The Warship

Rise of the Jain, Book 2

By: Neal Asher

Narrated by: David Marantz

Length: 15 hrs and 38 mins

Publisher's summary

The dangers of ancient technology loom over the Polity in the sequel to The Soldier, Neal Asher’s latest action-packed space opera series.

The haiman Orlandine, charged with safeguarding lethal Jain tech swirling inside an accretion disc located in the distant reaches of space, has weaponized a black hole to eliminate the threat. But others are suspicious of her motives, and both the Polity AIs and the leaders of the alien prador kingdom dispatch fleets of warships in anticipation of conflict.

As the black hole continues to eat its way through the planets in the accretion disc, making its way towards a dead sun, it becomes clear the disc has been hiding a larger secret. Nefarious forces with ulterior motives have manipulated Orlandine into deploying the black hole, triggering a series of larger events that will uncover a danger far older than even the Polity itself.

From British science fiction writer Neal Asher, The Warship picks up right where its predecessor, The Soldier, left off, showcasing Asher’s unique take on cutting-edge and fast-paced science fiction.

©2019 by Neal Asher. (P)2019 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved.

Neal Asher!

Best Sci Fi Ever! The David Narantz's narration is Splendid, I wish he narrated all of Nasher's books. The
Warship is the second book in the Jain series. Check out some earlier works for your initiation into Asher's galactic worlds. Makes Star Wars look like Micky Mouse.

the polity never disappointed

loved it can't wait for the next installment
as this left us with bated breath.

Strong story, weak physics.

Strong story and good plot development, although there was a minor plot hole toward the end. The author either has a weak understanding of the laws of physics or doesn’t care about letting said physics get in the way of a good story. The narration was top notch. Overall very entertaining.

Great series!

My favorite books from Mr Asher. My only complaint is for the publisher and audiobook rights. There is no The Human audiobook for American audiences. It was released for Europe but never got an American release. This is really disappointing and a missed opportunity for Neal and his fans.

here come the jain

loved this book, can't wait for part 3 of this series to conclude the story of the jain

Buckle the heck up

“As usual, Neal Asher delivers again with a smashing sequel to The Solder: The Rise of the Jain. Without any spoilers, this novel DRASTICALLY ups the ante and keeps giving us the amazing political humor, satire, military and hardscifi, all in JUST the right amounts.”
-From “How it Is: by Gordon”

Unique characters

Ends with comment “king was right, the Jane have arrived”
Will speculate this continues in a book yet to be written as there is nothing next on audible.
Story without a clear ending.

Great hard scifi!

The Warship is, per usual for Neal Asher, a complex and involved book with multiple tangents and storylines. I did myself a favor and relistened to The Soldier to bring myself up to speed for the next installment in the series. And that pretty much sums up Neal Asher's writing. I have to spin up to a higher level to absorb everything that's going on. (Make's me wish for a crystal AI to help the process.) I don't want to give events away in The Warship, so I'll just say it's a satisfying story arc, you get a clearer picture of the grand scheme of things, some mysteries are left unanswered from The Soldier, but many are explained and of course there's a lot more introduced into the mix. When I reached the end of The Warship it left me satisfied and looking forward to the next book in the series.

Don't be doing anything else while listening

First off, if you came here for a continuation of Book One, nope. This is a completely different story,

I knew that I was probably in trouble when the introduction was a description of all the many characters. It's a very complex story, with each having a mishmash of hangups and backstories. Worse, the characters have the ability to change form, function, and personality along the way.

It's going to take a lot of concentration to follow along, and, sci fi being what it is, expect unpredictable and arbitrary things to happen, easily explained away with techno-babble. I really like sci-fi and have been into it for 50 years, but I just couldn't get into this one. It was a struggle to follow, to the point that I wondered whether the manuscript had accidentally been dropped on the floor, and reassembled in random order... you just can't know what's on the next page... but than again, I don't like some jazz, which sounds arbitrary and random to me, so maybe it's just me. Maybe if I took my own advice and sat down to listen while doing nothing else, perhaps my review would be different, but I listen to books while doing other things, so there.

I realize that I'm in the minority with this one, given the high reviews this got, but so be it. I just couldn't complete it. I guess I'm more of a traditionalist when it comes to a story and plot line, and like a smaller cast of characters and a more straightforward story line.

A bit all over the place

I've listened to a lot of Neal Asher. I really like his descriptive narratives and character development. This book however seemed to be a huge set up story with so many different plot lines. None of them really meant anything to me and I only vaguely understood the plot line and situations. perhaps I didn't listen with enough focus, but definitely struggled to finish this one. and especially upset that my Audible store doesnt have book 3 so I guess I'll never know how this all turns out.