I got hooked on The Expanse TV Series when Sci-Fy Channel first aired the show.  The story was quick paced, lots of unexpected things happen, and near-future setting is quite believable.  As seasons rolled out, a coworker kept recommending I read the books from which the TV show was based.  My sister gave me the first five (of currently eight) books in the series at Christmas.  The books are written by two gentlemen (Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck) under the pen name James S.A. Corey.

The book takes place in a future where humanity has spread about the solar system, but has broken into three factions: Earth, Mars, and the [asteroid] Belt.  Mars has switched from an emphasis on terraforming to building a military.  [Perhaps Mars found Jesus].  Both exploit the mineral resources of the Belt, and treat the Belter’s a second-class.  I was originally all for the Belters, but their leadership was a bit thuggish, and I realized no side had a moral high ground.

A discovery on the Saturn Moon of Phoebe triggers a series of event were an unknown group is trying to lure Earth and Mars into war as cover for a vicious science experiment in the belt.  The main characters are a group of survivors from of an attack on a mining vessel.  As they try to figure out what happen they intersect with a detective working a missing persons case that explodes into one of the biggest events in the history of the solar system.  And things get really weird my dear reader.

For a man looking for differences, the TV show very closely matched the book.  In fact the only two differences I noticed were related to Miller, a detective on Ceres.  Most significantly, after Miller kills a truly evil person, the main character Holden reacts much more negatively in the book.  Miller’s relationship with another estranged cop is also more developed.  The TV show had a lot of extra involving politics on Earth and tension with Mars, but this first book takes place in The Belt.  My coworker assures me there will be more differences in the future.  The book does a better job of explaining why the material found on Phoebe was sent to our solar system in the first place.

You can pick up used Leviathan Wakes hardcopies for cheap.  For some reason the next two books are super rare (upwards of $400 each), but paperbacks are available for those who settle.  With the fourth book, rational economics return.