I have fond memories of reading Kevin J. Anderson's Star Wars novels, so I was curious to see how one of his more original sagas would play out. It's immediately apparent, however, that his Saga of Seven Suns is pretty huge: there are seven of these books altogether, and the first book alone is well over 600 pages long.
The story certainly has its moments. It is rather surprising and weird to see that it's not straight-up sci-fi, like I expected, but it seems to have a lot of fantasy elements to it. Even though there are other planets and stars, aliens, robots, and some far-out technology, it's a pretty odd universe with kings, heraldry, and a race of green people who use trees for FTL communications. The extravagance and political maneuvering reminded me a bit of Frank Herbert's Dune, while the story itself seemed to resemble something out of high fantasy. It is a very imaginative universe with a lot of interesting concepts, ideas, and fantastic worlds. The story does boast some exciting action, plenty of drama, and some romance. It all moves pretty fluidly; the book is big, but not too wordy or dense, so it makes for a pretty easy read.
However, I also felt that it was a pretty dry book, and my interest in it varied from section to section. The length is pretty daunting, and given the actual plot, I'd say that it could have easily been trimmed down a lot, and it could have gotten to the point quicker. By nature, the book jumps around multiple characters and viewpoints, which offers a very broad scope and insight on the universe and the events. It makes everything seem rather random, and it makes the plot meander around a lot. Very little of the characters really stood out to me; even though they have just enough depth to drive the story, their personalities never really kept my interest.
The book's composition gets the job done; as mentioned above, it isn't hard to read. It does seem to me that nearly every page is filled less with action and detail, and more with a description of what each character is thinking, what the implications of their actions are, and massive amounts of background information. This strikes me as a pretty serious violation of the "show don't tell" rule, and often times, some of the ideas become redundant or dragged-out. I think it makes the book even more dry to read. The overall style and syntax of the text is good, but not great.
I'm sure that, with the next six books, everything likely comes together into some massive story arc. I'm sure that there's a method to the madness. On its own, however, The Hidden Empire comes off as pretty long-winded and random, for a plot that could have been covered in a tighter and shorter novel. I think the best that can be said is that the author definitely flexes some decent world-building muscle.
3/5 (Entertainment: Average | Story: Average | Book: Average)
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