Ancillary Justice a story about an AI in a human body. Or sometimes its a story about an AI in thousands of bodies and a huge spaceship. It is always about a "her", and it is often confusing. Having read the interviews at the back of the book, I was surprised to see that the primary influence for the World of Ancillary Justice was the Roman Empire. References to tea, tamarind, lungis, and brown skinned people made me first think of South India. Plus the subcontinent lends a lot of interesting parallels with Justice's unconventional views on gender, what with there being an entire third sex in India that the west is largely unaware of.
The big draw to Justice is its protagonist's alien perspective. "Breq" (as she is occasionally known, but has many names throughout) sounds and behaves like the Terminator, seeing her world with a ruthless clinical detachment and anankastic eye for detail. But she is still in a human body with emotions, uncertainty, and sense of humour that the computer brain often lets slip. On top of that is her genderless, timeless culture, with its obsession with propriety and tea. And further than that, she is missing a huge portion of her mind and memories, making her understanding of the world even weirder still. It takes a while to get used to all this flavoured writing, but it fortunately doesn't get in the way of the more tense or dramatic story moments. Justice is actually a simple revenge plot, but it is seen through a stain glassed window.
My only real issue with the book is the lack of other characters. Breq is a compelling lead, but outside of her travelling companion and nemesis, there aren't many people I connected with. Whether it was a product of the writing style, or an overemphasis on Breq, I found myself not caring too much about the other officers and supporting characters Breq encounters, which is a problem because they are the motivation for a lot of what Breq does. I was also hoping for a lot more aliens. They certainly exist in Justice, but only on the periphery and are rarely described in detail.
Despite that, Justice does a lot right by the standards of good sci-fi writing, and I will almost certainly be picking up the sequels at some point. If you are at all intrigued by the idea of a vengeful supercomputer becoming lobotomised when all but one of its hardware interfaces (read: people) is blown to smithereens, definitely pick this up.
Splendid Cups of Tea for Everyone
Ancillary Justice a story about an AI in a human body. Or sometimes its a story about an AI in thousands of bodies and a huge spaceship. It is always about a "her", and it is often confusing. Having read the interviews at the back of the book, I was surprised to see that the primary influence for the World of Ancillary Justice was the Roman Empire. References to tea, tamarind, lungis, and brown skinned people made me first think of South India. Plus the subcontinent lends a lot of interesting parallels with Justice's unconventional views on gender, what with there being an entire third sex in India that the west is largely unaware of.
The big draw to Justice is its protagonist's alien perspective. "Breq" (as she is occasionally known, but has many names throughout) sounds and behaves like the Terminator, seeing her world with a ruthless clinical detachment and anankastic eye for detail. But she is still in a human body with emotions, uncertainty, and sense of humour that the computer brain often lets slip. On top of that is her genderless, timeless culture, with its obsession with propriety and tea. And further than that, she is missing a huge portion of her mind and memories, making her understanding of the world even weirder still. It takes a while to get used to all this flavoured writing, but it fortunately doesn't get in the way of the more tense or dramatic story moments. Justice is actually a simple revenge plot, but it is seen through a stain glassed window.
My only real issue with the book is the lack of other characters. Breq is a compelling lead, but outside of her travelling companion and nemesis, there aren't many people I connected with. Whether it was a product of the writing style, or an overemphasis on Breq, I found myself not caring too much about the other officers and supporting characters Breq encounters, which is a problem because they are the motivation for a lot of what Breq does. I was also hoping for a lot more aliens. They certainly exist in Justice, but only on the periphery and are rarely described in detail.
Despite that, Justice does a lot right by the standards of good sci-fi writing, and I will almost certainly be picking up the sequels at some point. If you are at all intrigued by the idea of a vengeful supercomputer becoming lobotomised when all but one of its hardware interfaces (read: people) is blown to smithereens, definitely pick this up.