#sievarden

a passionate manifesto

by me, a very newly converted fangirl

Elevator pitch: 

A multi-bodied warship is stripped down to just one body, goes on a revenge mission to kill a nearly-immortal galactic dictator, and spends three books singing ditties, drinking tea, and collecting stray humans(?) that cry a lot.

Characters:

Breq

formerly the very large, very old, very cool Justice of Toren warship

now a warship mind in a human body

sings a lot

very good with the pew pew pew

master of foolhardy plans

could be a he, a she, or neither (see: SHIP) but is definitely not an it (despite previous “see”)

will absolutely knock you out cold with one punch

lets baby lieutenants cry into her collar

extremely protective of said baby lieutenants, to the point of homicide

appreciates a good cup of tea

significant

Sievarden

an idiot

a well-meaning idiot (usually)

emotionally unbalanced

over a thousand years old

can be blindingly loyal

needs to watch her language

good in bed (allegedly)

could benefit from some therapy

Anaander Mianaai

thousands of years old

nearly-immortal galactic dictator

in the middle of an identity crisis

an ethnocentric idiot

has a bad habit of shooting people

could benefit from some therapy

Lieutenant Awn

an angel upon this earth

all-around Good Egg

doting big sister

good people skills

likely very pretty

Too Precious For This World, Too Pure

Lieutenant Tisarwat

seventeen years old

has manic pixie dream girl eyes (see previous point)

the Babiest of baby lieutenants

to be protected At All Costs

puppy-loves like no one’s business

can be unexpectedly terrifying

could also benefit from some therapy

Station

light of my life

the baddest hecker-upper to ever heck up

Mama Bear Cred 4 Lyfe

Kalr Five

snob

but a snob with TASTE

would in another life be called Jeeves

will likely be buried in a glass cabinet when she dies with a cross made out of tea spoons

Citizen Raughd

death is too good for her

Why you should read this book, which is quickly consuming my life:

1. Ladies being awesome - OR ARE THEY? Actually, the majority of the story takes place ostensibly in a language that doesn’t differentiate between genders, and ships don’t really get some of the cues to make those distinctions, so Breq (as the first-person narrator) just calls everyone “she.” It’s a really cool twist on the default male that I very much enjoyed.

2. The characters - There are so many characters with so many relationships and quirks and individual wants AND I CAN’T PROTECT THEM ALL. It’s very stressful. I love it.

3. Found families - Breq starts off the book completely, utterly alone. She used to be a ship with thousands of bodies (one ship mind plugged into emptied human bodies), but those were all destroyed, so it’s just her. And as a ship, as a thing, she’s not used to being considered significant. And then for three books she just keeps collecting people. Humans, maybe-humans, actual aliens, other ships, they all just get caught up in the flypaper of care that is Breq.

4. Humanity - SPEAKING OF BEING HUMAN, there’s a whole really cool, not-snobby prolonged discussion across the trilogy about identity and personhood and worth and humanity and it’s all tied in together because there’s always someone who wants to say that so-and-so isn’t enough to be considered a person or worthy or a human, and it’s much easier to shoot a person when you don’t consider them a person.

5. World-building - So you get to visit all these worlds and the author does a great job and pointing out that literally none of them are monoliths. There are all these tiny distinctions among cultures and practices and behaviors and religions in the same town and then that just multiplies across stations and planets and galaxies. It makes for a dizzying and delightful read.

6. It is a thing that reminds me of other things - Breq has a Costis to her Eugenides (Queen’s Thief series.) There’s well-built SPACE like only the best sci-fis do. There’s deep philosophical scheming like in Mistborn. (But it’s also all its own things AND IS A DEBUT like what the heck)

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