One can almost predict the end but not quite. A lot of interesting philosophy about where humanity needs to go next. The story of a risky effort to mine an asteroid and all the human till that goes with that. ( )

Very good techno-thriller from Daniel Suarez. I don't think he could ever top his first book, Daemon, a heart-stopping thrill ride from start to finish. Delta-V refers to the power required to escape Earth's gravity well. A major problem with colonizing space is that it's too expensive to get cargo into orbit and past the orbit of Earth- but if asteroids could be mined for waters and metals, the material would already be outside the gravity well, requiring much less Delta-V to be deployed.

The book is set in the 2030s. James Tighe, the main point of view character, is a caver and family black sheep. He is recruited by Nathan Joyce, a (pre-Twitter) Elon-Musk-type visionary and business titan, to crew the first space vessel to an asteroid and mine materials for return to near-Earth. The first half of the book consists of an endless training and culling sequence, with many recruits whittled down to just eight eventually. Then the crew heads out into space for a four year mission to mine, and to prove it can be done and launch humanity into space.

The second half of the book is gripping, as things of course go wrong and the crew along with their handlers on Earth have to improvise and try to get back safely. The book ends satisfyingly, but with big unresolved issues and a planned sequel.

Suarez knows how to write page-turners. This is really good, but I have a few issues. As noted above, the training sequence is too long, and could have been culled by 100 pages. There are also a ton of characters there, which seems unnecessary since many of them never make it to the mission, and I couldn't keep track of so many.

But really good anyway, I'm definitely in on the sequel(s). ( )

amazingly well-written story with interesting characters, well-researched science/physics, and a plausible plot line... i blew through this book in no time at all, and hope i can read book 2 (critical mass) in the next few weeks... ( )

Exciting page turning adventure about the selection, training and mission of a crew for the first asteroid mining. ( )

I'm no more than 5% in to this book, and find the ideas to be interesting, and the science seems good for what I can follow. However... it's getting to be a chore to keep reading, which is not what I'm looking for these days. It's too serious and matter-of-fact, and frankly, I'm getting bored. So, maybe I'll get back in to it one day, but until then - no rating.