Reviews with content warning for War - Shards of Earth

Reviews tagging 'War'

Shards of Earth by Adrian Tchaikovsky

8 reviews

cb1984's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

Excellent start to a series. The crew felt like a close damily straight away. I absolutely loved the various different sentient species involved. Some were pretty off the wall but all worked really well.

The threat of the architects was interesting too, mainly due to the unknowable motive behind their attacks. And the setup for the rest of the series was good fun.

I did think that some of the characters apart from Idris and Solace could have done with having a bit more of a journey, but to be honest that could easily happen in future books.

Overall, excellent characters, good plot, interesting universe, intriguing setup. Will read the others.

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bethmalena's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark inspiring mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

When it comes to space pirates, I think I like Becky Chambers’ ragtag shipmates better. Still, I ended up enjoying the characters and the action, though the pacing and arc seemed off at the end. I’m super intrigued by the big baddies (the Architects) who felt really fresh to me, so I’ll read the rest of the series.

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bluejayreads's review against another edition

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3.75

I generally prefer fantasy over scifi, especially scifi as hard as Adrian Tchaikovksy tends to write. But I picked this up because I enjoyed his novella Elder Race and was willing to try something else. This is fairly hard scifi, but it had solid and likeable characters, a strong plot that manages to have our protagonists hopping from planet to planet without ever feeling contrived or like a fetch quest, and some absolutely amazing worldbuilding concepts. So many of the ideas were unique and tied into a great story. The amazing worldbuilding manages to make the whole story feel intricate and vivid, even though the plot isn't particularly complex. Adrian Tchaikovsky is a great writer and I enjoyed the read. I'm on the fence about reading book two - not becuase I think it will be bad or that there isn't room for a sequel, but becuase sequels are usually not quite as good as book one and while I liked this book, I wouldn't say I love it or call it a favorite. But again, this book was good, so I'm not ruling it out.

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theaceofpages's review against another edition

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mysterious tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

There are a lot of characters, species, races and complexities in this book. I appreciate how much effort must have gone into it. It did take a while to sort everything out in my head though (nd to be completely honest, I'm not 100% sure that I've got it all in place). The story definitely got more interesting as it went on, in pat because I started to understand the setting and characters better and in part because the action picked up. I'll definitely keep an eye out for the next book in my library

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iono's review

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adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

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mar's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0

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magis1105's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

A very interesting battle.
After 50 years of war that humans barely made it out of, the new world still is fighting the same political issues. Worse still they still defend the right to practice slavery using lame excuses that those who are modified have a duty- they are not considered human enough.
Division on made-up moral or "naturalist" standards plays a big role in the social construct. And it's very hard to get over that.

The characters are fighting their own monsters- be it discrimination, or post-traumatic stress from the past war among a few other personal demons.
We have a found family setting, the personal growth, I was deeply moved by the characters and their circumstances- definitely have good fighting and [political intrigues. The con side - the romance or attempts at it were meh.
But overall I really liked it. I will continue the series as soon as possible.

Full review can be found https://bunkerofbooks05.wixsite.com/bunker-of-books/post/shards-of-earth

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aulandez's review against another edition

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adventurous lighthearted mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This is my fourth Tchaikovsky/Czajkowski book, and he just keeps impressing me. Children of Time and Children of Ruin were big-ideas sci-fi on the level of Kim Stanley Robinson, Asimov, Herbert, LeGuin, Butler, and for me he quickly entered the same category as those pillars of the genre. Doors of Eden elegantly walked a line between big ideas and character-focused adventure, and I loved the audiobook read by Sophie Alfred (Ace!) of Doctor Who fame. His books don’t exist first and foremost to explore a big idea, being a compelling story is what’s most important to him, but there are ideas he’s consistently interested in exploring, like the nature of biological and social evolution, and whether human beings can meaningfully direct the nature of our ecological, anatomical, psychological, or social future. Everything I’ve read so far, and his two big series Shadows of the Apt and Echoes of the Fall all seem to orbit around these questions, all while his capacity as an author (particularly in terms of character and atmosphere) just keeps increasing with every successive work. While I feel like he has a lot in common with the classics of big-idea sci-fi, and there are lots of echoes of Asimov, Herbert, and KSR, he has less in common with the current crop of hard sci-if authors than he does with the inheritors of LeGuin & Butler’s feminist-infused social sci-fi tradition like Ann Leckie and Arkady Martine, and Shards of Earth reminds me of nothing more than Ancillary Justice.

Shards of Earth is the most fun of his books that I’ve read, and while it doesn’t compare to Children of X in terms of scale or philosophical originality, it shoots past anything I’ve read from him in terms of character and weirdness. Clam alien gods! Lobster-cockroach people who graft LCD screens to their bodies and rent the space out for banner ads. Attitudinal robot archeologists. Queer space amazons who watch pirated k-dramas. Disabled space pirates with killer adaptive-assistive technology. And are the Castigar tunicates or annelids (tube-worms) that shape their shells to imitate human bodies? How much do you wanna bet Adrian has a saltwater aquarium?

I’ve noticed lots of complaints about the book’s failure to live up to their muscular standards of what “hard” sci-fi should be, and it think those readers missed the point of the book. Tchaikovsky pumps books out at a pace that Brandon Sanderson should find threatening, and like Sanderson he seems to mix up his length and vibe in an effort to keep himself engaged and manage the flow of publications. I don’t really think Children of X is hard sci-fi, but its certainly muscular, cerebral, and dense. I think Shards of Earth is meant to be the first in a series of lighter fare, owing more to Star Wars or Miles Vorkosigan than Dune, action-adventure focused, but not skimping on weird sci-fi ideas or political intrigue, ultimately a fun romp for author and audience. As a short, fast, fun action adventure that also provides a bit of meat, it’s great. My biggest complaint is the lack of romance, which Tchaikovsky really seemed to be trying to create space for but didn’t seem to know how to handle. In the end he seems have confirmed particular relationship will move forwards in future books, but it came off lifeless, and that particular relationship really undermines the character development of the characters involved, while he leaves off another that had a lot more narrative potential. I almost wonder if he was hesitant to pick up on the threads of queerness he’s seeded through the book, but maybe he’ll weave something I’ll appreciate more in future books. If it’s meant to be hard sci-fi ala Peter Hamilton or Alastair Reynolds, it’s definitely a failure, starting with the fact that it’s consistently fun to read!

I’ll be eagerly awaiting the next in the series, and despite my intentions to avoid author-bingeing this year, the next book I’m picking up is definitely one of the stack of Tchaikovsky’s I haven’t read yet.

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