The Grand Conjunction

Astropolis, Book 3

By: Sean Williams

Narrated by: Christian Rummel

Length: 10 hrs and 35 mins

Publisher's summary

Six hundred thousand years after Imre Bergamasc's abdication, the Host rules the supposedly peaceful galaxy. But revolution is fomenting - and Imre's unexpected return may be all it takes to light the final fuse.

©2009 Sean Williams (P)2012 Audible, Inc.

Disappointing but not entirely

I hated the first few hours of the book and be warned there’s a lot of sexual stuff that is uncomfortable, but with some reasoning behind it which is about two decades ahead of its time socially.

The end wraps up the trilogy for the most part. Satisfying if not a little dues ex machina.

But after the freshness of the original book and excitement of the second book, after I’ve reached the end I feel somewhat hollow about the series.

This is the third read through I’ve done of the series since it came out, fully forgetting the story each time, and feeling a little empty each time. Now, again, I can see why.

It’s not a terrible series. It has good ideas. Some of them are executed well. It has a lot of rough spots too.

One jarring thing about the narration was that the narrator changed the voices of some of the characters which had been consistent through the first two books for some reason. I have no idea why.

Should you read this series? Yes I think so. Do it. It won’t be your favourite series ever though.

A poor third attempt

Very disappointed with this book. The first two volumes where fast paced with a great storylines. This book's story line is slower then molasses pouring in a blizzard. If I could get my money back I would...

Interesting take on the far future

Admittedly the task of dealing with characters as they journey through great spans of time is... odd. I found myself shaking my head at some of the sequences due to the difficult task of accepting the ideas. But, ultimately I knew I was reading / listening to a series about exotic concepts and let most of the crazy things roll over me and just enjoyed the story as a whole.

I do have yo say that the final book seems to have left some things unanswered. Williams tries to answer plot questions with "overall" answers but I found myself wanting more specific resolution on many plot points. Still, I considered the series a fun listen as I drove.

One thing I found quite difficult to accept with this Audible presentation of the final book was Rummel's drastic change of the voicing of nearly all the characters. Until this final book, the voicing was consistent but it actually became hard to follow dialog at times in this final book with me thinking things like, "wait, that's Render speaking? That's not his voice." I know some characters physically change drastically in this final book but some are consistent like Render and Chiro who are primes so their voices should have been the same throughout the series.

Still, I'll give it a thumbs up for both content and presentation.