Ancillary Justice

My office, left-center

With the advent of my newly indentured servitude in the dusty and shadowed corridors at the Great Institute of Secret Learning and Ancient Knowledge, I've had plenty of time to catch up on my reading while crammed into the moldy dark of the commuter cattle cars with the rest of the plebeian laborers.

And so, I recently finished Ancillary Justice.

It's the first book by Author Ann Leckie. You might have heard something about it not too long ago. It was making quite a splash in the genre-fiction world, gaining the type of pre-release hype a debut author only dreams about. This is how I heard of it and ended up picking it up.

But for our desert island readers, here is what the back cover synopsis had to say:

"On a remote, icy planet, the soldier known as Breq is drawing closer to completing her quest.

Breq is both more than she seems and less than she was. Years ago, she was the Justice of Toren--a colossal starship with an artificial intelligence linking thousands of corpse soldiers in the service of the Radch, the empire that conquered the galaxy.

An act of treachery has ripped it all away, leaving her with only one fragile human body. And only one purpose--to revenge herself on Anaander Mianaai, many-bodied, near-immortal Lord of the Radch."

Weird, huh? Kind of interesting though, right?

I certainly thought so.

So, maybe somewhat unsurprisingly, the synopsis has the long and short of it. The story is about Breq. Breq is a dead person filled with the last remnant of an AI which was once housed in a massive starship and the hundreds of corpses that made up its crew. Its only living crew members had been its officers. During this time, Breq was known as The Justice of Toren, part of a grand fleet on a continuing mission of annexing planets one by one for the galaxy-spanning empire that built her, all in the service of their nearly omni-present and conquering Emperor Anaander Mianaai. But then something happened--something bad, something blood-soaked--and now Breq is all that is left and she is consumed with a thirst for revenge on the Emperor she once bowed to.

So despite the initial odd edges and ideas, the book is actually a pretty basic set-up when you get right down to it, but also perhaps unsurprisingly, it's those odd edges that really make it stand apart. They are well-written and smart--if maybe somewhat light on the more exciting "action" descriptions, but that's really only a minor complaint. Ancillary Justice is a fun read, stuffed with ideas and coolness, but it moves at a quick pace.

The really interesting part about this book is that it's all written in the First Person. Okay, sure, that's not all that revolutionary at all, actually, except in this case the POV is from that of an AI that used to be a giant starship, and for a large part of the book, also inhabits multiple bodies simultaneously. It's a testament to Leckie's sure hand that the POV jump between the ship and it's many bodies (or Ancillaries... see what she did there with the title? Eh? Eh?) is not only smooth and easy to follow, but feels natural.

Another interesting aspect--very interesting actually--is that, as a result of being a spaceship in a human body, gender is a confusing idea to Breq, and not always readily apparent to her whenever she has to deal with other humans. It's a bit of an issue for her and she often worries if she's guessing right. And what's really great about that is that the default pronoun she uses in the story ends up being "she". Thus, gender is not only a bit opaque for Breq, but for the reader too. And, much like the multiple POV shifts between the same character in its multiple bodies, it feels very natural. In fact, it didn't take long before I didn't notice the lack of "hes" in the book at all. Really, despite Breq's confusion, the gender of the other characters is not only often easily distinguishable, but it quickly becomes apparent that it doesn't really matter.

It's all very well done. Very impressive.

In the end, I really enjoyed the book. The answer to what's going on and what happened to Breq and why she wants her revenge is interesting and fun. Some folks out there might complain that the book turns out to mostly be a prequel for a greater story yet to be told, but I didn't mind that at all. If that tale is ever shared, I will definitely show up for it. All in all, Ancillary Justice is worth the hype and worth the read.

Very recommended.

Buy it, read it,

Jon

Today's Literary News (AKA My Dystopian Thursday Morning)

The Tweets just kept coming today, one thunder crack after another signaling doom and gloom for the publishing industry. It was like peering through Twitter's looking glass and seeing into the Big 6's dystopian future.

First there was this:

From @GalleyCat

Adult mass paperback sales plunged 54 percent in September while eBook sales rose 100 percent: http://mbist.ro/srAdhg

I've been anticipating numbers like that, but it's still surprising to see them in print.


And then there was this spooky bit:

By 2016, e-book revenues from portable devices will reach nearly $10 billion and bookstores that don’t merge digital and traditional commerce may face extinction

Now I'm imagining the pages of old books blowing through empty strip mall parking lots.

And finally, there was this piece of holiday joy: How many Christmases until we see a whole new industry?

Which is neatly summarized by these two quotes:

John Makinson, the global CEO of Penguin, was quoted in a Reuters article saying that the post-Christmas period in publishing coming up is “tougher to predict” than “any time that I can remember”. Asked what he sees in the immediate future, Makinson replied “dark clouds.”

The pace of the digital switchover is quickening. That will reduce the cash available to invest in building a new ecosystem at the same time the urgency of coming up with new answers is rising. It’s enough to make a sober executive, even at a very large, successful, smart, and innovative company, admit to serious concern for the industry’s future 

But in good Hollywood fashion, we'll end with a ray of hope striking out from deep within the gloom:

IndieBound Reader is an ebook reading application [... that] allows book lovers to read ebooks purchased at their local, independent bookstores.

Thank goodness, right? I've been wondering how much longer it would be before the independents began to get their act together.

Oh, and an interesting closing note: The Bookcase in Wayzata (a real nice bookstore, BTW) is where Claudia and I went to see Leanna Renee Hieber, Friend of The Scribblerati.

Aren't you glad I shared?

Interesting Bits

Interesting Bits – my thoughts on a few interwebby things I found interesting

Foreign Rights: How Authors Tap a Rich Vein of Royalties

I really can't disagree with anything the author of this article says. I can, however, disagree with the underlying subtext, which appears to be: here's something else those silly self-pubbers don't get. Clearly, the author of this article did not explicitly say that, but for the sake of this post I would like to focus on that particular notion.

This isn't the first time I've seen defenders of the mainstream publishing status quo make the argument that those who self publish are missing out on all the advantages that come along with mainstream publishing. I can't really disagree with that either. Mainstream publishers bring many advantages to their clients, including foreign rights. The problem with that particular argument is that there is no guarantee that anyone will be interested in obtaining foreign rights for your book. So while one can claim that foreign rights sales are an advantage to the author who chooses to mainstream published, it's only an advantage if it's a realized.

(I could belabor this point, especially in regards to marketing, but that's another post.)

The other thought-provoking bit about this article is that I don't see why foreign rights sales and self-publishing need to be mutually exclusive. The article states that navigating those murky legal waters can be terribly challenging for the typical author and again I can't disagree with that. But whoever said that you can't self publish AND have an agent who understands these things?

I've mentioned before that I'm pretty close to finishing my novel, To Kill the Goddess. Once I finish I will start querying agents just like everyone else. The difference between me and those who are only looking to mainstream publish will be that I will be keeping an eye open for an agent who is interested in representing me even though I may choose to self publish.

There are of course a whole host of questions around how that particular arrangement might work, but I've caught wind of these relationships here and there on the interwebs and I think that sort of thing just might be the wave of the future.

Hmmm… That sounds like another post too…

Goodbye Cruel World - BLACK HEART Writing Retreat

Doesn't that sound like heaven?

After having been unemployed for 2 1/2 months this summer I totally know what Holly is talking about. I can't possibly convey how much of an incredible experience that was for me to have that block of uninterrupted time. It's just like she says in the article, you really do become immersed in your story. You think about it all the time and you even find yourself dreaming about it.

But could I really go away for a month and do nothing but write? I kinda don't think so.
One of the nice things about being at home was that I didn't have to be away from the lovely @mplstravelkitty. Actually, after being by myself all day I was like a big puppy dog by the time she got home from work. I was all like, “How are you doing? How was your day? Guess what I made for dinner?”

The other reason I don't think I can go away for a whole month is that I found that I needed to get away from the writing on a fairly regular basis. Don't misunderstand me, I wrote every day, but after writing from 8 AM to 2 or 3 PM my brain was kind of mush. I needed the downtime to recharge for the next day. Besides, what better way is there to recharge then spend some time with your honey?