Caught up on the show now. Read through book 6, I'll see if I can blaze through books 7 and 8 in the month left before 9 drops.
Overall, the show is a net improvement over the books if you ask me, though it does insert
a lot more drama between crew members. It takes full advantage of having been written later by planning out the story arcs together better. Drummer is arguably the dopest character in the whole thing. TV Ashford is about 10 times cooler than I remember book Ashford being. I was totally surprised by who they got to play him but it worked out perfectly. I was also surprised at the casting choice for Murtry but that also worked surprisingly well.
Season 5 (and book 5) are pretty much just...