Storyline: 3/5 
 Characters: 4/5 
 Writing Style: 4/5 
 World: 2/5 
 I ended my review of Nemesis Games with a request for Abraham and Franck to focus less on simply getting through these middle volumes and to instead write solid science fiction stories. Although I'm sure they weren't listening to me, they did turn out a much more carefully written story free of those dumb plotholes and strains of credulity that typically mark space operas. This book sends the series on a slightly upward trend following that dip in the series that was book 5. 
 Corey was simply a better writer in this volume. The phrasing and science fiction lingo was more selective and fitting, and the book read like they cared about not only about the story's direction but about how it was being told. There were more geeky, enjoyable sentences like this: If there hadn't been so many f---ing human beings stressing the food webs over the last few centuries, the system might have been more robust. Or it might not have. It wasn't as though they had a second Earth to use as a control. History itself was a massive n=1 study, irreproducible. Or this It was like they were all being forced to find a min/max point in a complex curve of inertia, acceleration, and a lot of dead people. It's not hard science fiction but a science-based patois geared to genre enthusiasts. 
 This was the best Corey has managed characters as well. I looked on the last volume with some disdain because Corey was pulling cheap tricks to satisfy the reader. You know that place in your favorite television series - usually around season 3 - where the plot is starting to fizzle, they're having difficulty coming up with new ideas, and they're saving the best for later - when they start flooding you with relational dramas and drenching you with backstory? Nemesis Games was that moment for The Expanse. Here though, Corey finally figures out how to move our characters forward without overdosing on the past. I was particularly impressed with the subtlety and direction with a few of the characters (view spoiler)[ Holden's "absolute transparency/free information" quirk, Marco Inaros's meglomania, and Filip's adolescence (hide spoiler)]. 
 I did (and still do) begrudge Corey for the unresolved mini-drama of Nemesis Games. I would guess that it and this volume weren't part of the original story arc, and they squeezed them in to get more volumes out of the series. Though this is a better book, it still had to contend with the limitations and place Nemesis Games left to it. The authors also have veered off from a couple of tendencies that I thought were working well. The first was the balance and variation with the long-arc big mystery (remember the protomolecule anyone?) with the present action-adventure (view spoiler)[ The first was murder mystery the second political thriller, the third personal vendetta, the fourth was squatter's rights/terrorism, and the fifth was....terrorism again.... And the sixth was the second half of the fifth.... (hide spoiler)] The first four books maintained both a good balance between the alien mystery and the space-shoot-em-up and something new. These fifth and sixth books broke with that pattern, a move that I didn't appreciate. Similarly these two broke the patterns of the first person perspective shifts.(view spoiler)[ Book one had Holden and Miller; book two had Bobbie, Holden, Prax, Avarasala; book three had Holden, Bull, Melba, Anna; book four had Basia, Elvi, Havelock, and Holden. See the pattern? We keep our captain Holden perspective throughout, and we get three new character perspectives that were non-central to the series. In book five though, we get Holden, Amos, Naomi, and Alex. It is still four perspectives, but they've been our main characters throughout. Now, in book 6, we get Pa, Filip, Holden, Salis, Clarissa, Dawes, Avarasala, Prax, Alex, Naomi, Jakulski, Fred, Vandercaust, Dawes, Amos, Marco, Roberts, Bobbie. (hide spoiler)] These features were working and working well, and I'm not sure what prompted them to change. 
 Despite my criticisms, it was an enjoyable read. I still think these last two are placeholders in the series; it was at chapter 44 in this one that I realized that I really would have been okay if the present book had begun right there and the preceding 4/5 of the story hadn't been written. I'm glad the authors got this present storyline out of their system, because I'm ready to spend more time on the mystery and exploration side and less on the politics, rebellion, and war.