Reading Wednesday
Mar. 14th, 2018 02:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
brigdhWhat did you just finish?
Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie. Okay, yes, everyone was right: this book is amazing.
In a fairly typical space-opera future, the Radchaai Empire has for many eons had a merry old time expanding its territory by conquering other planets and forcibly incorporating them into its empire. Radchaai culture is intensely militaristic and hierarchical; soldiers are expected to follow orders, even if those orders are clearly, undeniably wrong, even if those orders are treasonous. I think you can see how this might lead to problems. But it's okay, because they're bringing civilization to the poor savages, see! The survivors get to become Radchaai citizens, and of course everyone wants to be a Rachaai citizen! There's a lot of Roman Empire parallels, is what I'm saying.
Breq was formerly a two-thousand year old AI running a warship used in these annexations of planets; currently, she's stuck in a single human body (I say 'she', but that's not entirely accurate. Radchaai culture doesn't mark gender at all, and Leckie expresses this by using the English word 'she' for every character, regardless of physical appearance or behavior). The experience of living in a single body, subject to a human's physical limitations, doomed to the inevitable of death, is quite the adjustment for Breq. She's also very, very angry at Radchaai imperialism, and has decided to dedicate her life to assassinating the Radchaai emperor. This is absolutely, incontrovertibly a suicide mission, since the emperor exists in thousands of identical cloned bodies, all constantly linked via wireless-internet-esque implants in their brains, living scattered throughout the empire. Even if Breq should make it past security and outwit the emperor long enough to kill one body, or – even more unlikely – two or three, the emperor as a whole will live on undisturbed, and Breq will certainly be caught and executed. This is not really a logical plan, but Breq is SO ANGRY. SO ANGRY, you guys. She of course denies this because she is an AI and repeatedly insists that emotions are unimportant to her, but nonetheless her feelings are Many and Huge.
A major part of the plot of Ancillary Justice is simply finding out what happened to make Breq so angry as to want to throw away her life on this revenge plot. It's not revealed until late in the book, so I don't want to spoil it, but it certainly resonates with certain events in the real-world history of colonialism. Relatedly, a major theme of the book is the question of identity. The line between Rachaai citizens and non-citizens is stark; a non-citizen can be killed, tortured, or abused with impunity, while citizens have a long list of highly respected rights, even though the same individual can move from one category to another in a short span of time. As an AI, Breq is not considered a person; the former humans who served on her ship considered her opinions and feelings no more than you'd consider if your iPhone really wants to play that Spotify playlist for the thousandth time in a row. Seivarden, who becomes Breq's companion, is a former Radchaai military officer who was accidentally frozen and forgotten for a thousand years before being thawed out; she has no living family or even descendants, no current job skills, and despite Radchaai culture priding itself on being ancient and unchanging, can barely understand the language modern people speak. She is everything that the Radchaai claim to revere, yet is lost and floundering, turning to drugs when she's unable to find a place she fits. Even the emperor herself: what does it actually mean to exist simultaneously in thousands of bodies, each with slightly different experiences, slightly different perceptions? What happens to the metaphor of "mixed mind" when there are literally multiple minds involved?
I think the reason it took me so long to read this book is because a lot of reviews and recommendations don't actually mention what it's about. They say that the narrator is an AI, they describe the thing about using 'she' for everyone, but neither of those are the driving engine of Ancillary Justice. To be fair, it is a hard plot to summarize, as books centered around "keep reading to find out what the characters already know!" always are. Still, I'm going to give it a shot. Ancillary Justice is a thriller of conspiracies and immoral orders that must be obeyed; it's a critique of colonialism and other ways of turning people into things; but most of all, it's a mystery about who broke Breq and how.
ALSO IT'S SO GOOD YOU GUYS!
Strange Survivors: How Organisms Attack and Defend in the Game of Life by One R. Pagan. I love books about weird biology. Whether it's about fungi that can turn ants into zombies, how lobsters have sex, or the resurgence of bedbugs, I eat that sort of thing up with a spoon. I just adore collecting gross trivia and fascinating tidbits about animals, plants, and all the other forms of life on Earth.
Strange Survivors is an excellent example of this genre I've just invented, this time focusing on how predators predate and how prey escapes. Each chapter is themed around a particular method: producing or detecting electricity, toxins and venoms, speed (less cheetahs and falcons and more the nanoseconds it takes a jellyfish to sting or the bullet-like force delivered by a mantis shrimp as it smashes a shell), and cooperation (such as slime molds banding together to form a larger organism or bees killing much larger hornets by swarming them). Pagan delivers a huge array of excellently weird biology. I don't want to turn this review into a long list of examples, so I'll restrain myself to just one, my favorite new fact: did you know that there is a genus of spiders that spit their webs at their victims, and the webs themselves contain venom!?!? If you, like me, think spitting spiders armed with sticky-venom-nets is a super cool fact, Strange Survivors is the book for you.
I do have some minor critiques. It's a fairly short book (170 pages of text), made shorter by the fact that Pagan chooses to spend the first two chapters on the basics of evolution and DNA. These chapters are well-written, but I think most of the potential audience for a book like this already has a general understanding of those topics and just wants to get to the weird biology facts. Certainly I did! Pagan also has perhaps a bit too much fondness for exclamation points, but overall I enjoyed his enthusiastic and conversational style.
I read this as an ARC via NetGalley.
What are you currently reading?
Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie. YES I'M NOW ADDICTED TO THIS SERIES.
Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie. Okay, yes, everyone was right: this book is amazing.
In a fairly typical space-opera future, the Radchaai Empire has for many eons had a merry old time expanding its territory by conquering other planets and forcibly incorporating them into its empire. Radchaai culture is intensely militaristic and hierarchical; soldiers are expected to follow orders, even if those orders are clearly, undeniably wrong, even if those orders are treasonous. I think you can see how this might lead to problems. But it's okay, because they're bringing civilization to the poor savages, see! The survivors get to become Radchaai citizens, and of course everyone wants to be a Rachaai citizen! There's a lot of Roman Empire parallels, is what I'm saying.
Breq was formerly a two-thousand year old AI running a warship used in these annexations of planets; currently, she's stuck in a single human body (I say 'she', but that's not entirely accurate. Radchaai culture doesn't mark gender at all, and Leckie expresses this by using the English word 'she' for every character, regardless of physical appearance or behavior). The experience of living in a single body, subject to a human's physical limitations, doomed to the inevitable of death, is quite the adjustment for Breq. She's also very, very angry at Radchaai imperialism, and has decided to dedicate her life to assassinating the Radchaai emperor. This is absolutely, incontrovertibly a suicide mission, since the emperor exists in thousands of identical cloned bodies, all constantly linked via wireless-internet-esque implants in their brains, living scattered throughout the empire. Even if Breq should make it past security and outwit the emperor long enough to kill one body, or – even more unlikely – two or three, the emperor as a whole will live on undisturbed, and Breq will certainly be caught and executed. This is not really a logical plan, but Breq is SO ANGRY. SO ANGRY, you guys. She of course denies this because she is an AI and repeatedly insists that emotions are unimportant to her, but nonetheless her feelings are Many and Huge.
A major part of the plot of Ancillary Justice is simply finding out what happened to make Breq so angry as to want to throw away her life on this revenge plot. It's not revealed until late in the book, so I don't want to spoil it, but it certainly resonates with certain events in the real-world history of colonialism. Relatedly, a major theme of the book is the question of identity. The line between Rachaai citizens and non-citizens is stark; a non-citizen can be killed, tortured, or abused with impunity, while citizens have a long list of highly respected rights, even though the same individual can move from one category to another in a short span of time. As an AI, Breq is not considered a person; the former humans who served on her ship considered her opinions and feelings no more than you'd consider if your iPhone really wants to play that Spotify playlist for the thousandth time in a row. Seivarden, who becomes Breq's companion, is a former Radchaai military officer who was accidentally frozen and forgotten for a thousand years before being thawed out; she has no living family or even descendants, no current job skills, and despite Radchaai culture priding itself on being ancient and unchanging, can barely understand the language modern people speak. She is everything that the Radchaai claim to revere, yet is lost and floundering, turning to drugs when she's unable to find a place she fits. Even the emperor herself: what does it actually mean to exist simultaneously in thousands of bodies, each with slightly different experiences, slightly different perceptions? What happens to the metaphor of "mixed mind" when there are literally multiple minds involved?
I think the reason it took me so long to read this book is because a lot of reviews and recommendations don't actually mention what it's about. They say that the narrator is an AI, they describe the thing about using 'she' for everyone, but neither of those are the driving engine of Ancillary Justice. To be fair, it is a hard plot to summarize, as books centered around "keep reading to find out what the characters already know!" always are. Still, I'm going to give it a shot. Ancillary Justice is a thriller of conspiracies and immoral orders that must be obeyed; it's a critique of colonialism and other ways of turning people into things; but most of all, it's a mystery about who broke Breq and how.
ALSO IT'S SO GOOD YOU GUYS!
Strange Survivors: How Organisms Attack and Defend in the Game of Life by One R. Pagan. I love books about weird biology. Whether it's about fungi that can turn ants into zombies, how lobsters have sex, or the resurgence of bedbugs, I eat that sort of thing up with a spoon. I just adore collecting gross trivia and fascinating tidbits about animals, plants, and all the other forms of life on Earth.
Strange Survivors is an excellent example of this genre I've just invented, this time focusing on how predators predate and how prey escapes. Each chapter is themed around a particular method: producing or detecting electricity, toxins and venoms, speed (less cheetahs and falcons and more the nanoseconds it takes a jellyfish to sting or the bullet-like force delivered by a mantis shrimp as it smashes a shell), and cooperation (such as slime molds banding together to form a larger organism or bees killing much larger hornets by swarming them). Pagan delivers a huge array of excellently weird biology. I don't want to turn this review into a long list of examples, so I'll restrain myself to just one, my favorite new fact: did you know that there is a genus of spiders that spit their webs at their victims, and the webs themselves contain venom!?!? If you, like me, think spitting spiders armed with sticky-venom-nets is a super cool fact, Strange Survivors is the book for you.
I do have some minor critiques. It's a fairly short book (170 pages of text), made shorter by the fact that Pagan chooses to spend the first two chapters on the basics of evolution and DNA. These chapters are well-written, but I think most of the potential audience for a book like this already has a general understanding of those topics and just wants to get to the weird biology facts. Certainly I did! Pagan also has perhaps a bit too much fondness for exclamation points, but overall I enjoyed his enthusiastic and conversational style.
I read this as an ARC via NetGalley.
What are you currently reading?
Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie. YES I'M NOW ADDICTED TO THIS SERIES.
no subject
Date: 2018-03-15 01:11 am (UTC)I did one of my two favorite high school science projects on cellular slime mold. It still makes me happy.
did you know that there is a genus of spiders that spit their webs at their victims, and the webs themselves contain venom!?!?
I did not know that; that's delightful. I just found out last night about the Iberian ribbed newt, which can puncture you with the sharp poisoned tips of its own extruded ribs.
no subject
Date: 2018-03-25 12:27 am (UTC)