Skip 30 years, Holden is looking forward to retiring with Nagata, Draper is easing into the roll of captain, and the Laconians are back in the action as Duarte shoulders the burden of being humanity's god emperor! 

The scale of the Expanse universe is still impressive. The characters are great and have grown over the last 30 years. This book sets up the final conflict with the Laconians, the protomolecule, and whatever aliens killed off the protomolecule's creators. 

 Persepolis Rising, book 7 of the Expanse series, follows thirty years after the events of the previous book, Babylon's Ashes. In essence, it is safe to say that this installment begins a 'part 2' of sorts to the nine book series. Our favorite characters are all present- Holden, Naomi, Amos, Alex, Bobbie and Clarissa all aboard the Rocinante, Drummer still in charge of the transit union, and Avasarala stalking in the background. The crew is obviously older and feeling their age- there's lots of mentions and asides about how their bodies don't work like they used to, don't heal as quickly, don't move as fast, etc. While that is sad, it's still great to know that they have been together in the time spanning the novels. Their characters are consistent, and their relationships in the years since have grown believably.
Seeds planted in previous novels reach harvest here- Duarte's rogue Martian fleet (that used Inaros' Free Navy campaign as cover) that escaped through the Laconia gate is back with an entire generation of brainwashed soldiers and ships that work in tandem with the protomolecule, making them nearly indestructible.
While the plot does struggle a bit after the initial attack from Laconia, it slowly builds back up as the crew of the Roci work with belters and an underground force to oppose its conquest of Medina station. Whatever lines that previously existed between Earth, Mars and Belters vanish as the inhabitants of the Sol system fight those of Laconia. The novel is reminiscent of The Empire Strikes Back in that the story ends on part cliffhanger, part pause- forces are scattered, and time is needed to lick wounds, regroup, and plan the next attack.
This novel is a great leaping off point for the books to come, and I can't wait to see how they will beat back the Laconia invasion, and find out more about the protomolecule and those who made it. 

A book that raises the stakes again in a way that fits well in universe and that the series has been building to since pretty early on. Satisfying character development and more complex consideration of characters and the ethics of their stances and actions. Definitely a slower read with less of the familiar sci-fi swashbuckling that many of the Expanse books provide but definitely one of the more interesting entries in the series.

****all spoilers****

Kicks off with a doomed gig to disciple an unruly colony and ends on the very same colony except now everyone is war torn!
I read this book non stop for a week and cried twice. I don’t even cry with books. 

The 30 year time jump was handled well enough - wish there was more hinting at what we missed in the inbetween years but it wasn’t completely missing

This book started out rough for me given the 30-year time skip. The previous books hadn't really discussed how aging worked, and we know from the last book that

Fred died in his 70s

so it seemed odd to have our characters around that age. I was also not convinced by the fact that Alex's "past 30 years" story involved

him getting married again, because I felt his journey in book 5 was understanding that he was not good at being a husband and should not try it again. So it was really weird to have that be a plot point.

One thing I'm sort of disappointed they didn't touch on is Filip ever finding Naomi again. I'm hoping they leave that for a last-book surprise, since she thinks he's dead, but it could just be that he never comes back.

I was also surprised by

Holden being willing to leave the Rocinante, because the ship was so much part of his identity. Though Naomi mentioned having thought of arguments for him to retire, she never did have to pull them out, and I expected her to.

Once I got past the weirdness of the time skip, though, I did really enjoy the book. I didn't love Drummer as a narrator—her character fell a little flat for me—and it was weird to suddenly get other <I>Rocinante</I> crewmembers as narrators in the last 1/3rd of the book. I especially enjoyed Amos' storyline; <spoilers>having an emotional arc for him was touching and it made Clarissa's death that much harder.

Recommend? Yes; it takes a bit of adjustment in the first few chapters with the time skip, but it's an excellent story and I enjoyed the central conflict here a lot.