Won the 2020 Hugo for Best Novel.
Ambassador Mahit Dzmare is posted far from her mining station home, to the Empire's glorious capital. Yet when she arrives, she discovers her predecessor was murdered. But no-one will admit his death wasn't accidental - and she might be next.
Mahit must navigate the capital's deadly halls of power, while hunting the killer. She must also somehow stop the Empire from annexing her fiercely independent colony. As she sinks deeper into this seductive yet unfamiliar culture, Mahit engages in intrigues of her own. For she's hiding an extraordinary technological secret, one which might destroy her station and its way of life.Or it might save them all from annihilation.
a fun read with beautiful, full worldbuilding and compelling politicking, and plenty of space opera to keep you from putting it down. for me, I didn't find it very striking as a plot or character book, though there's plenty of both, and didn't get much out of it as an ideas book (compared to other SF I've read that plays with self, empire, and language)
that said, I do love books that know how to interact with language! linguist-me was left satisfied!
This was not the normal type of sci-fi story I read and I didn't think I would enjoy it at first. But the more I read, the more I fell in love with this story. It's very rich, deep, symbolic, and full of meaning. The characters are deep and very interesting, and the elaborately detailed world/universe of the story is incredibly thorough and stimulating. This story had a great pace and evolved from a story of planetary politics to political inrigue and thriller-type pace. I finish this book feeling like I have experienced something profound and yet sad that it's over - and yet I've already downloaded the sequel! Arkady Martine is masterful and a bit like the Stephen King of the genre. Maybe my top book of the year!
A galactic-spanning empire, where the people are more important than the galaxy-spanning. Superb, personal, space opera.
5 stelle
Blurbed by Ann Leckie and reminiscent of her. A brilliantly written story with an rich cast of very human characters, in the throes of a series of events that are at once in human and also very banal – superbly demonstrates how the shifting of empires is something that happens at a very human scale, not by demigods or titans, but by people.
An example of space opera in the vein of Leckie, and Dune. That was one aspect of it that I could have done with a little more of, though that's probably a mood and taste thing. The world building is done well, and weaves the epic and prosaic, the exotic and banal, deftly, and with grace. There's plenty around the edges to make you feel that things extend much further than shown.
… wirklich schön anzusehen. Die Unterschiede auch in der Betrachtung der Welt, zwischen denen, die auf einer Weltraumstation aufgewachsen sind und denen, die auf DEM Planeten aufwuchsen.
Gute Charakterisierungen, tolles Namenssystem, das mir das Merken von Namen sehr erleichtert. Alle auf dem Planeten heißen $Zahl $Substantiv also bspw „Neunzehn Breitaxt“, „Sechs Vektor“, „Drei Seegras“. Die Zahlen haben manchmal auch Verbindungen zum Charakter oder Job der jeweiligen Personen — so viel einfacher zu merken für mich als irgendwelche random Fantasynamen wie „Ft‘anr Lobdart“ oder sowas.
Ich mochte auch die Poesie-Obsession der Planetenbewohnenden, die ihre ganze Kultur formt. Hier hatte ich allerdings desöfteren das Gefühl, dass die Übersetzung ihr nicht gerecht wurde.
Auch wunderte es mich sehr, dass die Menschen in dem Buch alle Männer oder Frauen waren und sehr sehr viel generisches Maskulinum genutzt wurde.
Daher werde ich den 2. Band auf Englisch lesen zum Vergleich.
An sich ist das 1. …
… wirklich schön anzusehen. Die Unterschiede auch in der Betrachtung der Welt, zwischen denen, die auf einer Weltraumstation aufgewachsen sind und denen, die auf DEM Planeten aufwuchsen.
Gute Charakterisierungen, tolles Namenssystem, das mir das Merken von Namen sehr erleichtert. Alle auf dem Planeten heißen $Zahl $Substantiv also bspw „Neunzehn Breitaxt“, „Sechs Vektor“, „Drei Seegras“. Die Zahlen haben manchmal auch Verbindungen zum Charakter oder Job der jeweiligen Personen — so viel einfacher zu merken für mich als irgendwelche random Fantasynamen wie „Ft‘anr Lobdart“ oder sowas.
Ich mochte auch die Poesie-Obsession der Planetenbewohnenden, die ihre ganze Kultur formt. Hier hatte ich allerdings desöfteren das Gefühl, dass die Übersetzung ihr nicht gerecht wurde.
Auch wunderte es mich sehr, dass die Menschen in dem Buch alle Männer oder Frauen waren und sehr sehr viel generisches Maskulinum genutzt wurde.
Daher werde ich den 2. Band auf Englisch lesen zum Vergleich.
An sich ist das 1. Buch aber abgeschlossen und kann alleinstehend gelesen werden.
Was ein bisschen kurz kam, als seiendes Thema nur angeschnitten aber nicht ganz ausgespielt worden: Der Charakter der Stadt. Diese ist AI gesteuert und wird von Ministerien beeinflusst, scheint aber auch das Potential zu haben, rogue zu gehen. Mal sehen ob das im Band zwei anklingt.
Kurzum: Echt spannend, manchmal n bisschen langatmig aber überlebbar und richtig gutes Worldbuilding. Zudem ein paar „Queers“, wobei Heterosexualität nicht die Norm zu sein scheint und daher als Beschreibung vermutlich L/G/B besser passen würde.
The slow-burning love-child of House of Cards and The Expanse
4 stelle
If I'm honest I first picked up this book because of the image on the cover but once I picked up the book I remained interested and the aesthetic remained pretty cool throughout and gave me vibes from the "Coup" and "The Resistance" board games.
The book really focuses in a lot on the political manoeuvrers of the central character Mahit and her allies (and enemies). There's a fair amount of political theatre and description of Mahit's internal monologue which reminded me of House of Cards. The world building meant that the plot does take a little while to really get going but once it does get going, there's a fair amount to be excited about. The last few chapters were pretty gripping and more reminiscent of something like The Expanse.
There is a lot of description of the culture and language used in the Teixcalaanli Empire which for me, …
If I'm honest I first picked up this book because of the image on the cover but once I picked up the book I remained interested and the aesthetic remained pretty cool throughout and gave me vibes from the "Coup" and "The Resistance" board games.
The book really focuses in a lot on the political manoeuvrers of the central character Mahit and her allies (and enemies). There's a fair amount of political theatre and description of Mahit's internal monologue which reminded me of House of Cards. The world building meant that the plot does take a little while to really get going but once it does get going, there's a fair amount to be excited about. The last few chapters were pretty gripping and more reminiscent of something like The Expanse.
There is a lot of description of the culture and language used in the Teixcalaanli Empire which for me, really teetered on the precipice between detailed world-building and self-absorbed. I'm not really in to poetry - which is a huge part of Teixcalaanli culture so maybe that explains why I didn't really get on board with certain aspects of the world building but the descriptions of the technology, city, space vessels etc were well done.
Overall a solid, captivating sci-fi read if you can get on board with some of the slower descriptive parts of the book.
