"Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested." (Francis Bacon)

Saturday, May 07, 2016

Ancillary Sword

TITLE: Ancillary Sword
AUTHOR: Ann Leckie

Book 2 in Leckie's wonderful Ancillary trilogy finds one-time ship AI Breq, formerly the ship Justice of Toren, now confined to a single ancillary body, on Athoek Station by order of the Radch emperor. As Fleet Commander, Breq has been tasked with keeping the station and that sector of space safe while the emperor wars with herself. I'd go into details but my review of the first book, Ancillary Justice, will have to suffice. It's complicated.

At any rate, Breq has agreed to go only because the sister of Lt. Awn, the officer she'd been ordered to kill years ago lives on Atheok Station and protecting Awn's sister is a priority for Breq. But she has issues of her own to contend with, including a young lieutenant assigned to her by the emperor as a spy, a ship already at Atheok Station whose captain is likely concealing something vital, and a situation of potential unrest between the haves and the have-nots living on the station.

There's more political intrigue and less action in this book than the first one, but the climatic scene in the station's garden is quite thrilling. Breq might be no more than an AI, but in many ways, she's amazingly human. I love this series, and as I'm about to start book 3, I wish there was a book 4 and more beyond it.

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