killed during an assassination attempt.
Providing adequate technical and scientific details to build a credible picture of a fictional future without interfering with the flow of the story is a perennial challenge for SF writers, and Scalzi strikes a good balance. There is enough description and explanation to make me feel he has thought about the Flow, the spaceships, etc., but I never felt I had wandered into a science text or engineering manual.
Since this is the beginning of a new series, not all the problems are solved or questions answered at the end of this book. There is enough of a sense of closure to avoid a total “cliffhanger” feeling…but a clever ending scene that makes the reader want to abduct the author and make him sit down to write the next installment RIGHT NOW. Scalzi says he has committed to it and even has a working title, but it is not due until 2019. Not soon enough, John; not soon enough.
NOTE: I received a free copy of this book from Net Galley in exchange for an unbiased review.

I just finished listening to the audiobook narrated by Wil Wheaton. I'm not sure why the other reviews are so negative - I loved it. Scalzi's writing style has just gotten better and I couldn't put the book down. I love his character driven sci-fi, and find it really weird that on reviewer wrote about "potty mouth". Really? Because of the f word?

I received this book as a gift by someone who noticed I have a fair library of sci-fi classics at home. The cover looked interesting but the book was bizarre, to say the least. While I did see glimpses of familiarity with other sci-fi writers styles, it is almost like chunks of the plot were cut and pasted and then gratuitous sex added, not that I am prudish but the scenes were bizarre and did not add to the plot I kept expecting something to fall into place but it did not. I tried but was unable to make myself finish it, which is unusual for me.

This book is basically a derivative copy of better authors much like Scalzis other "works" combined with sucky, boring dialogue, snark and political correctness.... in space! Scalizi writes women as though they are just men with boobs (much as he himself appears in person). It is difficult to communicate just how vapid and ordinary this book is - with absolutely no surprises and a predicable plot that is both boring and irritating at the same time. Overall this book carries less weight than the contents of the authors jock strap and is useful for lining bird cages provided you don't like the bird.

I have not read all of the book, I freely admit that. I gave it the prologue and first few chapters. At that point, had the copy been mine and not borrowed, it would have been flung at the nearest wall. Earlier, really, but I wanted to give it at least a chance to get better.

The emperox (both the dying one and the new one) sound far too much like bored gen-Xers. The heir not sounding particularly cultured or sophisticated, okay, I can sort of excuse, but the emperor of the known universe? One whose position seems fairly fraught with peril and a tug of war with the merchant houses? Threw me out of the novel. (Funnily enough, while it does look like at least somewhat inspired by Asimov, the emperox and the houses screamed "not the Laandsrad and Padisah Emperor" from Dune far more loudly, and the heir and her historian friend came across as being heavily inspired by Princess Irulan, the historian, also from Dune.

Then there is Kiva.

Straight up, she's rapey. We meet her rutting away on a subordinate who does not seem too thrilled to be there. I hated that character and her stupid vulgarities. If you are going to swear, at least be creative about it. A stream of S and F words gets boring real quick.

Then there is the mutiny. That whole sequence seems utterly implausible for a space merchant marine. From the way the weapons are stored to the absolutely ludicrous self-defense weapon the captain had it was all just one long knife to my suspension of disbelief. Its so many years in the future, and her self-defense weapon is *far* inferior to what we have now? *And* is only a single shot weapon?

Maybe it gets better after the first few chapters. I hated it so much by then I don't care. I did not like a single one of the characters, and they all felt wooden and flat in different ways.

[Edit] I got a hold of a copy again and read another chapter, to be fair. It had progressed from annoying bad to merely boring, so I think a second star is warranted. I still have no desire to read the rest, but it is not the worst thing I have ever read, so One star is slightly too harsh. [Edit]

Though I haven't read it, it surely will be a fantastic book. I say that because generally books with multiple 1 star reviews posted the minute the book is released are actually great. So I'm gonna go ahead and say 5 stars to counter balance the other nonsense reviews that the store continually allows to pollute the site.

This review is based on reading the Prologue and Chapters One, Two and Three. Really, you don't need to read further to gauge the quality of this novel.

In the beginning of Chapter Two, which introduces John Scali's self-proclaimed favorite character he ever wrote, the character, Kiva Lagos, is described vulgarly in the process of sexually exploiting a subordinate. the store took out this excerpt from the "Look Inside" material. Also, the store apparently doesn't allow obscenities in reviews, even if you're quoting directly from the book. But the uncensored excerpt is still proudly up at Tor's website. Check it out.Let's switch the sexes and see how it looks:

"Kivo of House Legos and the senior aristocrat aboard was busily boning a ship's barmaid when...."

Just as revoltingly inhuman.

Also, Scalzi is totally incompetent at exposition. He stops the action to info dump leaden paragraphs of what you need to know to understand what's going on. This is an amateur's mistake and deadly in fiction. There are only three ways to handle exposition:

GET IT OVER WITH – Best done at the very beginning of the story or chapter. Very popular until the mid 20th Century before readers were conditioned by TV and movies to have attention spans measurable in seconds. Has the advantage of efficiency because a lot of information and backstory can be conveyed as the reader is not yet engaged in the story itself and so is more receptive. Think of how commercials shown before a movie are tolerable, but if they interrupted ROGUE ONE for even one Super Bowl quality commercial, theaters would burn.
HIDE IN PLAIN SIGHT – Weave it  into the warp and woof of the story’s fabric and hope nobody notices. This is extremely difficult, akin to composing a four voice fugue, which is why lesser writers don’t even attempt it.
FICCIOUNUS INTERRUPTUS- The worse way: Stop the action, with or without warning, expect the reader to hold still while you inform him what he needs to know before proceeding to the…er, climax of the story. As might be expected, this is jarring, frustrating, and may lead to a loss of interest and withdrawal.

Scalzi chose the last method and I suspect both he and his readers will be screwed.

Picked it up at my local bookstore as the blurb on the back seemed interesting. Unfortunately, that was all that was interesting. The characters were flat, no complexities at all. The plot is Frankenstein-esque - a bunch of parts sewn together with callous disregard for the laws of nature or even simple human decency. It's the type of book that fifteen years ago you would have found with a plastic spine being sold in the teenage writer's home town.

Too expensive for a kindle book! The paperbacks are cheaper than the kindle version. Who is going to spend this much for any SF writer? The author should check his price points if he wants any entry into the ebook market. I'll sometime pay more for a really good author who has a proven and recent track record-- but there hasn't been much from John for a few years and it was uninteresting. So when the book goes on the extreme sales rack at the stores, then I'll buy.

Being a huge Scalzi fan, got this book and read it. Hated it!

First of all, he has created a feudal society. In an age of education, you cannot create a feudal society with Kings and Queens and Lords and Barons. He has copied many aspects of the British royalty, not much original thinking there.

The book does not even have a complete story, ends without any of the threads being tied up.

Looks like Scalzi has a fixed deal for a number of books and wants to fill out his quota.

Interesting plot and well developed characters make this a good read. Scalzi pretty much forces us buy book 2 since he's really left us hanging at the end of book 1. Don't care...hope there's a book 3 out there someplace!

I have read all of Scalzi’s previously written works and throughly enjoyed and admired them. What is so disappointing in The Collapsing Empire is that, in total contrast to his works that I so enjoyed, none of the characters is likable. You don’t care about their successes or failures. He also has a character with gratuitous potty mouth using the f bomb constantly. I found this jarring and off putting and an unrealistic contrivance. I agree with another reviewer who mentions that in the Acknowledgements Scalzi appears to gloat over his being paid for long-term additional works. I would appeal to him please to kill off Kiva and her foul mouth quickly and develop some characters who are cleaver and likable, traits I so enjoyed in Old Man’s War.

I can’t say that this is the most profound book I’ve ever read but it sure is entertaining. It captures human nature so accurately that if you aren’t laughing at the amazing profanity and immortality of Lady Kiva, you’re sad that she’s such a believable character. Humans have an innate tendency to screw each other over and then have the audacity to be offended at being caught doing it. This book is all about that contradictory nature. I only hope it doesn’t end with all hugs and running carefree through a field of flowers. Even science fiction can only stretch believability so far before reality snaps. Great fun reading.

I noticed that I didn't have to go through several pages just to read about each character. It's done well by Mr. Scalzi, but it is with all the books I've read by him. This is science fiction at its best. Rich characterizations, humor, and just plain fun.