I was *so* looking forward to this after reading the previous titles in the series, but I couldn't get into it, mostly because the beginning was so confusing--like most people, a long time has passed since I read the last one, and I don't remember all of the characters. Also, the dialogue-heavy format made it really hard to follow. I was sad to have to set this one aside!

Wow. This series has been absolutely mind blowing and Only Human does not disappoint. Actually, I am a little sad that it is over. I like the style of writing and the use of files as the medium for the narrative. It keeps the pace moving without being bogged down by too much detail. The addition of the two timelines was also fun. The parallels between the story and what is happening in our world right now really hit home for me, as a citizen of this world and as a social worker. The audiobook for Waking Gods was really something special and I am looking forward to listening to Only Human when it comes out. Read this series!

Full review will go live on my blog two weeks before the release date.

Excellent conclusion to an excellent trilogy. Unlike most series the books progress from a straightforward plot to a philosophical meditation. First rate intelligent science fiction.

This is a wonderfully entertaining series! I’m giving it 4 out of 5 partly because I’m stingy with 5 star reviews and partly because I listened to the audiobook of book 2 and it was so good that going back to the written word was a bit disappointing. In this final installment, Neuvel’s linguistics background is in evidence in the language of the Ekt, the alien species who slaughtered millions of humans in book 2. Eva, Rose, and Vincent have spent 9 years on Esat Ekt and are now back on Earth where they must face the consequences of the decisions they made before they left.

Only Human by Sylvain Neuvel
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The final book in the trilogy!

This one's a hard one to review only because it bucks expectations. Maybe only mine, but still.

Did I want answers and a big robot battle? Yes. Did I get answers and a big robot battle? Absolutely.

The direction of the storytelling will probably take you for a wild loop, however. It did for me. The cliffhanger had all my sights on the alien homeworld (or it's war-staging area) and I'm totally into the epistolary nature of these novels, so now I've got to reconcile myself to the fact that humanity is in WAY OVER ITS HEAD.

Derp. Fast forward another 10 years.

The aliens don't have their crap together. Haven't for a while. Oh, sure, they're technologically advanced and can still vaporize cities and teleport and do these nifty perfect atomic clones, but they're a pretty damn good mirror to our own messed-up selves. You know, US/Them crap about genetics. Purebloods and democracy skewed in favor of said Purebloods. Like I said, very familiar.

And our MCs live in this world for a decade, feeling the weight of the aliens' guilt and embarrassment until it all goes pear-shaped and we spend the rest of the novel back on Earth.

The characters really carry this novel, as they did the previous ones. Our fantastic rock-em-sock-em robot bash and the two battlers turned the scene into some really really tragic, heartwarming and rage-filled. The father/daughter dynamic was pretty brilliant.

I may have shed a few tears. The buildup was intense.

But the end? I really want to talk about the end but that's a spoiler too much. Suffice to say, I'm both conflicted and satisfied at the same time. Some pretty awesome humor and a lot of shame for being a member of this human race.

But then, what should we expect with a title that evokes a shrug? Oh, we're Only Human. Well, no excuses are going to cut this. You go, Rosa. :)

I'm already getting nostalgic. Action and pathos for the win. :)

Pub date: May 2018
3.5 I don't know why this was a slog for me. It was interesting to hear about what happened to Eva, Rose and Vincent, and what happens to the world after the robots leave, but I think the interview style of those stories put a barrier between me and the characters, which left me feel less invested. I'm sure it's just me, since I know my colleague will love it, as she did the last one. It could be the more I think about it, the better it will fare; if that happens I'll update this review. The whole series is definitely worth reading.

It's often said that the only thing that will end political strife on our planet is an alien invasion. Even Bill Clinton repeated that cliché. "Think of how all the difference among people on earth would seem small if we felt threatened by a space invader. Everybody gets together and makes nice."

That's not how things work out in Only Human, the third (and final?) book in Sylvain Neuvel's Themis Files series.

In the first book, Sleeping Giants, physicist Rose Franklin discovers pieces of a giant robot buried all around the planet and gathers them up to see what will happen when she puts them all together. In the sequel, Waking Gods, the original creators of the robot Themis return to Earth to attempt to fix the mistakes they made the last time they were here. But they accidentally take Rose and our other protagonists with them when they go home.

Now Rose, Vincent (linguist and Themis pilot,) and Eva ( Vincent's daughter) have returned home in Themis after living peacefully on the alien home planet for the past ten years. They naively expect to return to living normal, human life. But things have changed. The fear of a potential alien return has brought humanity's worst qualities to the surface. The U.S. has managed to reactivate a broken robots and have used its strength to align most of the world's countries into an uneasy, forced alliance. A test to determine genetic features thought to be dangerous has resulted in massive concentration camps and the threat of genocide. The world has degenerated into chaos and fascism. It's a pretty bad scene. In spite of President Clinton's predictions, proof of alien life has not brought humanity together. But now that our heroes have returned (and brought their own all-powerful robot with them,) maybe they can put things right.

Just like the first two books, Only Human is told through a series of transcripts, interviews, and news reports, rather than a straight narrative. If you read Robopocalypse or World War Z, you get the idea. This time though, it seems like Neuvel want to tell a cautionary tale. The commentary on current political events is very thinly veiled. Only Human isn't quite as fun as the earlier books, but it's still a fitting conclusion to the trilogy.

Only Human was a great finale to The Themis Files. I was really anticipating this novel, and it did not disappoint. It was great seeing the characters ten years into the future as they made their way back to Earth. The interaction/conflict between Vincent and Eva was at times true to life, if you live with a teenager. I have always enjoyed the author’s writing style and it works well in Only Human.

My only criticism is I would have liked Neuvel to have spent more time describing the life and people of Esat Ekt. We only catch glimpse from the journals of Vincent, Rose, and Eva. I had a lot of questions about their time on the strange planet that are glossed over.

It was a great read, and I would recommend it to my advanced reading students.

Thank you for the advanced copy.

Thanks to Netgalley & Neuvel for the ability to screen this title.

I think I had a logarithmic star rating. over the course of the read: 4*-3*-4*

Themis file #3. What a trip we have been on. In the first novel, I had some issues with the total file construct. It was novel but it wore on me over time. The second book really had a good blend of elements and the balance of the world and it's ultimate showdown (if one could call it that) was well put together. With the third and perhaps final installment we are given the archetype of files/interviews but it reads far more normal than anecdotal files from vol1. Let that be worth what it is worth, I'm not terribly sure if it plays into or out of the overall flow from volume to volume.

Pros or cons first... Let's hit my sticking points.

What this volume does produce is a deep interpersonal relationship building (or destroying) story. As we know I have issues with characters who do not grow properly and Vincent in the early parts of this book really drove me nuts. I'm a father and as such, I reflect what would I do in a lot of his situations. I won't spoil the off-world elements but I feel that if a near decade of time rolls by we all change far more than less--especially if we are on another planet. I didn't see him change but his reasoning was a fairly large plot element so either it had to be, or there was just not enough other plot elements in the imagination to drive the levers forward to the outcome Neuvel wanted.

My other sticking point is while they have this decade of development there just doesn't seem to be much of it. A scientist who can't learn a language, a linguist who barely gets a language, and again a near 10 years and I just don't feel anyone but Eva develops. Again maybe in some ways, this was necessary but it feels like such deeply lost opportunity that I find it really hard to relate.

Relationship and growth plot devices aside we have a lot of intelligence in here. The geopolitical climate of Earth in absence has turned south in a big way. Governments full of the power hungry and a scared population creates populism that we can almost extrapolate from our current day affairs. Vincent has this diatribe on patriotism I'll excise once the book is published that I read like 10x for it's dead on nature. This is where I know Neuvel has a really keen eye on how systems operate (which is why I get irked when we don't see it consistently.) Interpersonal discussions between teams within the robots showcase so much humanity and how fast we can slip down a slope we potentially won't recover from.

We are children and like children with big toys, we like to bang them together. What's mine is mine, what's yours is mine. Luckily we do have some intelligence, compassion, empathy, a bit of sympathy, and maybe with that, the world will find its way. I'm certainly not going to spoil it for you. The build-up and culmination of this chaortic moment in time play out very well. I couldn't have guessed it and am glad to see how everything resolved. Fun times!

As I pause to re-read--I ponder. This book could have realistically been split into two books. One would have been just off-world and then the followup on return. Or maybe just a few foreshadows of files interspersed. The more I reflect on what happens off-world and how shallow it plays out it could have had a dedicated moment there where it was deeper and more meaningful. Ah well. A boy with an imagination can dream.

Oh.. and I'll always have a sweet spot for Mr. Burns. I'd invite him to lunch any day of the week to hear one of his stories!

It's a quality conclusion to the series and there's a crack in the door to the universe which has a lot of room for exploration in the future. I like where Neuvel's mind wanders and since there are other projects in the works I look forward to where his mind travels next.

I absolutely loved this trilogy! Fantastic conclusion to an amazing story! From the moment I started Sleeping Giants (#1), I was hooked!! This was a very satisfying ending for this super imaginative and cleverly written trilogy.

I received a free ARC of this book from the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for my honest opinion

The Themis Files trilogy is an outlier, as it seems to get better from book to book (I’m looking at you, Hunger Games). Only Human is the best of the bunch. It has extreme heart, and it unlocks a wider world for the reader to explore. Engrossing, funny, and warm, the Themis Files trilogy is one that even the novice sci-fi fan can enjoy.

I can't believe we're already at the end of such a thunderous trilogy. The Themis Files swept me off my feet from the first page of book one, and kept me begging for more until the very end. Only Human is a fantastic finale to an already strong series, and while I'm sad to see it end, it was definitely the epic conclusion the Themis Files deserved.

Once again, nine years have passed between this book and the last. While I found this temporal jump unsettling when reading Waking Gods, it was even more shocking when reading Only Human because of just how much had changed: humanity has lost its mind. The robot our motley crew defeated at the end of the last book has been taken over by the US, who have been using to, well, take over the world. Just as Rose and Vincent predicted, with an unbeatable robot in the hands of a single government, the world is falling to its knees. To top it all off, the discovery of alien DNA in the population has led to widespread segregation across the planet, including work camps and executions. Countries are using the genetic code to crack down on their undesirables - a thinly veiled allegory to what could happen to us if we allowed our genetic differences to divide us. Sound familiar?

And while the Earth has been growing more insane, Rose, Vincent, Eva and General Govender have been trying to adapt to life on the Alien world of Esat Ekt. Here the author demonstrates a fantastic job of worldbuilding, as he creates a massive society so different from ours. It reads almost like a thought experiment, seeing what would happen to a society so afraid of stepping on its own toes that it never accomplishes anything. It was also an interesting change having two different time periods running concurrently through the book: life on Esat Ekt alternating with life back on earth, after the team returns.

I absolutely loved the character building. Eva and Vincent's relationship grew perfectly in this last installment. It was fantastic seeing them try to learn to live as a family, see them butt heads, see them end up on opposing sides. Eva has to be my favorite character here: while I miss Kara, she makes up for her departure with a familiar snark. Seeing Vincent wanting nothing more than to go home, while Eva put down roots, made me relate to Eva even more: third culture kids, children of expats, we recognize each other everywhere.

If I did have some qualms, it would be with how certain parts felt a little rushed. I realize the author was trying to show how slowly things moved on Esat Ekt, but at times it felt too slow: they lived on that planet for almost a decade, but it read like the course of a year. And the ending was a little... I don't think Deus Ex Machina has ever been such an accurate term. It was a little too perfect, to the point I could easily imagine that Vincent or Rose died and imagined the entire thing. But maybe it's because I'm not used to happy endings!

Rose's growth was incredible; Vincent's mental anguish was palpable; Eva's determination and will made her a force to be reconned with. Other characters grew a lot over the past 18 years of this series, as well, and I was happy to see them almost redeemed at the end. All in all, a fitting conclusion to a fantastic series. Not to mention it was impossible to put down. I sure hope Neuvel has more planned for us in the future, despite the trilogy ending!

Oh my gosh I actually shed a tear when I got to the end of Only Human – possibly because of what happened in it but mostly because THIS IS THE END. What an amazing, entertaining, creative and brilliantly written trilogy.

This series has had it all, amazing characters, heart stopping action, emotional trauma, and GIANT ROBOTS. Did I mention the GIANT ROBOTS?

So Only Human completes the tale, here we find some of our friends living on an alien planet until OOPS nope they are home. But what the heck have they arrived back into? The world is in turmoil, we have all gone mad and goodness knows whether or not there is any way back for the human race. It doesn’t help that the alien race are not exactly the greatest role models…

ANYWAY Eva is cross with her Dad Vincent and that may cause one or two issues. I thought I was going to miss someone but actually Katherine arrived and so I didn’t as much as I might have. I still haven’t forgiven the author though, just in case he thinks he’s off the hook, I said Katherine helped. Because she was funny and dangerous and brought some new life to our eclectic and highly captivating cast. In fact this may be one of the best yet for those hilariously ironic and clever little dialogue pieces that just make you smile.

I’m not giving away any further plot details, I’m trying not to spoil too much for anyone that hasn’t even started these yet – what I will do is say that this was the perfect end to what has been a perfect trilogy for this reader, the writing is simply rock and roll and it’s a bit of a rock and roll story from start to finish – but with an emotional depth that grips you and, honestly drives you a bit mad. In a great reading way.

So if I haven’t sold it to you yet, can I just remind you – GIANT ROBOTS. Plus damn fine plotting, damn fine characters and a damn fine finish . A trilogy to die for.

Highly Recommended.

Thank you to folks at Netgalley for giving me access to a review copy of this book . First I have to tell you that I love this trilogy and I was immersed in this world as soon as I read “sleeping Giants” so I came into this book with a biased opinion. I won’t give any spoilers or a complex review until the official date of this book but I can say that I was satisfied with the ending , not completely happy but satisfied. Hopefully you guys all get a chance to read this books , let me know what you think of this book .

Not as enjoyable as the first two books. But, it was still a decent send off for one of my favorite series.

I have followed the Themis Files from the beginning and like the whole scenario of the Ekt coming to our world. Vincent and Eva are back in planet Earth in Them is and things are not as they left them nine years ago. The U.S. Is using Lapetus for world domination. Can Themis bring back peace?

Wow! Sylvain Neuvel has done it again! I was so excited when I was approved for this ARC because I absolutely LOVE these books and Only Human is just as magnificent as the first two. I started reading it earlier this afternoon and finished it at a little after 1am; I couldn't sleep without knowing how it ended!

I'll post a longer review closer to the release date, I need a minute to process all my thoughts on this one. Just know that it is an incredible end to an amazing trilogy!

**Many thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC!! All opinions are my own.**