The Collapsing Empire Book Review

Author: John Scalzi
Book Link

Here we go with another Scalzi book review. I don’t know what to say except I can’t get enough of this author.

The best way to describe this book is Star Trek: Deep Space Nine mixed with the characters of Kevin Smith movies… in a really good way.

Disclaimer: If you hate politics, science fiction and a few characters that swear obsessively, I would strongly discourage you from picking this up. Then again, if you’ve read anything by this author before, you know full well what you’re getting into.

Unlike the last book I read from Scalzi where I jumped in the middle of a series, this one is the beginning of a completely new story arc and universe. For that reason, it does take a bit to get into because you have to put together the pieces as you go along. For me, that took about fifty pages.

Once it gets going though, it ramps up in a magnificent display of awesomeness.

Quick summary: Humans have discovered something called The Flow, which allows them to colonize distant stars and galaxies… the catch being no one really knows how it works. They create a new empire called The Interdependency as a hedge against interstellar war whereupon all the systems are dependent on each other — then The Flow starts shifting.

The story moves quickly and the disparate characters it follows slowly begin to merge together into one interconnected plot. For this reason, it never got confusing and it built towards an ending that was satisfying enough to pick up the next one in the series.

So thank you Mr. Scalzi for chewing up another weekend of mine with your raw edge of literary prowess in a genre I can’t get enough of.