Cannonball Read 11

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Muscle and Blood and Skin and Bones

Ancillary Sword, Ancillary Mercy by Ann Leckie

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Assyria soon discovered a painful truth: empires are like Ponzi schemes: financial frauds in which previous investors are paid returns out of new investors’ deposits. The costs of holding imperial territory can only be underwritten by loot and tribute extracted by constant new conquests; empires must continue to expand if they are not to collapse.” – Paul Kriwaczek, Babylon: Mesopotamia and the Birth Of Civilization  At the end of Ancillary Justice, Anaander Mianaai was openly at war with herself. One faction of the Lord of the Radch wanted to stop expanding and stop making ancillaries. The other faction wanted to […]

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7/6/2018 's CBR10 Review No:29 |

Becoming more human

Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie

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3.5 stars. I’m still not totally sure what I think about the second book in the Imperial Radch series. I think I’ve been putting off my review for it because I’m uncertain about it. On one hand, it was immensely readable. On the other hand, not much seemed to happen. The first book was pretty plot driven with Breq out for revenge and lots of flashbacks. Ancillary Sword is fully based in the present and takes things slowly. SPOILER WARNING: If you haven’t read book 1, you’ll probably want to stop reading here. Breq is in command of a ship […]

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2/3/2018 's CBR10 Review No:16 |

Ancillary Space Opera

Ancillary Justice and Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie

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Target: Ann Leckie’s Ancillary Justice (Imperial Radch #1) and Ancillary Sword (Imperial Radch #2) Profile: Science Fiction, Space Opera The Imperial Radch series is a relatively simple little space opera, in the classic sense of the term.  Spanning hundreds, if not thousands of years, multiple star systems and a variety of cultural influences, it’s a series firmly rooted in the tropes of its genre.  While Ancillary Justice does wonderful things with those ideas and concepts, building a surprisingly compelling setting and cast, the series as a whole is somewhat underwhelming.  Lacking the bombast of James S. A. Corey’s The Expanse […]

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3/30/2015 's CBR7 Review No:4 |

Must-Read Sci-Fi

Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie

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One of my favorite books of 2014 was Ann Leckie’s Ancillary Justice. It’s a sci-fi novel that won pretty much every prize awarded for that genre and features one of the coolest protagonists I’ve ever encountered in literature: Breq, an “ancillary” or corpse soldier who has been untethered from the collective consciousness of her ship but retains amazing physical and cognitive powers. As one character states in book 2, “[Breq] is pretty fucking badass.” In book 1, Breq was on a mission to reach the supreme ruler of the Radch, Anaander Mianaai; in doing so, we learn how it was […]

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1/4/2015 's CBR7 Review No:3 |

Come for the spaceship protagonist, stay for the emooootions.

Ancillary Sword (Imperial Radch, #2) by Ann Leckie

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Breq is smart. Breq is capable and knowledgable. Breq is thoughtful, empathetic. Breq yearns for social justice. Breq mourns for lost love. Breq loves to sing, but has a bit of a temper. Breq used to be a spaceship. Well, if we’re going to get technical, Breq was the artificial intelligence who inhabited the spaceship Justice of Toren, and also thousands of ancillary human bodies (whose previous inhabitants had, um, vacated the premises). Now she only inhabits one, and almost everyone she has ever known is dead. Ancillary Sword is the second book in the Imperial Radch series. Breq is […]

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12/31/2014 's CBR6 Review No:97 |


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