Alien abduction gets a bad rap. It usually goes like this: One kooky neighbor gets beamed up into a flying saucer and returns to earth different, full of interstellar knowledge. But what if the scale was bigger . . . a lot bigger? What if the aliens came to take us all away? In their massive novel The Mercy of Gods, the author duo known as James S.A. Corey takes the term “survival of the fittest” to a whole new level.
On the far-flung planet of Anjiin, Dafyd Alkhor has it pretty good. He may be a lowly research assistant, but he’s a part of the most prestigious scientific team in the academy. Renown and glory await, but then things take a bit of a turn. Seventeen shining alien starships appear in the sky, rapidly subdue human resistance and abduct the best and brightest to be brought back to the alien homeworld. These aliens, the Carryx, have conquered and assimilated numerous species into their society over the centuries, building a veritable empire across galactic space. But even a species as powerful as the Carryx has an enemy that threatens to destroy them. Dafyd and his team are soon caught in a dangerous game: Find a way to help the Carryx defeat their foe or be discarded as unuseful. After all, for the Carryx, usefulness is survival.
Corey demonstrates a key skill when it comes to expansive sci-fi: balance. No single part of The Mercy of Gods feels unattended to, and details arise on the page just as the reader wonders about them. When the humans are trapped in their holding cells on the alien ship, Corey explains how the aliens account for food, water and other needs. He clearly loves dreaming up all the smart and sometimes grotesque ways one species might attempt to care for another. The interpersonal relationships of Dafyd’s research team are similarly balanced: The shifting, intimate perspectives from various members of the team bring readers close to the pain that would come with such an upheaval.
Corey is the author of The Expanse, an acclaimed sci-fi series that subsequently became an acclaimed TV show. As one would expect from such an accomplished writer, there’s a confidence present throughout The Mercy of Gods: It’s alternately thrilling, intimate, thought-provoking and inventive. In this first installment of a new series, Corey deftly creates a new universe of alien strangeness for humans to test themselves against. I’m excited to see how far we can go in future entries.
