Scan barcode
A review by wolvenbolt
The Robots of Dawn by Isaac Asimov
adventurous
challenging
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
So far this is the weakest book of the series, it took the weaknesses and sufferings from the first book that were originally minor and amblified them.
Majority of this book was dialogue, I'm not kidding, I kept track of it and at one point 20% of the book near the beginning was taken up by a single character's dialogue spanning many pages in a row. It just kept going on and on and on and on, dialogue and dialogue and talking and talking and talking and talking. I've read over 300 books since 2018, I've never encountered anything like this ratio of prose and dialogue. It was completely unchecked and out of control.
I absolutely love Baley, he's one of the most fascinating and well-written protagonists I've read. I really enjoyed his journey in this book, and seeing how he's trying to overcome his fears and acclimatise himself to the Outside.
Daneel was as good as ever but, again, not shown as much as I'd have liked, it focused more on Giskard, which I realised why at the end of the book.
However, again, same critism as the first book:
The tying up of the investigation at the end of the book was a massive exposition dump that mostly came out of nowhere. Now it wasn't as random-seeming as the first book, but the second book was quite good at the tying up of the investigation, and this was closer to book 1 than the book 2. Everything made sense in the end, which is good, but we were along for the journey with Baley the whole time and we were in his head and most of what he deduced at the end seemed to have popped out of nowhere and like Baley came to those deductions off-camera. Books such as this are done well when you get to the end and everything is revealed and you can go "Oh shit yeah! I remember seeing that! Oh yeah that makes sense!" etc, and that really didn't feel like it at the end.
But I really loved the last bit of the book and the amazing twist with one of the characters. Makes me super excited for the last book!
The book was too long, the prose-to-dialogue ratio was tilted way too far towards the dialogue, focused a lot less on the world building compared to the other books (and it's one of Asimov's strengths in this series imo), but the worldbuilding that was there was decent enough to make me see the world. But the ending and it's implications are exciting!
Majority of this book was dialogue, I'm not kidding, I kept track of it and at one point 20% of the book near the beginning was taken up by a single character's dialogue spanning many pages in a row. It just kept going on and on and on and on, dialogue and dialogue and talking and talking and talking and talking. I've read over 300 books since 2018, I've never encountered anything like this ratio of prose and dialogue. It was completely unchecked and out of control.
I absolutely love Baley, he's one of the most fascinating and well-written protagonists I've read. I really enjoyed his journey in this book, and seeing how he's trying to overcome his fears and acclimatise himself to the Outside.
Daneel was as good as ever but, again, not shown as much as I'd have liked, it focused more on Giskard, which I realised why at the end of the book.
However, again, same critism as the first book:
The tying up of the investigation at the end of the book was a massive exposition dump that mostly came out of nowhere. Now it wasn't as random-seeming as the first book, but the second book was quite good at the tying up of the investigation, and this was closer to book 1 than the book 2. Everything made sense in the end, which is good, but we were along for the journey with Baley the whole time and we were in his head and most of what he deduced at the end seemed to have popped out of nowhere and like Baley came to those deductions off-camera. Books such as this are done well when you get to the end and everything is revealed and you can go "Oh shit yeah! I remember seeing that! Oh yeah that makes sense!" etc, and that really didn't feel like it at the end.
But I really loved the last bit of the book and the amazing twist with one of the characters. Makes me super excited for the last book!
The book was too long, the prose-to-dialogue ratio was tilted way too far towards the dialogue, focused a lot less on the world building compared to the other books (and it's one of Asimov's strengths in this series imo), but the worldbuilding that was there was decent enough to make me see the world. But the ending and it's implications are exciting!