Is there such a thing as too “grand” a setting in a story? I used to think no. The grander the better. However, Exodus: The Archimedes Engine by Peter F. Hamilton is making me think hard on taking that back. It is unfortunate to have to point out that I could not finish the book. I stopped right at around 60%, chapter 20 out of 35. Consisting of about 900 pages, I gave it a fair enough chance before calling it quits. The story here is definitely what can be called a grand space opera. I would hazard that hardcore sci-fi readers will geek out at all the possible technology being described in the novel. There’s space travel, ship wars, political maneuvering and sabotage, different species and cultures, and a bunch of other things that would appeal to science fiction fans. However, all that counts for little if the writing and story take a backseat.

The beginning started out decent. We learn that a gas giant is slowly making its way to the Kelowan start system, a system with two habitable planets mainly for humans after their exodus from Old Earth thousands and thousands of years ago. The gas giant threatens to destabilize the economy between the two planets, but of course, we learn that other factions can take advantage of the situation instead. We then slowly get introduced to the star players of the story along with the planets Anoosha and Gondiar along with how the Celestial Dominion is like. We learn about the Celestials, who can transfer their mindline to new hosts to continue a sort of immortal-like existence, and how they keep the humans and basically everything else in the dominion under their thumbs or whatever body part they consider to be a thumb. It’s not all bad here initially, but it did take some time for me to finally settle in.

As I went along, I started to see cracks. While some readers may complain about the multitude of characters that need to be kept track of, I was okay with it. The biggest issue is that as the chapters went on, I started to not really care about the characters themselves. It’s obvious that Finn and Elle are the main protagonists of the story. However, I found myself not really caring that much once the story or chapter swung back to them. This immediately raised a red flag for me. I found myself actually a bit more interested in Terence’s police arc and Thyra’s slow climb to ruthlessness instead. Regardless, the majority of the characters just felt a bit devoid of that “it” factor that either makes me want to cheer or not cheer for them. For example, I guess I was supposed to feel happy for Finn once he finally accomplished his lifelong dream of acquiring a spaceship, but instead, it was just another “whatever” moment. I guess I was supposed to feel happy and exhilarated when Finn came out of a battle victoriously, but once again, nothing of that sort happened.

For readers that truly value the minute detail of everything, they likely will enjoy the writing here. However, there came a time when I was finally just fed up with the author going into auto-description mode and piling on description after description along with how every single little thing worked or looked. It’s odd because in such a sweeping world that’s not Earth as we know it, how else can the readers settle in to Gondiar, Anoosha, the stars and space traveling, and the different planets and their surrounding orbital view along with a thorough description of every single piece of gadget and technology ever built? But eventually, I got sick of it. Like, really, really sick of it. It was just too detailed a description. While I wasn’t too disappointed that the story progressed slowly, it did make me wonder whether the payoff would be worth it. Add to that a second book in the series that is to be released soon, equally as long, and it was here at chapter 20, 60% in on book one, that I made the decision that, no, it would not be worth it.