Molly Fyde and the Land of Light

Molly Fyde, Book 2

By: Hugh Howey

Narrated by: Jennifer O'Donnell

Length: 11 hrs and 59 mins

Publisher's Summary

What began for Molly as a simple journey to retrieve her father’s old spaceship has turned into an epic adventure with far-reaching consequences. For years, she dreamed of reconnecting with her past. Now she’s going to meet it in a way she never expected: head-on.

Her father is alive. Her mother’s memories are trapped inside his old ship. She’s on the run from her very own Navy, and now has been tasked with the impossible: Rescue her parents. Save the galaxy. End a war.

Before she can begin, however, Molly must first help a friend in need. One of her crew members is in trouble, a life hanging by a slender thread. There’s only one place to turn: the home world of Humanity’s sworn enemy, the very race Molly and Cole have been trained to meet in battle and have been conditioned to fear and loathe: Planet Drenard, the next stop for the starship Parsona.

©2009 Hugh Howey (P)2013 Hugh Howey

Incredibly Weak Prose

So much effort is put into plot and exposition there's none left for humor, characterization, world-building, or making us care. What we get are completely flat characters and half-hearted occasional efforts. Molly loves Cole, Cole pretty much exists for nothing but loving and serving under Molly. Walter exists to be the annoying nerd, everyone else is already forgotten. There's a joke or a bit of world-building color once every few chapters. Molly is contacted by someone claiming to be her long-dead mother. The process of her resolving whether to believe this incredible claim is terribly slap-dash. She does, she doesn't she does, there's an info-dump about Turing Tests, and then it's settled, with no explanation or call-back and no use of the Turing Test idea.

The plot is episodic; this could easily be a TV series. We get into scrapes, we have predictable escapes, over and over. Molly and Cole are, no surprise, always noble and true and fearless. There's a larger plot arc that's just chasing a MacGuffin for now.

In the second half of this book, we run into a woman whose dream is to be eternally pregnant and raise a possibly unbounded number of children, dressing them all alike, calling them all the same. I believe motherhood to be a great joy, but constant pregnancy? Dozens of children? This is a really poorly thought-out version of what a woman's heaven might be.

I'm finishing this, but I've sped it up to 1.5x to get it over with quickly, a first for me.

As good as the First

I loved this book the narrator was great
full of action and suspence
You get easily attached to the the heroes

Good story for Young Adults

Good 2nd installment of this fun, interesting Saga. Really enjoy Hugh Howey and I think this is a great series for Young Adults to get into his work. Really excited to see how the story continues!