Frustrating and disappointment are the words I would use describing The Rise of Endymion. I didn’t like Endymion books as much as Hyperion books. It took me this long to get to The Rise of Endymion. First third got my hopes up. It had what was good in Hyperion books. It had different characters with different voices. Frustration came after this. After about first third book starts to concentrate on Endymion. Other characters are set for interesting story arcs but book concentrates on least interesting character, Endymion. Other characters’ story arcs are mentioned but it is only Endymion for the rest of the book.
Why Endymion is least interesting character? He has no agency in story. He just follows his love and does what his love tells him to do. There is one point when he decides do to something but it is because he thinks his love wants to make that decision. The Love is messiah like character who knows what will happen in future and goes to that future without any doubts. She has destiny she wants to fulfill. So most of the book is told by character who follow another character going on predestined path.
Stories go to predestined ends but this time character in control knows what the end is. There are no surprises for her. Even reader knows where this is going because we get to beginning of Endymion only close to end of book. You might expect book gets exciting at that point. It won’t. It gets disappointing. Without going into spoilers the big event happens “off screen”. It is told to Endymion afterwards. He is not there when it happens.
Hyperion books would have told it from different perspectives when it happened. Not The Rise of Endymion. Makes me wonder what happened to Dan Simmons. He was so good with this on Hyperion books. After first third book drops what made Hyperion books so good. Hyperion had some magical elements but it also had hard science fiction elements. The Rise of Endymion goes full magic dropping hard science fiction elements.
Book is not all bad. What is good is good but there is too little of good. It is disappointing because this story could have been as good as Hyperion books. Even with all magic this introduces. Just tell this story from different points of views like in Hyperion and limit how much this was told from Endymion’s point of view. He isn’t as important as book’s name suggest.
I like idea of telling story from less important character’s point of view. But not like this where the character doesn’t have any agency. During the story he convinces himself to have even less agency. The worst thing is he isn’t even there during big conclusion of the story. It was told to him and then there was long send of to give characters some sort of closure.
When listening Hyperion books I wondered why there is no talks of Hyperion tv series. Now I know. It would be as hated as last season of Game of Thrones if done faithfully to books. But I think it could work if Endymion books wouldn’t be done as faithfully and this book’s story was phased differently and told from other characters’ points of views.