I would call this Scalzi’s dumbest book to date. That doesn’t mean what you think it means. I mean it’s just lacking in big or methodical ideas. There’s a share of science, but not as much as I would have liked (how do you grow an organic nuclear reactor?) but its more like spitballing and hand-waving and less like some hard “what could be” you’d find from Asimov or Heinlein.

Usually Scalzi takes on some interesting “what if” subjects, like politics and trade routes, metaphysical identity issues, and so on. Kaiju is, Scalzi self-admits, a book written to try and shake off all the terribility of 2020 and beyond.

It’s so short I hadn’t had time to form an opinion on it before I was done. Honestly, it’s probably the book of his I like the least. Scalzi admits he wrote it in a four-week haze in March of 2021 after failing on another novel. But that’s fine. Scalzi’s therapeutic exhales are better than some author’s shouts.