The Faith of Beasts (Book 2 of The Captives’ War), by James S.A. Corey, is an excellent sequel to The Mercy of Gods, which I reviewed very positively last year. It continues to develop the plots and themes introduced in the first book, while expanding the world- and universe-building in unexpected yet satisfactory and exciting ways.
However, it definitely doesn’t stand on its own. I didn’t regret not having reread the first book, but I would have been lost if I’d skipped it entirely. (The more recent in-universe novella Livesuit provides additional perspective but doesn’t involve any characters from the novels, so it’s not essential.) Even if I’d started here with Book 2 and managed to follow the plot and keep the characters straight, I’d probably have perceived its characters very differently, primarily Daffyd Alkhor and the spy swarm.
SPOILERS FROM BOOK 1:
I don’t see a way to meaningfully review Book 2 without talking about the events of Book 1 in The Captives’ War series. Essentially, Daffyd starts out as a politically connected but low-level assistant in a research lab on Anjiin, a planet so isolated from humanity that its people have lost all knowledge of their Earth origin (just legends that they came from Somewhere Else, reinforced by the non-DNA-based lifeforms that they’ve been learning to live alongside). After the Carryx invaders come, kill an eighth of the population and subjugate the rest, they transport several thousand survivors offplanet, focusing on scientists that may prove to be useful “beasts.” (Species that do not prove useful to the Carryx get wiped out.) Daffyd, seeing no path to survival for humanity other than cooperation, betrays a human rebellion plan to their captors and is named the chief diplomat/administrator/enforcer for the rest of humanity. Naturally, most humans see him as an opportunistic collaborator/quisling, because they don’t know that he has a plan for eventual rebellion AFTER the humans become trusted servants to the Carryx. He’s encouraged in his planning by the revelation that his lover Else hosts a swarm-entity that’s a spy for forces opposing the Carryx in their long interstellar war of conquest.
Jake Casella Brookins wrote a long, thoughtful analysis in 2024, “Tangled Fantasies: Speculative Anti-Imperialism and the Myth of Internal Resistance in S.A. Corey’s The Mercy of Gods,” which talked about that book and various other SFF fiction in the last 20 years or so, such as Seth Dickinson’s The Traitor Baru Cormorant, that have explored the topic of resisting or trying to subtly guide conquerors toward kinder rule from within their systems. He rightly points out that this often results in people with good intentions merely becoming captured by those systems and becoming accomplices in tyranny, without accomplishing anything positive. Indeed, anyone who pays attention to history or current events has seen many examples of that happening.
But Daffyd’s perspective is that he is trying to guard humanity from an existential threat, after seeing the Carryx wipe out other species; although the Carryx value possible benefits from humanity’s successful scientific research efforts, they will tolerate no failures in their tools, of which they have a near-infinite supply as they conquer planet after planet and species after species, millennium after millennium. So, Daffyd believes that humanity must keep its head down and nose to the grindstone for now, in order to secure a future in which it can dare to dream of freedom.
MILD SPOILERS FOR BOOK 2:
Daffyd thinks that Else/the spy died during the events of the first book, so he sets up a system to try to carry on with his plan, picking a security chief and various others to help him administrate humanity, including artificial embryos to accelerate population replacement and growth. The only person he trusts with the truth is a woman whom he invites to take charge of education and culture, including generating a mythological framework to support future resistance efforts even if he and others of his generation die off in the meantime.
But he’s not alone; Else’s body died, but the spy-swarm had jumped to another human host, carrying its previous host’s memories along. Rather than welcoming its return, Daffyd is initially horrified to realize that the swarm has been taking over a succession of people’s bodies; he argues that it’d been killing those hosts instead of just adding their personalities to its repertoire and keeping them alive (if fading) in its/their memory. The swarm reflects on this and eventually starts trying to form its own unique personality, but in the meantime, it and Daffyd resume trying to work together to fight the Carryx.
Daffyd also becomes aware that at least one other species is performing obedience to the Carryx while harboring its own secret plot of maintaining secret long-term resistance, or at least information-gathering and propagation. I assume that this also bolsters Daffyd’s morale in his secret plotting (after losing comrades and feeling increasingly isolated), although it’s not stated in the plot.
The Mercy of Gods focuses tightly on the humans within the core group of survivors from Anjiin (plus the spy-swarm that tags along with them), but The Faith of Beasts also widens its scope dramatically. Some of the people who’d worked with Daffyd’s initial group are split off and sent to serve the Carryx on other fronts of the eternal war. A couple are sent to explore a surprisingly intact enemy ship, while Jessyn, the secret rebel who’d survived Daffyd’s purge, explores the remains of an enemy settlement on a conquered planet. Each group becomes aware of what had been hinted in the first book and explicitly stated in Livesuit, that the hated eternal enemy of the Carryx, or at least some of the frontline soldiers for their enemy alliance, are other humans. Jessyn and the others all decide immediately to keep this information secret for as long as possible, at least from the Carryx.
I continue to really enjoy the character of Jessyn, although she doesn’t get as much POV time as Daffyd. She manages to keep her chemically-controlled mental issues and her burning hatred of the Carryx under control, and her current companions see her as an efficient scientist, but when presented with opportunities to undermine and destroy the Carryx and their nonhuman servants, she’s terrifyingly efficient in that, too. She’s briefly tempted by an opportunity for escape and romance, and it’s sweet how she at least gets to daydream about it for a little while.
Back to Daffyd, continually struggling with hard choices and becoming more hardened himself (and sometimes taking giant leaps toward that). He’s continually learning as much as he can about the Carryx, for immediate survival and longer-term resistance, although they’ve warned him NOT to presume to “understand” humanity’s masters, just to study how to be a better servant. The readers, informed by brief passages from the point of view of the Carryx, become aware of an important misunderstanding about their culture before Daffyd does, and it’s quite suspenseful to see whether that misunderstanding would lead to a disastrous mistake in strategy.
Daffyd also wrestles with leadership of other humans who don’t seem able to understand their dire situation; scientist leader Tommen, whose life Daffyd arguably saved in the first book by performatively disciplining him by breaking his arm, sort of settles into his new subordinate role but forgets to think about how much danger remains; moreover, a sub-administrator starts organizing a strike, and Daffyd has to decide how to discipline him, lest the Carryx view work stoppages as proof that humans are unreliable beasts/servants.
LOOKING FORWARD IN THE SERIES:
If Daffyd doesn’t figure out how to communicate the existential threat of their situation to his entire community, these minor rebellions will continue, undermining his position with the Carryx. Progressing from broken arm to death (mimicking Carryx patterns) in subordinate after subordinate seems a poor strategy, unlikely to result in anything but Daffyd’s eventual assassination. I do appreciate that Daffyd is portrayed as fallible in several ways, not a mastermind whose judgment should always be trusted (as we should always reserve judgment about people who choose to work within evil systems).
Actually, I can see how it may make sense to have a significant time jump before the next book in the series. How long will Daffyd be able to keep riding the tiger? And it will be very interesting to see how the next generation grows up under Carryx rule, possibly seeing it as the natural order of things, although their constructed “myths” will conflict with that.
I continue to be fascinated with this series. Daffyd, Jessyn, and the swarm seem unlikely to ever become happy characters, as the overthrow of the Carryx is far from inevitable, but they and their choices are deeply interesting to me. I love how the worldbuilding (and universe building) has been expanded in the second book, as Daffyd and readers become more familiar with other servant-species and with the wider, ongoing war.
It’s possible that a third book could wrap up most of the current plotlines, but I think it’s much more likely that the series will continue for another three or four books or more. But so far, I am enjoying the ride!
The Faith of Beasts, book 2 in The Captives’ War, by James S.A. Corey, will be published April 14. You can preorder it here: The Faith of Beasts by James S. A. Corey | Hachette Book Group
Content warnings: Spy-swarm usage of human vessels; human subjugation, violence and death; mental health issues, although less prevalent than in Book 1.
Comps: Comparisons: The Madness Season (1990), by C.S. Friedman; “Colony” (TV series on USA Network, 2016-2018); “Un village français” (French TV series, 2009-2017, available subtitled or dubbed streaming); The Traitor Baru Cormorant, by Seth Dickinson.
Disclaimers: I received a free eARC for review from the publisher via NetGalley.
