What to Read Next: It's A Big Big Universe

Issue #339, featuring Edna Ferber and James S.A. Corey

Jupiter Seen From Europa by Ron Miller. Miller is an American artist who specializes in astronomical art. His work has even been featured on postage stamps.

Happy Friday, readers!

It’s hard to believe, but here in Colorado we’re only a few weeks away from school starting. Summer break is waning (even if the temperatures aren’t) and, as always, it went so much faster than seemed possible just a couple of short months ago.

My summer reading has been stellar and it’s been fun to narrow in on my Pulitzer reading list. I like having a general reading direction, while also leaving room for going along with my whims. Today’s books are in both of those buckets.

The first is 1925’s Pulitzer winner for fiction; the second is actually a nine-book series that I finished after dipping in and out of for the last year. Let’s get to it!

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So Big by Edna Ferber

As I’ve mentioned before, the early years of the Pulitzer Prize featured quite a few names that are no longer recognizable and plenty of titles that aren’t even in print anymore. Edna Ferber’s So Big (1924) sits in a funny middle ground where it’s not exactly well-known, but is still regularly found on bookstore shelves.

Set in the rural outskirts of Chicago, protagonist Selina Dejong comes of age and transforms from an eager and innocent young woman into a confident wife and mother who grabs life by the horns.

The story does two rather different things. First, it shows the harsh realities of rural life and how that existence can steal the life out of you (literally). In contrast to that, it also shows how a person can grow into their circumstances and learn to seek out all that life has to offer.

In the midst of those themes, Ferber also explored meaning on an existential level, and the costs of ambition in terms of life sacrificed for the money or power that might be gained.

While reading, I was repeatedly reminded of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, which is one of my all-time favorite books. So Big didn’t reach that level of brilliance, but it had some of the same life-giving vibes. It was a powerful book and among my favorites of the prize’s first decade. One hundred years later, it remains well worth reading.

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The Expanse by James S.A. Corey

Between 2011 and 2021, James S.A. Corey — pen name for writing pals Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck — published nine books, totaling ~5,000 pages. Called The Expanse, the series explores the idea of what would happen when humans start venturing beyond our own atmosphere to colonize the moon, Mars, and eventually the rest of the solar system.

Our main characters form the crew of the Rocinante, a freighter-turned-fighter spaceship. Holden, the fearless leader, is kind of what you expect in a sci-fi lead. Brash, bold, loves to be a hero. Miller is our friendly neighborhood detective who’s trying to solve some space mysteries. Those two steal the show in the first book, and then added into the mix are Naomi, Alex, Amos, and Bobbie (one of my favorite characters in any series ever).

With each successive book, the world of the Expanse grows wider and more imaginative. There are one or two jaw-dropping plot points in each book where I thought, “How did they think of that?!”

Corey imagines intergalatic battles, the dramatic politics of colonization, space survival, long-extinct aliens, and so much more. It’s really everything you’d want in a space opera.

There’s not much point in telling you about each book individually because they all build on what has previously happened. This is not a series you can jump into halfway through. If you read the first two or three and get hooked, reading the rest is well worth it. I read all nine in three different chunks over the course of about a year and loved it.

The Expanse arc as a whole was five stars and I’m certain the series will go down as one of the great, epic sci-fi stories ever penned.

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Thanks so much for reading. I deeply appreciate your time and inbox space.

-Jeremy