Review: The Consuming Fire, by John Scalzi

[Russ Allbery]

The Consuming Fire
by John Scalzi

Series:    Interdependency #2
Publisher: Tor
Copyright: October 2018
ISBN:      0-7653-8898-7
Format:    Kindle
Pages:     320

The Consuming Fire is the second book of the Interdependency series and
is part of a single story with The Collapsing Empire. This is not a
good series to read out of order.

The Collapsing Empire was primarily setup: introductions to the
players, the story of Cardenia Wu-Patrick becoming emperox and what she
learns about the empire in the process, and of course revelations of
the fragility of her empire that culminate in a cliff-hanger ending.
The Consuming Fire is unambiguously the middle book of a trilogy, which
includes kicking that cliff-hanger along to the next book. The events
of the first book left Cardenia clear on both the threat and the
necessary response, but the status quo has substantial momentum and the
rest of her government doesn't want to believe things that might
disrupt it. Everything slows down from the climax of the first book,
political complications multiply, and some parts of the plot enter a
waiting game.

This type of middle-book slowdown can be frustrating, but here I
thought it worked. It also made this an interesting book to read in the
current political moment, where US (and, for that matter, UK) politics
seems to be going through that middle-book tension.

During the time period of The Consuming Fire, thoughtful people (and
insiders) have figured out the broad outlines of what's going to
happen, but it hasn't happened yet. This is the time when one can be
fairly certain of the meaning behind previous events but there's still
a bit of uncertainty left, so people who have substantial incentives to
come up with alternative explanations still have maneuvering room. It's
the tense and frustrating middle period where one is trying to head off
a slow-motion train wreck, or at least minimize the damage, but still
have to deal with the people claiming there is no wreck and no train.

This probably makes the book sound miserable: a bit too on the nose,
and thus likely to bring up unwelcome echos of current political
messes. It's not, though. Partly this is due to political wish
fulfillment: Scalzi is telling a story of smart and engaged people
finding ways to change the world, including some very satisfying
victories over their cynical opponents, so the reader is spared the
sense of futility real-world politics more often brings. Partly it's
due to Scalzi's comfortable, fast-moving style. But much of its
avoidance of middle-book tension is use of another middle-book
technique: the side exploration mission that crops up between chapters
of the main plot, and which opens up surprise revelations for the
world-building. I won't spoil that; suffice it to say that Scalzi is
doing some interesting things with history, how it is recorded, and how
that recording process can change the emphasis.

I think this series is still more of a speedboat than a submarine. It's
determinedly headed towards its plot destination, and while that path
is well-supported by an underlying lake of world-building with some
occasionally interesting scenery, Scalzi rarely stops the boat to dive
below the surface and explore in detail. That said, I grumbled a bit in
my review of the first book about interchangeable characters, but
didn't feel that here. Either I was too grumpy when reading the
previous book or the characters are carving out their own territory as
the series continues. Marce is still a cipher to me, but Kiva was my
favorite surviving character in the first book and didn't let me down
in the second. (And Scalzi makes an excellent choice in showing a key
scene from her perspective. It benefits tremendously from her acerbic
commentary.)

Something else I've liked about both books of this series so far is
that Scalzi portrays all sides with intelligence. Some of the villains
are cynical, self-serving scum, but they still make coherent,
reasonable plans and anticipate their opponents' strategies. Neither
the heroes nor the villains fall for obvious ploys. Scalzi does
hand-wave some of the details, and I'm sure one could nitpick the
tactics, but the books never made me want to. So many stories like this
involve inexperienced protagonists blundering into obvious danger and
then saving themselves through desperate heroics. It's nice to read a
story that gives its characters more credit for advance planning.

The Collapsing Empire ended on a cliff-hanger; The Consuming Fire ends
on essentially the same cliff-hanger, except complicated by subsequent
revelations. Readers who dislike waiting for a story's conclusion may
want to hold off until the third book is published (currently scheduled
for early 2020). I'm enjoying the series and will certainly keep
reading.

Followed by an as-yet-unnamed third book.

Rating: 7 out of 10

Reviewed: 2018-12-27

-- 
Russ Allbery (eagle at eyrie.org)              <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>