I’m now at little over halfway through the weekly
installments for The Human Division,
and I thought it would be good to examine my thoughts up to this point.
First, I’m enjoying the episodic format much more than I
expected to. As the week have gone on, I’m
excited to realize that Tuesday is coming, & that I’ll have a new episode
to read. Normally I am a bit
disappointed that I only have one episode, & really want to keep reading.
Second, I’m impressed with Scalzi’s ability to change formats
and styles in the episodes. While there
is a certain tonal similarity to all of his work, he has mixed things up
considerably, with some episodes being dark, some comedic, some political, some
action. It’s been a good mix.
My major complaint is that the story has been a bit too
scattershot up to this point. By
choosing to tell the story through so many characters and settings, I feel like
I am losing depth in any of them. At
this point I’m wondering if the format wouldn’t work better with a smaller story
that would still allow for episodic structure but also provide more character
depth.
