What do you think?
Rate this book
First Planets
Earth Retrograde: Book II of the First Planets
Becoming the planet's most (in)famous human has not changed Brooklyn Lamontagne one bit, but the time has come for him to choose where his allegiances really lie.
The United Nations is working to get everyone off Earth by the deadline – set by the planet’s true owners, the aliens known as the First. It’s a task made somewhat easier by a mysterious virus that rendered at least fifty percent of humanity unable to have children. Meanwhile, the USA and the USSR have set their sights on Mars, claiming half a planet each.
Brooklyn Lamontagne doesn’t remember saving the world eight years ago, but he’s been paying for it ever since. The conquered Earth governments don’t trust him, the Average Joe can’t make up their mind, but they all agree that Brooklyn should stay in space. Now, he’s just about covering his bills with junk-food runs to Venus and transporting horny honeymooners to Tycho aboard his aging spaceship, the Victory.
When a pal asks for a ride to Mars, Brooklyn lands in a solar system’s worth of espionage, backroom alliances, ancient treasures and secret plots while encountering a navigation system that just wants to be loved…
File Science Fiction [ Space Casablanca | Y2K | Cosmic Shrooms | Not Dead Yet ]
The United Nations is working to get everyone off Earth by the deadline – set by the planet’s true owners, the aliens known as the First. It’s a task made somewhat easier by a mysterious virus that rendered at least fifty percent of humanity unable to have children. Meanwhile, the USA and the USSR have set their sights on Mars, claiming half a planet each.
Brooklyn Lamontagne doesn’t remember saving the world eight years ago, but he’s been paying for it ever since. The conquered Earth governments don’t trust him, the Average Joe can’t make up their mind, but they all agree that Brooklyn should stay in space. Now, he’s just about covering his bills with junk-food runs to Venus and transporting horny honeymooners to Tycho aboard his aging spaceship, the Victory.
When a pal asks for a ride to Mars, Brooklyn lands in a solar system’s worth of espionage, backroom alliances, ancient treasures and secret plots while encountering a navigation system that just wants to be loved…
File Science Fiction [ Space Casablanca | Y2K | Cosmic Shrooms | Not Dead Yet ]
- GenresScience Fiction
372 pages, Kindle Edition
First published October 24, 2023
9 people are currently reading
66 people want to read
About the author
R.W.W. Greene
19 books89 followersR.W.W. Greene is the author of "The Light Years" (Feb. 2020)," "Twenty-Five to Life" (Aug. 2021), "Mercury Rising" (May 2022), and "Earth Retrograde" (Oct. 2023), all from Angry Robot Books. Member of SFWA.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
November 1, 2025
Brooklyn Lamontagne, superman and hero of Mercury Rising, saves humanity a second time in the conclusion of the First Planets series, a hard-ish, retro-alt-Earth, dystopian space opera.
Moon-sized Artiplanet leaving the solar system.
My dead-tree copy was a short-ish 365 pages with a US 2023 copyright.
R.W.W. Greene is an American science fiction writer, recovering journalist, and teacher. He's the author of four science fiction novels, both in series and standalone. I’ve read several of the author's books, the last being Mercury Rising (First Planets #1) (my review).
Having read Mercury Rising is mandatory for reading this book. Without it, you’ll be Lost in Space.
TL;DR
Brooklyn Lamontagne, the superman who saved Earth from the most xenophobic of two alien species vying to conquer it, gave his life in the process. However, he didn’t know one of his latent superpowers was invulnerability. It took years to recover his body, which was quickly, if painfully, revived.
The second time around, he's challenged by the other, the more technologically advanced species, The First Ones. They have prevailed while he was dead. They are engaged in an orderly mass expulsion of humanity from Earth to the Moon and other planets, while also compelling humans into cleaning up the greatest part of any evidence of the Anthropocene and leaving Earth in Very Good (VG) condition-- else lose their deposit.
Written in a breakneck fashion toward the end, the story gives a Cook’s Tour of intrasolar human space: Venus, Earth, Mars, and The Belt. The story continues Lamontagne’s picaresque adventures with the added attempt of saving humanity. The writing is as wry and satirical as in the previous book, but the author has too many plot elements in play, which results in an inconsistent pacing. There’s a Bum’s Rush starting in the first third, with Greene pulling in plot elements and bundling them up for a thin ending.
The Review
All of Greene’s books feature hard-ish tech, dystopian societies, and many are space operas. For me, that’s a trifecta. He’s also a local Indie author, though that’s not the reason I like his work. His One Planet series was originally planned as a trilogy, but I learned through my local Indie bookstore that his publisher, Angry Robot, cut it back to a duology. This book is a rewrite born out of the challenge of putting 10 pounds of written and planned narrative into a 5-pound bag. I can imagine the second book’s scheduled publication date didn’t change either. I see this as the reason the book starts out strong and then loses momentum, as the level of detail and cohesion in plotting starts to falter. Still, there were parts of this book I liked.
Greene is a polished author. The book has a bit of that MFA scribbler vibe to it, but with more outlandish and artistic flourishes than in Mercury Rising, making it easier to sit back and enjoy the ride. The writing was technically good, the prose clear and straightforward. I didn’t find any typographical errors, though a few grammatical and repetition errors snuck in.
Lamontagne’s single POV was maintained throughout. Both dialogue and inner dialogue prose were solid. Dialogue felt “period” appropriate, though I don’t recall how people spoke in the late 1970s. I do remember the use of "Douche." In places, I found the badinage amusing, at the snort-and-chuckle level.
Action sequences were good. Lamontagne's an Action Hero, so there were enough of them. Toward the end, they felt abbreviated.
The descriptive narrative was good overall, though I did notice some hand-waving and a few technical errors. You’d have to have a penchant for astrodynamics to spot them. For instance, the only place you can maintain a "geostationary orbit" is at the Equator. It can’t be done over the North Pole without constant correction. I also think the First Ones megastructure The Artiplanet was located at the Sun-Earth L3 Lagrange Point? Most contemporary SF readers, fans of the less technically rigorous Standard Sci-Fi Setting , likely won’t notice.
I thought the book started oddly. That’s because its predecessor, Mercury Rising, included Chapter 1 of this book gratis, which I read and well remembered (it’s now part of Chapter 2, and somewhat different). After that, it picked up. Sub-plots rained down like hailstones. Lamontagne went on a tour of intrasolar human space in a muscular exercise of the juxtaposition trope. There were capers. I grew concerned as the back cover of my book drew closer, and the story showed no sign of entering its final act. In the end, a hoary old trope to produce an HFA was artistically, but not artfully plucked from the ether, with the thinnest of supporting narrative, especially compared to the earlier chapters of the novel.
Summary
Greene rewrote his trilogy into a duology, and I fault him for his effort. Had he ruthlessly pared down what he’d had in waiting for the trilogy, and written a much smaller, yet tighter book that only tied up the plotlines introduced in Mercury Rising which had become a boat anchor, this book would have been better. Instead, he tried to pack too many of the hopes and dreams of the trilogy into this final book. There was simply too much stuff and too few pages.
I liked many parts of this book. However, the whole was less than the sum of the parts I liked.
The more I like a book, the more critical I become. I liked the first third of this book. I liked snippets of the rest, but there was too much story and not enough pages, leading to disappointment in the end. I was overwhelmed by the plot and underwhelmed by the thinning narrative that tried to support it.
Greene took a fall with this series. First Planets was a great idea as a trilogy, but not so much as the finally written duology. Next time, I suspect he'll get a signed contract when beginning a multi-book effort?
Moon-sized Artiplanet leaving the solar system.My dead-tree copy was a short-ish 365 pages with a US 2023 copyright.
R.W.W. Greene is an American science fiction writer, recovering journalist, and teacher. He's the author of four science fiction novels, both in series and standalone. I’ve read several of the author's books, the last being Mercury Rising (First Planets #1) (my review).
Having read Mercury Rising is mandatory for reading this book. Without it, you’ll be Lost in Space.
TL;DR
Brooklyn Lamontagne, the superman who saved Earth from the most xenophobic of two alien species vying to conquer it, gave his life in the process. However, he didn’t know one of his latent superpowers was invulnerability. It took years to recover his body, which was quickly, if painfully, revived.
The second time around, he's challenged by the other, the more technologically advanced species, The First Ones. They have prevailed while he was dead. They are engaged in an orderly mass expulsion of humanity from Earth to the Moon and other planets, while also compelling humans into cleaning up the greatest part of any evidence of the Anthropocene and leaving Earth in Very Good (VG) condition-- else lose their deposit.
Written in a breakneck fashion toward the end, the story gives a Cook’s Tour of intrasolar human space: Venus, Earth, Mars, and The Belt. The story continues Lamontagne’s picaresque adventures with the added attempt of saving humanity. The writing is as wry and satirical as in the previous book, but the author has too many plot elements in play, which results in an inconsistent pacing. There’s a Bum’s Rush starting in the first third, with Greene pulling in plot elements and bundling them up for a thin ending.
The Review
All of Greene’s books feature hard-ish tech, dystopian societies, and many are space operas. For me, that’s a trifecta. He’s also a local Indie author, though that’s not the reason I like his work. His One Planet series was originally planned as a trilogy, but I learned through my local Indie bookstore that his publisher, Angry Robot, cut it back to a duology. This book is a rewrite born out of the challenge of putting 10 pounds of written and planned narrative into a 5-pound bag. I can imagine the second book’s scheduled publication date didn’t change either. I see this as the reason the book starts out strong and then loses momentum, as the level of detail and cohesion in plotting starts to falter. Still, there were parts of this book I liked.
Greene is a polished author. The book has a bit of that MFA scribbler vibe to it, but with more outlandish and artistic flourishes than in Mercury Rising, making it easier to sit back and enjoy the ride. The writing was technically good, the prose clear and straightforward. I didn’t find any typographical errors, though a few grammatical and repetition errors snuck in.
Lamontagne’s single POV was maintained throughout. Both dialogue and inner dialogue prose were solid. Dialogue felt “period” appropriate, though I don’t recall how people spoke in the late 1970s. I do remember the use of "Douche." In places, I found the badinage amusing, at the snort-and-chuckle level.
Action sequences were good. Lamontagne's an Action Hero, so there were enough of them. Toward the end, they felt abbreviated.
The descriptive narrative was good overall, though I did notice some hand-waving and a few technical errors. You’d have to have a penchant for astrodynamics to spot them. For instance, the only place you can maintain a "geostationary orbit" is at the Equator. It can’t be done over the North Pole without constant correction. I also think the First Ones megastructure The Artiplanet was located at the Sun-Earth L3 Lagrange Point? Most contemporary SF readers, fans of the less technically rigorous Standard Sci-Fi Setting , likely won’t notice.
I thought the book started oddly. That’s because its predecessor, Mercury Rising, included Chapter 1 of this book gratis, which I read and well remembered (it’s now part of Chapter 2, and somewhat different). After that, it picked up. Sub-plots rained down like hailstones. Lamontagne went on a tour of intrasolar human space in a muscular exercise of the juxtaposition trope. There were capers. I grew concerned as the back cover of my book drew closer, and the story showed no sign of entering its final act. In the end, a hoary old trope to produce an HFA was artistically, but not artfully plucked from the ether, with the thinnest of supporting narrative, especially compared to the earlier chapters of the novel.
Summary
Swing your arms sideways to direct your fall. Twist your shoulder to protect your head. Keep your knees bent and your feet down. Fall like a sack of beans—relax everything.-- "How to Take A Fall"Greene originally envisioned the First Planets series as a five-book series. His agent talked him off that ledge and into a trilogy. He wrote the first book and likely a large part of the second. That first book, Mercury Rising, was an acquired taste. His publisher pulled the plug on the trilogy, leaving him with a duology.
Greene rewrote his trilogy into a duology, and I fault him for his effort. Had he ruthlessly pared down what he’d had in waiting for the trilogy, and written a much smaller, yet tighter book that only tied up the plotlines introduced in Mercury Rising which had become a boat anchor, this book would have been better. Instead, he tried to pack too many of the hopes and dreams of the trilogy into this final book. There was simply too much stuff and too few pages.
I liked many parts of this book. However, the whole was less than the sum of the parts I liked.
The more I like a book, the more critical I become. I liked the first third of this book. I liked snippets of the rest, but there was too much story and not enough pages, leading to disappointment in the end. I was overwhelmed by the plot and underwhelmed by the thinning narrative that tried to support it.
Greene took a fall with this series. First Planets was a great idea as a trilogy, but not so much as the finally written duology. Next time, I suspect he'll get a signed contract when beginning a multi-book effort?
October 27, 2023
Earth Retrograde had one of the coolest endings I have ever read. Full stop, I was blown away by the absolute genius of how this series ended. I daresay it is one of my all-time best endings ever, if that is a thing (I'm absolutely going to make that a thing, tbh). And that is sad, because I want to shout about it to everyone, and discuss all the stuff, but I cannot. Because spoilers are rude, and I aim to be non-rude. So here's what I am going to do: I am going to implore you to start/finish this series, so that we can discuss it. Here are some reasons why that would be a good life choice:
►The aforementioned amazing ending. I did all the work for you, so you don't have to wonder "hmm will the ending be satisfying?" because you know it will. Saves you any worry, which is very nice of me.
►This is a duology, we love those! In fairness, I am a wee bit sad, because I didn't want it to end. However, I think the series ended up being the perfect length and this was a very good life choice (the author mentions that it had been intended to be a trilogy, and while I am sad to leave the world, I think it was done perfectly).
►The characters are wonderful. They are flawed messes, but in the most enjoyable way! They're like you and me, right? We're all messes, and in this series, some of those messes have to try to save humanity and stuff. Love love love it.
►Alt-history is becoming such a fave for me. In this book, for example (and this is told early on so not a spoiler, really) the Oppenheimer Nuclear Engine allows for earlier space exploration. JFK lives. And like all good alt-history, you can't help but wonder, what leads to what? The butterfly effect is full force, leaving the reader with a million thought-provoking questions of "what-if?".
►The story is very entertaining. It's exciting, because of that whole "saving humanity" thing, but it's also just written in a way that makes it fun while also being high stakes and full of adventure.
Bottom Line: Have I convinced you yet? Read this, read this now. And then message me so we can talk about it please and thank you!
You can find the full review and all the fancy and/or randomness that accompanies it at It Starts at Midnight
►The aforementioned amazing ending. I did all the work for you, so you don't have to wonder "hmm will the ending be satisfying?" because you know it will. Saves you any worry, which is very nice of me.
►This is a duology, we love those! In fairness, I am a wee bit sad, because I didn't want it to end. However, I think the series ended up being the perfect length and this was a very good life choice (the author mentions that it had been intended to be a trilogy, and while I am sad to leave the world, I think it was done perfectly).
►The characters are wonderful. They are flawed messes, but in the most enjoyable way! They're like you and me, right? We're all messes, and in this series, some of those messes have to try to save humanity and stuff. Love love love it.
►Alt-history is becoming such a fave for me. In this book, for example (and this is told early on so not a spoiler, really) the Oppenheimer Nuclear Engine allows for earlier space exploration. JFK lives. And like all good alt-history, you can't help but wonder, what leads to what? The butterfly effect is full force, leaving the reader with a million thought-provoking questions of "what-if?".
►The story is very entertaining. It's exciting, because of that whole "saving humanity" thing, but it's also just written in a way that makes it fun while also being high stakes and full of adventure.
Bottom Line: Have I convinced you yet? Read this, read this now. And then message me so we can talk about it please and thank you!
You can find the full review and all the fancy and/or randomness that accompanies it at It Starts at Midnight
April 30, 2024
3.5 stars.
During the last ten years, the United Nations has been working hard to get everyone off of Earth by the deadline set by Earth's first inhabitants, the First. There has also been a virus that has swept through the population, rendering at least fifty percent of humans infertile. And the US and USSR are setting up to contest ownership of Mars.
Brooklyn Lamontagne may have saved Earth eight years ago and died, but he's back, doing his best to keep busy just enough to keep his ship going and get drunk.
During a long trip transporting a friend to Mars, Brooklyn inadvertently creates a baby AI, who has a number of needs, including a need to connect with others emotionally. Once they land, Brooklyn stumbles on a number of plots: superpowers' espionage, surprising alliances, and the search for ancient artifacts, and, most alarmingly, the sudden departure of the Jellies from the solar system.
Brooklyn is the embodiment of doing the absolute minimum to get by. So despite being altered (in book one) and inadvertently becoming a hero, he's still the same guy, mostly bemused by everything around him.
The story has the same slightly whimsical, slightly odd feel of the first. I love author R.W.W Greene's version of Earth history, where the Oppenheimer Nuclear Engine kickstarted Earth's space exploration years earlier, with a number of interesting technological and societal changes following.
Greene intended this as a trilogy, but chose instead to wrap things up in this book, which worked for me. I liked the resolution, though I found the pacing in this instalment to be slower than the first, with parts of the middle dragging for me. There's still humour, and affecting, emotional scenes, and I loved the development of the baby AI.
Though I liked this a little less than the first, the finish to this story was great, and I hope to read more by this author.
Thank you to Netgalley and to Angry Robot for this ARC in exchange for my review.
During the last ten years, the United Nations has been working hard to get everyone off of Earth by the deadline set by Earth's first inhabitants, the First. There has also been a virus that has swept through the population, rendering at least fifty percent of humans infertile. And the US and USSR are setting up to contest ownership of Mars.
Brooklyn Lamontagne may have saved Earth eight years ago and died, but he's back, doing his best to keep busy just enough to keep his ship going and get drunk.
During a long trip transporting a friend to Mars, Brooklyn inadvertently creates a baby AI, who has a number of needs, including a need to connect with others emotionally. Once they land, Brooklyn stumbles on a number of plots: superpowers' espionage, surprising alliances, and the search for ancient artifacts, and, most alarmingly, the sudden departure of the Jellies from the solar system.
Brooklyn is the embodiment of doing the absolute minimum to get by. So despite being altered (in book one) and inadvertently becoming a hero, he's still the same guy, mostly bemused by everything around him.
The story has the same slightly whimsical, slightly odd feel of the first. I love author R.W.W Greene's version of Earth history, where the Oppenheimer Nuclear Engine kickstarted Earth's space exploration years earlier, with a number of interesting technological and societal changes following.
Greene intended this as a trilogy, but chose instead to wrap things up in this book, which worked for me. I liked the resolution, though I found the pacing in this instalment to be slower than the first, with parts of the middle dragging for me. There's still humour, and affecting, emotional scenes, and I loved the development of the baby AI.
Though I liked this a little less than the first, the finish to this story was great, and I hope to read more by this author.
Thank you to Netgalley and to Angry Robot for this ARC in exchange for my review.
December 25, 2023
I still have to find a R.W.W. Greene novels i don't like and this is the second in a series that started with a bang and continues with another bang.
Well plotted, great world building, humour, alternate history: a fascinating mix that ketp me enthralled.
Highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this ARC, all opinions are mine
Well plotted, great world building, humour, alternate history: a fascinating mix that ketp me enthralled.
Highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this ARC, all opinions are mine
November 13, 2023
The nitty-gritty: R.W.W. Greene's witty and creative alt history series ends with a bang in this well written, if sometimes uneven, conclusion.
Last year I raved about R.W.W. Greene’s Mercury Rising, the first book in a planned trilogy. And oh what a difference a year makes. Due to reasons I can only guess at, Rob’s trilogy became a duology instead, and the author was forced to cram two books’ worth of plot and ideas into only one book. As skilled a writer as he is, Earth Retrograde unfortunately suffers from this in some ways, but is brilliant in others, and so this ended up being a mixed bag for me (and I'm sticking with my four star rating because the ending is so good). This is a sometimes uneven story that needed that extra book to make it a truly outstanding trilogy, but what the author does well he does really well. Therefore I can hardly fault him for giving it a good try, and I will say this duology is definitely worth your time, even with some of my complaints.
Also beware of minor spoilers for the first book.
The story opens soon after the end of Mercury Rising. Brooklyn Lamontagne has died and been brought back to life after being injected with alien technology nanobots. The First, a powerful alien race who claimed to have been on Earth long before humans, has demanded that they leave the planet. Various efforts at relocating billions of people to distant planets and moons are underway, but now Brook has been sent a message that could change everything. Someone has told him the First have left Earth, suddenly vanished into thin air, although no one knows why. Is this good news for the human race? Or do the First have some nefarious ulterior motive for leaving? Brooklyn is determined to solve the mystery, and he sets about doing just that with an assortment of rag-tag acquaintances, criminals, and close friends.
Just as in Mercury Rising, Greene has mastered a particular retro ambiance that mixes the hip sex, drugs and rock-n-roll mentality of the 70s with cutting edge alien technology. This combo is what makes his books so appealing to me, and I loved seeing more of it here. Brooklyn exemplifies that quality, a man who has been through a lot and yet still manages to stay upbeat in the face of terrible danger. Sure, he occasionally needs casual sex, drugs and lots of alcohol to get through the day, but who wouldn’t in those circumstances? Greene’s writing style mimics Brook’s devil-may-care attitude with punchy humor and sarcasm galore, and I spent a lot of time smiling and laughing at the characters’ wry observations and ridiculous antics.
There is an overarching plot to Earth Retrograde, but it’s sometimes hard to see it. Brook’s life is filled with slice-of-life moments, vignettes that stand up on their own but often don’t go anywhere. One of the things I struggled with most is the overabundance of characters, many who appear briefly to star in a scene or two with Brook, then disappear, never to be seen again. I found myself wondering if a particular character had appeared in Mercury Rising, but I just didn’t remember them. Take the Purple Lady, for example. I don’t have any memories of her in the first book, yet she seems to be very important to Brook in this one. Other characters pop up, characters I do remember, like Andy, but her role this time around wasn’t nearly as compelling as it was in book one. New characters like Float, one of the species who the First created, became one of my favorite characters in the story. Yet like many others, I grew fond of them just as they were making their exit from the story. Brook is in constant motion, flying from Earth to Venus to Mars and back, and he ends up leaving many a good friend behind.
The story has bursts of exciting action, since Brook and his friends are trying to figure out how to save the world, but between those thrilling scenes are stretches of story that frankly lost me. I found myself reading pages at a time but not really absorbing anything. Whether this was due to my distracted mental state, or simply an issue with the plot, I’m not really sure. But many events seemed to appear out of nowhere without context. Had I really forgotten so much of Mercury Rising? I found myself lost until something else finally grabbed my attention, which made for a disjointed reading experience.
But then. In the last seventy-five pages or so, everything changed. Greene’s grand scheme was finally revealed, the answer to humanity’s survival was explained, and I began to love the story again. The ending was simply brilliant, a fitting conclusion for such a unique series. Greene mentions in his Acknowledgments that he always knew where the story was headed, it was getting there that had to be figured out.
So, despite some setbacks, I’m so happy to have read this series. Rob Greene has become a “must read” author, and I can’t wait to see what he does next.
Big thanks to the publisher for providing a review copy.
Last year I raved about R.W.W. Greene’s Mercury Rising, the first book in a planned trilogy. And oh what a difference a year makes. Due to reasons I can only guess at, Rob’s trilogy became a duology instead, and the author was forced to cram two books’ worth of plot and ideas into only one book. As skilled a writer as he is, Earth Retrograde unfortunately suffers from this in some ways, but is brilliant in others, and so this ended up being a mixed bag for me (and I'm sticking with my four star rating because the ending is so good). This is a sometimes uneven story that needed that extra book to make it a truly outstanding trilogy, but what the author does well he does really well. Therefore I can hardly fault him for giving it a good try, and I will say this duology is definitely worth your time, even with some of my complaints.
Also beware of minor spoilers for the first book.
The story opens soon after the end of Mercury Rising. Brooklyn Lamontagne has died and been brought back to life after being injected with alien technology nanobots. The First, a powerful alien race who claimed to have been on Earth long before humans, has demanded that they leave the planet. Various efforts at relocating billions of people to distant planets and moons are underway, but now Brook has been sent a message that could change everything. Someone has told him the First have left Earth, suddenly vanished into thin air, although no one knows why. Is this good news for the human race? Or do the First have some nefarious ulterior motive for leaving? Brooklyn is determined to solve the mystery, and he sets about doing just that with an assortment of rag-tag acquaintances, criminals, and close friends.
Just as in Mercury Rising, Greene has mastered a particular retro ambiance that mixes the hip sex, drugs and rock-n-roll mentality of the 70s with cutting edge alien technology. This combo is what makes his books so appealing to me, and I loved seeing more of it here. Brooklyn exemplifies that quality, a man who has been through a lot and yet still manages to stay upbeat in the face of terrible danger. Sure, he occasionally needs casual sex, drugs and lots of alcohol to get through the day, but who wouldn’t in those circumstances? Greene’s writing style mimics Brook’s devil-may-care attitude with punchy humor and sarcasm galore, and I spent a lot of time smiling and laughing at the characters’ wry observations and ridiculous antics.
There is an overarching plot to Earth Retrograde, but it’s sometimes hard to see it. Brook’s life is filled with slice-of-life moments, vignettes that stand up on their own but often don’t go anywhere. One of the things I struggled with most is the overabundance of characters, many who appear briefly to star in a scene or two with Brook, then disappear, never to be seen again. I found myself wondering if a particular character had appeared in Mercury Rising, but I just didn’t remember them. Take the Purple Lady, for example. I don’t have any memories of her in the first book, yet she seems to be very important to Brook in this one. Other characters pop up, characters I do remember, like Andy, but her role this time around wasn’t nearly as compelling as it was in book one. New characters like Float, one of the species who the First created, became one of my favorite characters in the story. Yet like many others, I grew fond of them just as they were making their exit from the story. Brook is in constant motion, flying from Earth to Venus to Mars and back, and he ends up leaving many a good friend behind.
The story has bursts of exciting action, since Brook and his friends are trying to figure out how to save the world, but between those thrilling scenes are stretches of story that frankly lost me. I found myself reading pages at a time but not really absorbing anything. Whether this was due to my distracted mental state, or simply an issue with the plot, I’m not really sure. But many events seemed to appear out of nowhere without context. Had I really forgotten so much of Mercury Rising? I found myself lost until something else finally grabbed my attention, which made for a disjointed reading experience.
But then. In the last seventy-five pages or so, everything changed. Greene’s grand scheme was finally revealed, the answer to humanity’s survival was explained, and I began to love the story again. The ending was simply brilliant, a fitting conclusion for such a unique series. Greene mentions in his Acknowledgments that he always knew where the story was headed, it was getting there that had to be figured out.
So, despite some setbacks, I’m so happy to have read this series. Rob Greene has become a “must read” author, and I can’t wait to see what he does next.
Big thanks to the publisher for providing a review copy.
September 26, 2023
Review: Earth Retrograde by R.W.W. Greene (The First Planets Duology #2)
Synopsis
Brooklyn Lamontagne spends his time running most any cargo to and from Venus after saving the world from galactic war. Unfortunately for Brooklyn, he can’t remember it.
Shunned by the Earth’s governments and making ends meet with his alien co-pilot Float, Brooklyn is soon called into action again when his pal Demarco tells him that The First, the all-powerful alien conquerors of the Solar System, pull out on their occupation of Earth.
What made The First turn tail? Whatever it was, it’s a closely-guarded secret that Brooklyn, his mushroom trip-created AI and his too-old-for-this-shit crew are going to find out.
Review
Thank you to Angry Robot for sending me an ARC of Earth Retrograde. I couldn’t wait for my pre-ordered copy to arrive. After book one of The First Planets Duology, Mercury Rising, was one of my top reads of the year [LINK] I had high hopes for the follow up. Did Earth Retrograde live up to lofty expectations? As Brooklyn Lamontage would probably say, thafuckyou think?
We have jumped forward two decades since Mercury Rising. Brooklyn hasn’t bathed in glory for foiling a Jelly (squid-like aliens) plot to drop a planet-cracking meteor on humanity. Instead, he’s an outcast; like a cosmic weary Mal Reynolds hailing from a 1970s Queens, NY. His human citizenship has been revoked and he spends his time with his Jelly co-pilot, Float, ferrying cargo and people during a mass Earth exodus.
There’s just something captivating about space migration. At a time where populism is rife and we’re subject to politicians frantically telling us to look over there, it’s fitting that there are Sci Fi stories that look at this. Earth Retrograde is no exception and seems to throwback to The Great Migration by Ma Boyong, another cracking Sci Fi mass migration story.
And if you’re not familiar with an R.W.W. Greene novel by now, this sort of a plot is all par for the course. A lot is happening in the background. A lot. Here, Earth has been claimed by The First and they want the earthlings gone and they want them gone yesterday. Yet the story centres around our unassuming protagonist, Brooklyn. It’s a story where the unspectacular NPCs are shoved into the spectacular, which often goes about as well as can be expected. Not very.
This is precisely what I love about Greene’s writing and why he’s one of my favourite writers in the genre. I love that every character is fully fleshed out and has their time under our reader’s lens. Even the sentient ship A.I.’s rock simulator program is still, somehow, a page-turning event. Nothing at all is rushed along. The story just unfolds and is allowed to happen. In one sitting I somehow managed to read a third of the book without even realising it because it’s just so easy to keep on reading.
Light Years
Adding to the charm is the myriad of references to a groovy 70s soundtrack. Even the many parts of the book are named predominantly after Pearl Jam songs. Eddie Vedder is mentioned as having something alien about him but also there’s that cameo from an artist late on in the book. I heavily recommend booting up Pearl Jam’s greatest hits as a soundtrack to an Earth Retrograde binge.
Immortality
Let’s bring this back to the main character. Brooklyn, that Mal Reynolds/Han Solo greaser character who never asks for anything that happens over the entire duology. I can’t tell you the empathy I feel for the guy. The universal weariness that radiates from him right from the very start of the book really tugged the heartstrings. He’s the guy who can’t catch a single break but has no choice but to keep on going. And, due to the nanobots implanted inside him in Mercury Rising, not even death sticks long enough to give him some reprieve.
Brooklyn’s relationships, even the romantic ones, are always fleeting but always poignant. Even so with what loosely passes as the duology’s antagonist, Caliban. The universe just needs to leave Brooklyn alone but it never seems like it’s going to happen. This takes us to the ending of The First Planets … ack it’s a great ending but it was a suckerpunch. Yeah. Sigh.
Off He Goes
It seems rare for trad pub to let an author tell their story over two books rather than a series. Huge credit to Angry Robot for giving Greene the platform to make these books something special. You will struggle to find a better literary Sci-Fi embodiment of the space girl lofi hiphop videos on YouTube than Mercury Rising and Earth Retrograde. There is no drawback to this duology. No downside. Greene nailed it.
Synopsis
Brooklyn Lamontagne spends his time running most any cargo to and from Venus after saving the world from galactic war. Unfortunately for Brooklyn, he can’t remember it.
Shunned by the Earth’s governments and making ends meet with his alien co-pilot Float, Brooklyn is soon called into action again when his pal Demarco tells him that The First, the all-powerful alien conquerors of the Solar System, pull out on their occupation of Earth.
What made The First turn tail? Whatever it was, it’s a closely-guarded secret that Brooklyn, his mushroom trip-created AI and his too-old-for-this-shit crew are going to find out.
Review
Thank you to Angry Robot for sending me an ARC of Earth Retrograde. I couldn’t wait for my pre-ordered copy to arrive. After book one of The First Planets Duology, Mercury Rising, was one of my top reads of the year [LINK] I had high hopes for the follow up. Did Earth Retrograde live up to lofty expectations? As Brooklyn Lamontage would probably say, thafuckyou think?
We have jumped forward two decades since Mercury Rising. Brooklyn hasn’t bathed in glory for foiling a Jelly (squid-like aliens) plot to drop a planet-cracking meteor on humanity. Instead, he’s an outcast; like a cosmic weary Mal Reynolds hailing from a 1970s Queens, NY. His human citizenship has been revoked and he spends his time with his Jelly co-pilot, Float, ferrying cargo and people during a mass Earth exodus.
There’s just something captivating about space migration. At a time where populism is rife and we’re subject to politicians frantically telling us to look over there, it’s fitting that there are Sci Fi stories that look at this. Earth Retrograde is no exception and seems to throwback to The Great Migration by Ma Boyong, another cracking Sci Fi mass migration story.
And if you’re not familiar with an R.W.W. Greene novel by now, this sort of a plot is all par for the course. A lot is happening in the background. A lot. Here, Earth has been claimed by The First and they want the earthlings gone and they want them gone yesterday. Yet the story centres around our unassuming protagonist, Brooklyn. It’s a story where the unspectacular NPCs are shoved into the spectacular, which often goes about as well as can be expected. Not very.
This is precisely what I love about Greene’s writing and why he’s one of my favourite writers in the genre. I love that every character is fully fleshed out and has their time under our reader’s lens. Even the sentient ship A.I.’s rock simulator program is still, somehow, a page-turning event. Nothing at all is rushed along. The story just unfolds and is allowed to happen. In one sitting I somehow managed to read a third of the book without even realising it because it’s just so easy to keep on reading.
Light Years
Adding to the charm is the myriad of references to a groovy 70s soundtrack. Even the many parts of the book are named predominantly after Pearl Jam songs. Eddie Vedder is mentioned as having something alien about him but also there’s that cameo from an artist late on in the book. I heavily recommend booting up Pearl Jam’s greatest hits as a soundtrack to an Earth Retrograde binge.
Immortality
Let’s bring this back to the main character. Brooklyn, that Mal Reynolds/Han Solo greaser character who never asks for anything that happens over the entire duology. I can’t tell you the empathy I feel for the guy. The universal weariness that radiates from him right from the very start of the book really tugged the heartstrings. He’s the guy who can’t catch a single break but has no choice but to keep on going. And, due to the nanobots implanted inside him in Mercury Rising, not even death sticks long enough to give him some reprieve.
Brooklyn’s relationships, even the romantic ones, are always fleeting but always poignant. Even so with what loosely passes as the duology’s antagonist, Caliban. The universe just needs to leave Brooklyn alone but it never seems like it’s going to happen. This takes us to the ending of The First Planets … ack it’s a great ending but it was a suckerpunch. Yeah. Sigh.
Off He Goes
It seems rare for trad pub to let an author tell their story over two books rather than a series. Huge credit to Angry Robot for giving Greene the platform to make these books something special. You will struggle to find a better literary Sci-Fi embodiment of the space girl lofi hiphop videos on YouTube than Mercury Rising and Earth Retrograde. There is no drawback to this duology. No downside. Greene nailed it.
October 14, 2023
One of the most rewarding experiences of reading the Indrajal Comics version of Flash Gordon in my childhood was that those comics took Flash, Dale, and Zarkov outside the confines of the palaces of Arboria and the arenas of Ming and out of Mongo itself. In the pages of those comics, our heroes fought Skorpi invaders in ancient Mars, chased an outlaw in the moons of Jupiter, battled a crazed, thawed-out Norse warrior in the Arctic, and foiled a plot to devolve Venusian fauna to prehistoric predators. I loved those stories because they expanded the world and populated it with interesting characters – Roper the Mercenary, the misguided tech billionaire, Willie the Psychic, a group of precocious kids.
(Indrajal Comics published licensed comics like Flash Gordon, Mandrake, Phantom, Rip Kirby, and Garth in Indian languages. I used to read those in Bengali, my native language.)
As a grown-up, I re-read those Indrajal Comics issues and also sought out the original source materials – the works of Alex Raymond, Mac Raboy, Harvey Kurtzman, Dan Barry, and Jim Keefe. And I came upon another very interesting storytelling technique they employed: the use of our Solar System as a setting.
The use of our own backyard, as it were, in science-fiction stories were in vogue in the heydays of the pulp magazines – Northwest Smith and Flash Gordon were two most famous examples. But nowadays, space-opera is almost always set in far-flung galaxies and distant worlds. While there’s a lot of creative freedom to be had in the Star Wars Empire or the Warhammer 40,000 Imperium, or Star Trek’s Mirror Universe, there’s something to be said about stories that utilise worlds that are closer to us – the Moon, the satellites of Mars, the Asteroid Belt.
It is precisely this factor that drew me in to Earth Retrograde, the second in the First Planets duology by EWW Greene. The book starts with a recap of events that led to this story (note to all series authors: please do this) and those events form a delightful alternate history. Oppenheimer invented the Atomic Engine in 1945. Mankind walked on the Moon in 1950. The Mercurian Menace are defeated by a group called Freedom 7 in 1961. As I was going through the timeline, my grin got bigger and bigger.
And then the real story began. Since I’ve not read Mercury Rising, Book I of the duology, I found the story a bit difficult to get into, but once I found my footing, it was one long happy reading.
Greene has managed to sculpt a masterpiece in terms of world-building. There are criminals, there are secret agents, there are rival political and religious movements, there are squid-like aliens, there are sex-clubs for the aforementioned squid-like aliens, there are neighbourhoods for Hollywood stars on the Moon – it’s a smorgasbord of cultures and places and peoples and species in this book.
The fact that it’s set in our Solar System makes it especially enjoyable for me. Also, Earth is front-and-centre in the book. We get to know the politics and sociology of Earth against the backdrop of an eviction notice served by an alien race.
But no amount of world-building can sustain a book if the characters don’t resonate with readers. And here too, Greene shines. While Brooklyn, our hero, takes the centre-stage, the supporting characters also well-developed. I particularly liked the character of Evelyn who grows from a one-night stand for Brooklyn to a heavyweight in her own right.
Earth Retrograde is a tip of the hat to the Solar System-based science-fiction of CLE Moore, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Mac Raboy, and James S.A. Corey. It is also very much it’s own beast, serving as a template for what can be accomplished in 60-odd chapters – spoiler alert: a lot – if the author has boundless imagination to come up with one bonkers thing after another but enough pragmatism to prune those things where necessary.
While the story of Brooklyn Lamontagne ends here, I hope Greene considers writing spin-offs. There are enough interesting characters here to merit books of their own.
(Indrajal Comics published licensed comics like Flash Gordon, Mandrake, Phantom, Rip Kirby, and Garth in Indian languages. I used to read those in Bengali, my native language.)
As a grown-up, I re-read those Indrajal Comics issues and also sought out the original source materials – the works of Alex Raymond, Mac Raboy, Harvey Kurtzman, Dan Barry, and Jim Keefe. And I came upon another very interesting storytelling technique they employed: the use of our Solar System as a setting.
The use of our own backyard, as it were, in science-fiction stories were in vogue in the heydays of the pulp magazines – Northwest Smith and Flash Gordon were two most famous examples. But nowadays, space-opera is almost always set in far-flung galaxies and distant worlds. While there’s a lot of creative freedom to be had in the Star Wars Empire or the Warhammer 40,000 Imperium, or Star Trek’s Mirror Universe, there’s something to be said about stories that utilise worlds that are closer to us – the Moon, the satellites of Mars, the Asteroid Belt.
It is precisely this factor that drew me in to Earth Retrograde, the second in the First Planets duology by EWW Greene. The book starts with a recap of events that led to this story (note to all series authors: please do this) and those events form a delightful alternate history. Oppenheimer invented the Atomic Engine in 1945. Mankind walked on the Moon in 1950. The Mercurian Menace are defeated by a group called Freedom 7 in 1961. As I was going through the timeline, my grin got bigger and bigger.
And then the real story began. Since I’ve not read Mercury Rising, Book I of the duology, I found the story a bit difficult to get into, but once I found my footing, it was one long happy reading.
Greene has managed to sculpt a masterpiece in terms of world-building. There are criminals, there are secret agents, there are rival political and religious movements, there are squid-like aliens, there are sex-clubs for the aforementioned squid-like aliens, there are neighbourhoods for Hollywood stars on the Moon – it’s a smorgasbord of cultures and places and peoples and species in this book.
The fact that it’s set in our Solar System makes it especially enjoyable for me. Also, Earth is front-and-centre in the book. We get to know the politics and sociology of Earth against the backdrop of an eviction notice served by an alien race.
But no amount of world-building can sustain a book if the characters don’t resonate with readers. And here too, Greene shines. While Brooklyn, our hero, takes the centre-stage, the supporting characters also well-developed. I particularly liked the character of Evelyn who grows from a one-night stand for Brooklyn to a heavyweight in her own right.
Earth Retrograde is a tip of the hat to the Solar System-based science-fiction of CLE Moore, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Mac Raboy, and James S.A. Corey. It is also very much it’s own beast, serving as a template for what can be accomplished in 60-odd chapters – spoiler alert: a lot – if the author has boundless imagination to come up with one bonkers thing after another but enough pragmatism to prune those things where necessary.
While the story of Brooklyn Lamontagne ends here, I hope Greene considers writing spin-offs. There are enough interesting characters here to merit books of their own.
December 20, 2024
Real Rating: 4.5* of five
The Publisher Says: Becoming the planet's most (in)famous human has not changed Brooklyn Lamontagne one bit, but the time has come for him to choose where his allegiances really lie.
The United Nations is working to get everyone off Earth by the deadline—set by the planet’s true owners, the aliens known as the First. It’s a task made somewhat easier by a mysterious virus that rendered at least fifty percent of humanity unable to have children. Meanwhile, the USA and the USSR have set their sights on Mars, claiming half a planet each.
Brooklyn Lamontagne doesn’t remember saving the world eight years ago, but he’s been paying for it ever since. The conquered Earth governments don’t trust him, the Average Joe can’t make up their mind, but they all agree that Brooklyn should stay in space. Now, he’s just about covering his bills with junk-food runs to Venus and transporting horny honeymooners to Tycho aboard his aging spaceship, the Victory.
When a pal asks for a ride to Mars, Brooklyn lands in a solar system’s worth of espionage, backroom alliances, ancient treasures and secret plots while encountering a navigation system that just wants to be loved…
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER. THANK YOU.
My Review: "The mice will see you now" said Slartibartfast to Dentarthurdent.
The First and their prior claim to the Earth Humanity thinks it owns, and definitely dominates, left me uneasily aware that the religious nuts' worldview of a creator god who is the real owner of the place and the people is a very, very short step from most SF...at least the kind with superpowered aliens. I'm not a believer in either things (aliens or gods), so I was a bit more distanced from this book's essential worldview than the first one.
As soon as we get into alien territory I lose steam. I like the idea here more than it sounds like I do; alert readers will notice a 4.5* rating, which is no one's idea of a dissatisfied reader's opinion. I'm mostly responding to Brooklyn's kindness and unwillingness to leave anyone who needs help unhelped. I'm also deeply satisfied by the story's ending.
But I'll admit, I wanted to know more about the First than I learned; the book needed to be longer, or there needed to be another one. Read together, in quick sequence, the story moves quickly to its satisfying conclusion...which is why I re-read the first one. It's a long afternoon and evening taken at one stretch, but it worked well for me. Think of it aas one read and submerge into Brooklyn's forty-two degrees antisolar worldview.
Make this two-part story your escape-from-togetherness read this Yuletide if you batten on alternate history and/or space operas without pew-pew battles. Think Flash Gordon with sex clubs, or the Star Wars cantina with booze reviewer's notes sound like fun? Welcome, Soul Sibling, to your dream's fulfillment.
The Publisher Says: Becoming the planet's most (in)famous human has not changed Brooklyn Lamontagne one bit, but the time has come for him to choose where his allegiances really lie.
The United Nations is working to get everyone off Earth by the deadline—set by the planet’s true owners, the aliens known as the First. It’s a task made somewhat easier by a mysterious virus that rendered at least fifty percent of humanity unable to have children. Meanwhile, the USA and the USSR have set their sights on Mars, claiming half a planet each.
Brooklyn Lamontagne doesn’t remember saving the world eight years ago, but he’s been paying for it ever since. The conquered Earth governments don’t trust him, the Average Joe can’t make up their mind, but they all agree that Brooklyn should stay in space. Now, he’s just about covering his bills with junk-food runs to Venus and transporting horny honeymooners to Tycho aboard his aging spaceship, the Victory.
When a pal asks for a ride to Mars, Brooklyn lands in a solar system’s worth of espionage, backroom alliances, ancient treasures and secret plots while encountering a navigation system that just wants to be loved…
I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER. THANK YOU.
My Review: "The mice will see you now" said Slartibartfast to Dentarthurdent.
The First and their prior claim to the Earth Humanity thinks it owns, and definitely dominates, left me uneasily aware that the religious nuts' worldview of a creator god who is the real owner of the place and the people is a very, very short step from most SF...at least the kind with superpowered aliens. I'm not a believer in either things (aliens or gods), so I was a bit more distanced from this book's essential worldview than the first one.
As soon as we get into alien territory I lose steam. I like the idea here more than it sounds like I do; alert readers will notice a 4.5* rating, which is no one's idea of a dissatisfied reader's opinion. I'm mostly responding to Brooklyn's kindness and unwillingness to leave anyone who needs help unhelped. I'm also deeply satisfied by the story's ending.
But I'll admit, I wanted to know more about the First than I learned; the book needed to be longer, or there needed to be another one. Read together, in quick sequence, the story moves quickly to its satisfying conclusion...which is why I re-read the first one. It's a long afternoon and evening taken at one stretch, but it worked well for me. Think of it aas one read and submerge into Brooklyn's forty-two degrees antisolar worldview.
Make this two-part story your escape-from-togetherness read this Yuletide if you batten on alternate history and/or space operas without pew-pew battles. Think Flash Gordon with sex clubs, or the Star Wars cantina with booze reviewer's notes sound like fun? Welcome, Soul Sibling, to your dream's fulfillment.
November 3, 2023
This duology is a quirky read that hits many main tropes within the genre, yet this turns out to be a memorably different read. Take our plucky hero, for instance. Brooklyn Lamontagne is a disaster magnet that never went looking for major trouble or adventure. After all, he ended up being a computer specialist – and yes… other protagonists claim to hate the adventures they undergo. But Brook really, really does. He self-medicates with alcohol a lot of the time – which was an aspect of the book I did find a bit annoying. I’m teetotal, so all the descriptions about the variety and quality of the strong stuff he was quaffing didn’t really do it for me. In contrast, many of the adventures he has undergone don’t get that much attention, because Brook can’t recall them.
We have a highly evolved alien species – the First, who now no longer need physical bodies. They claim to have visited Earth millions of years ago, before Humanity were around, and after centuries of watching us, they’ve decided to evict us. And they have the technology to persuade our angry politicians that agreeing to their terms isn’t such a bad idea, after all. They regard us with all the compassion we show an ant infestation. Fortunately, Brook doesn’t spend all that much time on Earth, as his disturbing reincarnation has all sorts of important people convinced that he’s an agent for the First. There are such entities working amongst the human population, after all…
I liked Brook and his instinct to try and help out those around him. But I didn’t ever feel I really knew him. It’s a book full of incident and unexpected twists, which drive the plot forward, rather than Brook having any agency. And that’s fine – it is, after all, a staple of classic science fiction. And Greene is good at keeping the pace up and the plot driving forward. However while I enjoyed the ride, I kept getting the sense that I was missing chunks of the story. And I’ve come away with a feeling that this series, while enjoyable, could have been so much better if there’d been three books instead of two. That said, the ending is fabulous and highly memorable. And so very clever. I’ll be thinking about it for a long time to come. Highly recommended for sci fi fans who enjoy alien encounters – apart from anything else, this is one I’d love to chat about with others who’ve read it. While I obtained an arc of Earth Retrograde from the publisher via Netgalley, the opinions I have expressed are unbiased and my own.
8/10
We have a highly evolved alien species – the First, who now no longer need physical bodies. They claim to have visited Earth millions of years ago, before Humanity were around, and after centuries of watching us, they’ve decided to evict us. And they have the technology to persuade our angry politicians that agreeing to their terms isn’t such a bad idea, after all. They regard us with all the compassion we show an ant infestation. Fortunately, Brook doesn’t spend all that much time on Earth, as his disturbing reincarnation has all sorts of important people convinced that he’s an agent for the First. There are such entities working amongst the human population, after all…
I liked Brook and his instinct to try and help out those around him. But I didn’t ever feel I really knew him. It’s a book full of incident and unexpected twists, which drive the plot forward, rather than Brook having any agency. And that’s fine – it is, after all, a staple of classic science fiction. And Greene is good at keeping the pace up and the plot driving forward. However while I enjoyed the ride, I kept getting the sense that I was missing chunks of the story. And I’ve come away with a feeling that this series, while enjoyable, could have been so much better if there’d been three books instead of two. That said, the ending is fabulous and highly memorable. And so very clever. I’ll be thinking about it for a long time to come. Highly recommended for sci fi fans who enjoy alien encounters – apart from anything else, this is one I’d love to chat about with others who’ve read it. While I obtained an arc of Earth Retrograde from the publisher via Netgalley, the opinions I have expressed are unbiased and my own.
8/10
September 20, 2023
The beautifully pulpy, full-of-heart story of Brooklyn making his way through a believable space landscape continues in Earth Retrograde.
Mercury Rising pleased me so much. Greene’s intelligent and warm take on underachieving Brooklyn made me want so much more. We’ve missed a lot in the gap between books one and two of the duology but Greene refers back skilfully to an intriguing history that I enjoyed piecing together.
The relationship with Andi has changed, making room for fresh bonds to be explored and new issues about how we adapt in a changing landscape where inexplicable actions of forces beyond our control impact on our reality in potentially devastating ways. Bureaucracy is the Kafkaesque nightmare face of these seismic changes in the day-to-day lives of ordinary folk.
But Brooklyn is not ordinary. What he went through in book one has left him more powerful than he wishes and the longing for normalcy is such a poignant element to the novel. Will Brooklyn be able to save those he loves and hold onto the shreds of the life he’s made for himself? The odds are against him but Greene’s belief in humanity (however alien the form it comes in) shines through and Brooklyn is a character that will stay with me for his efforts alone.
Mercury Rising pleased me so much. Greene’s intelligent and warm take on underachieving Brooklyn made me want so much more. We’ve missed a lot in the gap between books one and two of the duology but Greene refers back skilfully to an intriguing history that I enjoyed piecing together.
The relationship with Andi has changed, making room for fresh bonds to be explored and new issues about how we adapt in a changing landscape where inexplicable actions of forces beyond our control impact on our reality in potentially devastating ways. Bureaucracy is the Kafkaesque nightmare face of these seismic changes in the day-to-day lives of ordinary folk.
But Brooklyn is not ordinary. What he went through in book one has left him more powerful than he wishes and the longing for normalcy is such a poignant element to the novel. Will Brooklyn be able to save those he loves and hold onto the shreds of the life he’s made for himself? The odds are against him but Greene’s belief in humanity (however alien the form it comes in) shines through and Brooklyn is a character that will stay with me for his efforts alone.
September 28, 2023
If Don’t Look Up had the point of view of Tom Petty and the setting of Hitchhiker’s Guide, you might have something like Earth Retrograde… feel-good alt history Americana that leaves you hopeful even at world’s end. I loved it!
April 12, 2025
What a fun ride! Mercury Rising and Earth Retrograde were a great read, filled with fun twists from an alternate history, a full, distinct world within, and OH MAN what an ending. 10/10 recommend to anyone looking for something different or just a good time reading.
September 6, 2025
Brooklyn Lamontagne-- Wait, wasn't he dead at the end of MERCURY RISING? Well, yes. But Brooklyn is back, scurrilous as ever, trying to solve the mystery of why the First, who drove humans off Earth, have suddenly...just disappeared. Dazzling worldbuilding, nonstop action, and a lot of fun.
November 23, 2023
I really enjoyed where this ended up. I loved the characters and how well they are thought out, but you can tell there was meant to be more.
December 3, 2023
R.W.W. Greene’s picaresque hero, Brooklyn Lamontagne has returned in this sequel to Mercury Rising. I fully enjoyed diving back into the unique universe that Greene has created. This is not your typical space opera, because Brooklyn is not your typical hero. This time, he's gotta save the world again, despite not remembering how he did it the first time and the cast of characters involved makes the whole trip worthwhile.
October 3, 2025
waste of time
Never knew what was happening, book seemed to wander from one situation to the next with little plantation of why. Wanted to like it but real lacking in substance
Never knew what was happening, book seemed to wander from one situation to the next with little plantation of why. Wanted to like it but real lacking in substance
October 31, 2023
Always entertaining, and almost self soothing with why things are the way that they are.
I do appreciate that this alternate history of space travel was very entertaining and super fun to read. Since it had been a while since reading Mercury Rising, some of the details from the first book were fuzzy, but I remember it being a really fun time. This was no exception.
I appreciate the weirdness and the succinct sarcasm.
Overall its a great series, and it will leave you laughing.
Thank you to Netgalley and Angry Robot for an early copy.
I do appreciate that this alternate history of space travel was very entertaining and super fun to read. Since it had been a while since reading Mercury Rising, some of the details from the first book were fuzzy, but I remember it being a really fun time. This was no exception.
I appreciate the weirdness and the succinct sarcasm.
Overall its a great series, and it will leave you laughing.
Thank you to Netgalley and Angry Robot for an early copy.
October 22, 2023
Earth Retrograde is the second book in the First Planets duology.
It takes roughly 20 years after the first book, Mercury Rising.
Earth Retrograde involves an evacuation of Earth and a couple of side quests along the way.
Mr. Greene has put together a fantastic world where everything got jumpstarted early.
The moon, Mars, Venus and the Asteroid Belt have all been colonized.
I enjoyed the first book quite a bit. There were a couple of spots that dragged me down. I’m happy to say that there were none of those issues this time around.
This book started off strong and kept up the pace until the ending. A very satisfying ending, at that.
This is an alternate history that can stand with the best of the classic Space Opera books from the Golden Age of Science Fiction.
It takes roughly 20 years after the first book, Mercury Rising.
Earth Retrograde involves an evacuation of Earth and a couple of side quests along the way.
Mr. Greene has put together a fantastic world where everything got jumpstarted early.
The moon, Mars, Venus and the Asteroid Belt have all been colonized.
I enjoyed the first book quite a bit. There were a couple of spots that dragged me down. I’m happy to say that there were none of those issues this time around.
This book started off strong and kept up the pace until the ending. A very satisfying ending, at that.
This is an alternate history that can stand with the best of the classic Space Opera books from the Golden Age of Science Fiction.
October 29, 2023
[Blurb goes here]
Earth Retrograde is the sequel to Mercury Rising (3.78 stars on Goodreads). Mercury Rising is an interesting book with some great characters. The same cannot be said about Earth Retrograde.
Brooklyn Lamontagne has become a rock smuggler. The rocks are rare on Earth, even if they seem to be run-of-the-mill minerals found on every surface of the now-occupied Venus tunnels where humanity is supposed to go. You see, The First—as they call themselves—have set a deadline. All humans must leave Earth; the remaining ones will die when The First take over.
If you've read the blurb, the story seems quite exciting. It's anything but.
R.W.W Green weaves a tale with many unnecessary 'side quests' that fail to coalesce, creating nothing more than fleeting distractions from the main storyline.
Then there's the absurdity of the tech. This is just one of many instances: when it suits Greene, fuel is something to be mindful of when traversing space between planets. Then, by whim, if the main character is in a hurry to get somewhere, fuel is a non-issue.
I wanted to like this book as much as I did the first one. I couldn't.
Thank you for the advanced copy!
Earth Retrograde is the sequel to Mercury Rising (3.78 stars on Goodreads). Mercury Rising is an interesting book with some great characters. The same cannot be said about Earth Retrograde.
Brooklyn Lamontagne has become a rock smuggler. The rocks are rare on Earth, even if they seem to be run-of-the-mill minerals found on every surface of the now-occupied Venus tunnels where humanity is supposed to go. You see, The First—as they call themselves—have set a deadline. All humans must leave Earth; the remaining ones will die when The First take over.
If you've read the blurb, the story seems quite exciting. It's anything but.
R.W.W Green weaves a tale with many unnecessary 'side quests' that fail to coalesce, creating nothing more than fleeting distractions from the main storyline.
Then there's the absurdity of the tech. This is just one of many instances: when it suits Greene, fuel is something to be mindful of when traversing space between planets. Then, by whim, if the main character is in a hurry to get somewhere, fuel is a non-issue.
I wanted to like this book as much as I did the first one. I couldn't.
Thank you for the advanced copy!
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews