Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

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A lot of characters to follow, three plots, and wondering if or when it will all make sense

A Desolation Called Peace by Arkady Martine

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It took me way longer to really get into A Desolation Called Peace than it did A Memory Called Empire. Part of the problem in A Desolation Called Peace is that there are too many different groups and places that take almost ¾ of the novel to really come together. I get that that is a technique for suspense, but it doesn’t work terribly well here, especially when Mahit’s thread has so little to do with everything else which actually does eventually connect. It feels […]

“Language is not so transparent, but we are sometimes known, even so.”

A Desolation Called Peace by Arkady Martine

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A Memory Called Empire absolutely blew me away, and this book is no different. It continues the first book’s exploration of identify, memory and society, with the addition of a completely alien species and the need to avert total war. So, you know, no pressure, Mahit. “She thought of Eleven Lathe, her poetic model, her hero, writing Dispatches from the Numinous Frontier out alone amongst his aliens, the Ebrekti. Could she do worse? Certainly, but perhaps not much worse—and then, gleeful and bitter, she thought, Fuck you, […]

“Be a mirror”: Twisty political intrigue, spectacular world building, and cultural assimilation

A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine

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From the prologue, this book absolutely blew me away. It’s a twisty political intrigue, with an Aztec-influenced empire. It’s also a meditation on the meaning of empire from a person who is trying to keep her home from being swallowed by it while at the same time being entranced with its literature and language. It’s about how that language controls how we tell stories about ourselves and the world around us. “You’ve said something meaningless.” <Yes,> Yskandr agreed. <When I was ambassador it was my habit […]

Great characters, complicated plot, too much emphasis on poetry as civilization

A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine

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If you like political intrigue in space, then this is the book for you! (I listened to the audio book, so I had to look up all the spellings. I never would’ve gotten Teixcalaanli right!) Mahit Dzmare is a new ambassador from Lsel Station to the Teixcallanli Empire. The previous ambassador, Yskandr Aghavn, is mysteriously dead. When she arrives at Teixcalaan, she is plunged into the mystery surrounding his death, some political machinations from high-level movers and shakers, a favor requested by the Emperor himself, […]

A murder mystery in the heart of a space opera

A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine

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I brought this book home in March 2019.  It was Mysterious Galaxy’s featured speculative fiction hardcover pick for the month.  Over the past year this book kept getting recommended; by fellow Cannonballers, articles, and it is nominated for a Hugo award.  That nomination finally pushed A Memory Called Empire to the top of my TBR. In a normal timeline, I would have torn through this book in a matter of days.  Instead it took a few weeks.  This book pushed all the right buttons; excellent sci-fi world […]

Scenes From a Memory

A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine

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Do you know hat time of the year it is?   Yes, the Hugo nominees are out! And I’ve signed myself up again to read as many of them as possible. Going down the Best Novel list, I have already read Gideon the Ninth – which I reviewed here – and I loved the hell out of it. But now voting is going to be a bit complicated because A Memory Called Empire is another excellent, if tonally different, addition to the shortlist. And I’ll […]



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