Oh, man. This series. This book!!!! WHAT.
Ancillary Mercy is probably my favorite of the series so far. The first book might overtake it on re-read, just because I’m a sucker for finely structured stories, and Breq’s revenge journey cum search for identity alternated with flashbacks to her time as Justice of Toren was very, very satisfying (you know, once you figured out what the hell was going on). The second book was Breq beginning to come into her own, win people over to her side, by basically being completely awesome. But this one is just so satisfying. It brings to a head Breq’s search for identity now that she’s no longer an AI with thousands of ancillary bodies, but is now an AI living inside one body, acting as captain for her own ship and crew. It puts a pleasing cap on all the stuff Breq stands for, as cheesy as it sounds, empathy, kindness and love being the most important (although that’s never something stated aloud). And by this point, the characters not only know and love each other more, but we as readers do, too, and there were soooo many scenes in here where I was just cackling with glee over clever things said or emotional connections made. SPOILERS Breq and Seivarden CUDDLE and everyone tells Breq they love her basically, without actually saying it, and I CRIED, you guys, when the Ship basically told Breq she loved her as a ship loves a captain and just FRIENDSHIP <3 <3 <3 <3 END SPOILERS.
SPOILERS And don’t even get me started on the confrontations with Anaander Mianaai, both Seivarden’s, and the big one at the end with everybody. Nobody needs a punch to the face more than that cow END SPOILERS.
Leckie also makes the genius decision to bring in two new outside characters, one another ship in the body of an ancillary, who is very sarcastic; and one a very alien alien representative of the fearsome Presger, who has trouble understanding concepts like food and propriety, and is always saying and doing ridiculous things. They both add in needed levity, as well as an alienness that brings a nice new flavor to all the space-traveling.
I recognize on a rational level that this series is not going to be for everyone. It takes too many chances, is much too firm in being itself, and those are two things that nearly always disqualify something or someone from being easily loved by the majority of people. But by god, I’m glad I’m not one of those people. I love this book. I love this series. I love Ann Leckie. And I love the characters that she created. I will continue to push this series on people I know in the hopes that some of them will eventually love it as much as I do.
I know I’m going to have to re-read this series sometime soon, when I can sit down and read them all together, and I can already tell I’m probably going to love it even more when I do.
