RogerBW's Blog

Ancillary Sword, Ann Leckie 25 November 2014

Sequel to Ancillary Justice. Breq, now a Fleet Captain, travels to a backwater world to help assure its survival in the civil war.

This second volume doesn't try to be the same as its predecessor; it's a much smaller story than Ancillary Justice, taking place over a few weeks and mostly in a single star system, but the quality has not dropped from that first book. (After the disappointments of second-volumes Two Serpents Rise and Moon Over Soho I'm happier about this than is perhaps reasonable.)

There's even less in the way of Big Space Battles than last time. But there's much more about the Radch society; in particular, since Breq is now a member of it rather than an outsider, she and we are able to see clearly the significant problems within it which were not apparent to her in her previous lives.

Seivarden spends most of her time off-stage this time round, but Breq is not short of broken people with whom she has to work. A middle section is perhaps a little heavy-handed about coerced consent, and I was disappointed not to get more of the Translator, but I was probably supposed to be. The reference to everyone with female pronouns is continued, and people who have problems with that or who can't tell characters apart without gender cueing are not going to enjoy this book.

I didn't reread the first book before starting this one, and there isn't a huge amount of catching-up material, but I didn't feel lost; even so, I wouldn't recommend this as an entry point to the series. Apart from anything else, one would be depriving oneself of the gradual realisation of the situation that the first book provides. This book is probably easier to read, though, since Breq no longer has the constant multiple viewpoints of her previous life, and the story is told in order.

This is not explodey spaceship milsf; it's much closer to recent Bujold and comedies of manners, though with rather more of an edge since the underlying society is rather more rotten. It's a much quieter book than the first, but it's the quiet of a pot that's about to boil over.

To be followed by Ancillary Mercy.

[Buy this at Amazon] and help support the blog. ["As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases."]

See also:
Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie

Previous in series: Ancillary Justice [re-review] | Series: Imperial Radch | Next in series: Ancillary Mercy

  1. Posted by Chris Suslowicz at 05:01pm on 02 December 2014

    Also very much worth reading is the two part "She Commands Me And I Obey" story available on the Strange Horizons website. This includes some backstory involving the Itran Tetrarchy that is well worth having.

    I'm enjoying the series immensely.

    Chris.

  2. Posted by RogerBW at 05:05pm on 02 December 2014

    Thanks! Links are http://strangehorizons.com/2014/20141110/commands-f.shtml and http://strangehorizons.com/2014/20141117/commands-f.shtml for anyone else who wants to catch up.

    I've not been wildly enthused about most new SF lately, but this series is one of the few things that's really worked supremely well for me.

Comments on this post are now closed. If you have particular grounds for adding a late comment, comment on a more recent post quoting the URL of this one.

Search
Archive
Tags 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000s 2010s 3d printing action advent of code aeronautics aikakirja anecdote animation anime army astronomy audio audio tech aviation base commerce battletech beer boardgaming book of the week bookmonth chain of command children chris chronicle church of no redeeming virtues cold war comedy computing contemporary cornish smuggler cosmic encounter coup covid-19 crime cthulhu eternal cycling dead of winter doctor who documentary drama driving drone ecchi economics en garde espionage essen 2015 essen 2016 essen 2017 essen 2018 essen 2019 essen 2022 essen 2023 existential risk falklands war fandom fanfic fantasy feminism film firefly first world war flash point flight simulation food garmin drive gazebo genesys geocaching geodata gin gkp gurps gurps 101 gus harpoon historical history horror hugo 2014 hugo 2015 hugo 2016 hugo 2017 hugo 2018 hugo 2019 hugo 2020 hugo 2022 hugo-nebula reread in brief avoid instrumented life javascript julian simpson julie enfield kickstarter kotlin learn to play leaving earth linux liquor lovecraftiana lua mecha men with beards mpd museum music mystery naval noir non-fiction one for the brow opera parody paul temple perl perl weekly challenge photography podcast politics postscript powers prediction privacy project woolsack pyracantha python quantum rail raku ranting raspberry pi reading reading boardgames social real life restaurant reviews romance rpg a day rpgs ruby rust scala science fiction scythe second world war security shipwreck simutrans smartphone south atlantic war squaddies stationery steampunk stuarts suburbia superheroes suspense television the resistance the weekly challenge thirsty meeples thriller tin soldier torg toys trailers travel type 26 type 31 type 45 vietnam war war wargaming weather wives and sweethearts writing about writing x-wing young adult
Special All book reviews, All film reviews
Produced by aikakirja v0.1