Leviathan Wakes
by James S. A. Corey · first published 2009
39% recommend52% neutral9% critical
Why HN recommends it
Gritty, near-future space opera that respects the physics of space travel while mixing politics and mystery. Suits hard-SF fans, Gap series readers, and anyone who liked The Expanse TV show.
Common criticism: Some find the characters flat and the prose bland
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
When Captain Jim Holden's ice miner stumbles across a derelict, abandoned ship, he uncovers a secret that threatens to throw the entire system into war. Attacked by a stealth ship belonging to the Mars fleet, Holden must find a way to uncover the motives behind the attack, stop a war and find the truth behind a vast conspiracy that threatens the entire human race.
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Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
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I mainly read SF to relax (biased towards hard space opera) and have accumulated a "best of the best" list of my own: Leviathan Wakes - James S. A. Corey (TV show The Expanse is loosely based on this, but IMO doesn't even come close) Revelation Space - Alastair Reynolds Three Body Problem (all 3 books) - Liu Cixin Consider Phlebas…
on “Ask HN: Recommend one book I need to read this summer?” ↗Fiction:- The Expanse by James S. A. Corey http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leviathan_Wakes & http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calibans_War Near SF by Daniel Saurez http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_(Suarez_novel) Non Fiction:- Katherine Boo: http://www.behindthebeautifulforevers.com/ Susan…
on “Ask HN: Best books you read in 2012” ↗Totally agree with you. I couldn't get past the first few chapters, because it was flat out boring. Compared to something like Leviathan Wakes, by James S.A. Corey...Ready Player One is so.... boring. There, I said it too.
on “YC’s Summer Reading” ↗Unrelated to Netflix, but if you've watched The Expanse and liked it, I can really recommend the original novel series; the show covers roughly the first half of the first book, Leviathan Wakes, and the sixth book arrived late last year, with at least one more still to come. They're an absolutely brilliant combination of space opera and hard sf, and while I gather one of the authors counts George…
on “Netflix's gamble pays off as subscriptions soar” ↗If you enjoyed the Gap series, I can really recommend checking out Leviathan Wakes by James SA Corey. It has largely the same gritty feeling as the Gap does but is a lot closer to us in technology.
on “The Best Science Fiction Books (According to Reddit)” ↗An interesting scene I ran across in the novel Leviathan Wakes was two planets' miltaries trying to get control of asteroids suitable for dropping on each other's heads. That felt credible to me.
on “Essay on Realistic Space Combat” ↗Here is a partial list of the books I read this year. These are all books that stood out to me which I enjoyed: Fiction Books: * Leviathan Wakes, Caliban's War, Abaddon's Gate, Cibola Burn by James S. A. Corey * Homeworld, Out of the Black (books 3 & 4 in the Odyssey One series) by Evan Currie * Furies of Calderon, Academ’s Fury (1 & 2 of the…
on “Ask HN: Books you read in 2016?” ↗Some fiction from this year I would recommend: Leviathan Wakes (The Expanse #1) by James S. A. Corey - I enjoyed this whole series. I like that the physics of space travel is respected among the politics/mystery. Each book in the series is a bit of a different genre…
on “Ask HN: Books you read in 2018?” ↗A bunch of books: Leviathan Wakes by James S.A. Corey (as well as several of the sequels), American Gods by Neil Gaiman, The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi, The Magicians by Lev Grossman, Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie, Harry Potter…
on “Ask HN: Which books have you read more than once?” ↗- Philosophy of Software Design by John Ousterhout - Leviathan Wakes by James Corey - UNIX: A History and a Memoir by Brian Kernighan - Efficient Linux at the Command Line by Daniel Barrett
on “Ask HN: What were the best books you read in 2025?” ↗Upvoting both of you for referencing The Expanse (And the books, i.e Leviathan Wakes)... It's so good to see something that resembles hard-sci-fi on television.
on “Buried Ice Water Discovered on Mars” ↗My favorites on this list are: - Station 11, just a great novel even if you don't care about SciFi - Ancillary Justice series. Also really good novels but more for SciFi fans. - Leviathan Wakes: The inspiration for the best SciFi TV series of the decade. - Murderbot!!!! Everybody loves Murderbot Diaries I was sad to not see Seveneves. I think that novel is 2/3 amazing and you can just skip…
on “The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Books of the Past Decade” ↗…works for you. Books worth trying to see if you like the styles include: * Rivers Of London - Magic in a modern London setting * Burning Chrome - A collection of classic Cyberpunk short stories * Leviathan Wakes - The start of the Expanse series of works, a harder style of sci-fi * All Systems Red - The start of the Murderbot Diaries, a softer style of sci-fi * Permutation City - Existential sci-fi
on “Ask HN: How to transition from non-fiction to fiction reading?” ↗…actually interviewed Grossman when the first one came out, in 2010: https://jakeseliger.com/2010/10/14/an-interview-with-lev-gro.... If you like it, try Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy too. Leviathan Wakes disappoints: its plot and political economy are interesting but on a sentence-by-sentence level one wishes for more. If you haven't read it yet try Peter Watts, Blindsight.
on “YC’s Summer Reading” ↗…me, I have to really pay attention while listening to an audiobook, otherwise I lose the thread. Also, why are audiobooks 5 times more expensive than their dead-tree version? https://www.amazon.com/Leviathan-Wakes-James-S-Corey/dp/0316... https://libro.fm/audiobooks/9781478998938-leviathan-wakes That's crazy.
on “We can't get enough of audiobooks” ↗