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My buddy Jon put the question out there: Should we even finish this book? I voted yes because 1- I thought, against all hope, it might get better and 2- we couldn’t legitimately warn people away from it if we didn’t finish it ourselves. And, quite honestly, as I read on, I realized I had to find out how bad this book would get. It was a train wreck. All told, the group in the story did a little more wandering around, got into some nasty fights, fled, and in the end, kinda won, I think. (This is a trilogy, but there is no way you could pay me to read the rest.) I made a fickle prediction about how the book would end. One plot guess: the best buddy would bite the dust (spoiler: he did) and the second was the mysterious woman would hook back up with the fallen angel guy. After the best bud went bye bye, I started to actually pay attention. Would I go 2 for 2? It didn’t look hopeful as I reached the last few pages. My lucky streak was about to be up. But the last paragraph literally had the mystery woman revealing her devious plans to reunite with her beloved fallen angel guy. I laughed hard for a good 30 seconds. I will remember the book simply b/c I guessed the contrived and unoriginal ending. This book is that bad.

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Uldyssian is the hero, I think, and his friends are trying to help him, we think. The women seemingly have nothing more to do than be mysterious or fawn over him. The story goes from point A to point B, introduces some characters who are quickly dispatched, our main character develops some nonsensical powers, he’s blamed for murder, then he must run. His friends join him, along with the mysterious woman, and they flee to where? The forest. And then they go in circles and get attacked. Everyone is worried, but no one knows what to do and altogether – between cut scenes with the bad guy – I wonder what I’m reading and why I’m reading it. Suffer with us on this weird, anemic entry into fantasy fiction. There is one high point – the book is mercifully short.

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The fate of life, free will, a higher level of existence and harmony with the universe is pared down to these two simple words: Choose Again. The finale to Dan Simmons’ science fiction masterwork is shocking, poignant and one of the most grippingly emotional human stories I have ever read. I felt a sense of loss, hope, gratitude and awe at the mysteries Simmons weaved and the insight we glimpsed into a universe sewn together not by science, but by the intangible power of love. It’s not as cheesy as it sounds, but to say more is to spoil this story that has so much to offer and in my mind is a resounding achievement in science fiction and the human imagination. RoE’s characters display every facet of humanity – our triumphs and our failings – and explores the depths of the universe – the possibilities of other worlds and other plains of existence. The story is anchored by its lead characters who show the best of who we want to be and who never give up even in the face of relentless evil. It is a love story, an epic across space and time, a journey to find faith, and a beautiful homage to the spirit of the human race. Listen to the podcast as we share our thoughts on the best of what this story had to offer.

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Our characters are perpetual nomads, refugees with no home, but they are guided by a strong sense of destiny that takes them across half the populated galaxy, again. The worlds are simply amazing and we are given this deep experience of what it’s like to be in these places, to feel the exotic cultures and to see our group of survivors adapt to them. Raul goes through one of the most truly remarkable and harrowing experiences imaginable (even having experienced a lifetime of adventures). The reunion of Raul and Aenea on T’ien Shan is beautiful, and the setting – on a world of mountains – is unforgettable in its grandeur. The humans on the world must live on the mountaintops away from the acid ocean surface. Life there is rugged and made for the strong, with zip lines, cliffside walkways, and mountain climbing the only way to travel the world. The people there live on the precipice, both literally and figuratively as one of the last strong free worlds not controlled by the Pax. This adventure gets serious and very passionate as we approach humankind’s final trial.

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This is the finale to the Hyperion series. It’s a bittersweet realization to see this epic saga end knowing that these characters will leave us forever. But it’s also an exciting prospect to see this masterwork wrapped up and how Simmons deals with some weighty and ambitious issues that he has built up over four books and two generations.

We’ll take this in baby steps. Listen to part 1 of 3 of the book discussion to see how man’s final reach for an enlightened destiny begins. We have the reintroduction of the cradle of civilization, Aenea’s ascendancy to messiah status to restore humanity, and our favorite male hero Raul, who almost gets sidelined by kidney stones. Yes, even in the far flung future, they have kidney stones. Spoilercast ahead.

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This is the conclusion to our 3-part book discussion on Endymion, the epic 3rd entry in Dan Simmons’s Hyperion Cantos. The journey in the book is quite simply stunning – the water world of Mare Infinitus had me in Jaws-panic-mode and the ice world of Sol Draconi Septem left me ready to take vacation on Hoth.

The journey goes from bad to impossible as the elements force superhuman feats from our band of fugitives. Man and machine conspire to kill Aenea and her friends, who must reach the mythical Earth or watch generations become enslaved by an evil that many thought destroyed. Listen to the REIGN spoilercast to find out if they make it and if this journey is one that you think you could survive.

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What do you do when you’re outgunned, outnumbered, and have slim chance of escape? What we can say, without spoiling, is that Aenea, the time-traveling 12-year-old messiah, is quite the poker player. Listen to the REIGN spoilercast to find out how the ultimate game of space tag is played out.

Endymion, book 3 in the 4-part Hyperion Cantos, is an exciting race across the galaxy, which has changed drastically in three centuries since our last visit here. It’s amazing to see familiar places in this universe and how they’ve adapted to the new superpower in space.

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Raul is a hero I can get behind. He lives a rugged life on Hyperion, never staying in one place too long and surviving how he can as a third-class citizen on his native world. He’s confident in his own abilities, but has no prospect of traveling the stars or joining the larger community of humanity and what it has evolved into. But then his wrongful death starts an adventure of a lifetime.

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Master Chief’s book debut is filled with action and intense confrontations, but the narrative only gets interesting when his comrades are battling in space. Master Chief is sidelined to procedural missions mostly on the ground that don’t place him in the hero role. But we have fun discussing the continuing military cliches and pick apart the highs and lows of this adventure.

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Halo, one of video game history’s defining science fiction war epics, comes to the written page. Can it muster the same emotional resonance that the gameplay inspired in a generation? Well, if you like your military cliches, you are in luck. Saddle up for super soldier training 101.