cover image Memory’s Legion: The Complete Expanse Story Collection

Memory’s Legion: The Complete Expanse Story Collection

James S.A. Corey. Orbit, $28 (432p) ISBN 978-0-316-66919-1

Bestsellers Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck, writing as Corey, give Expanse fans a last gift after wrapping up the epic space opera series with 2021’s Leviathan Falls. The eight stories collected here, including the original novella “The Sins of Our Fathers,” add depth to main and supporting characters, and provide both prologues and epilogues to the events of the series. Every entry also succeeds as a standalone; while followers will know the significance of a passing reference in “Gods of Risk” to an interview of an “old, dark-skinned woman in an orange sari,” those who don’t will still be able to appreciate the gripping narrative of crime and family loyalty. Authors’ notes further enrich the experience for fans, as when they share that an actor from the TV adaptation plausibly suggested to them the identity of a background figure in “The Butcher of Anderson Station.” The new novella combines efforts to survive on a world populated by monsters with depictions of two people working to overcome the burdens of growing up with two very different larger-than-life parents. This volume is a perfect lagniappe. (Mar.)