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jasonfurman 's review for:
The Stars Are Legion
by Kameron Hurley
Just about the slimiest book I have ever read. And the most decayed. Billed as an all female space opera, The Stars Are Legion is set in a largely organic world of large spaceships or worlds with tentacles, arteries, organs and the like. The ships are led by human women who fight using cephalopod guns, travel on organic transports, and coexist with creatures swarming all around the worlds. Women give birth to all manner of things--terrible monstrous creatures, organic spare parts for the worlds and their equipment, more rarely other humans, and even more rarely new worlds themselves. Occasionally a bit of metal shows through somewhere, a refraction of the strangeness of the overall setting and a reminder that something deeper may be beneath it all.
The setting is an age old battle between two separate sets of worlds, both dying and decaying and fighting over the limited scraps to keep themselves going a little longer. Another world, the Mokshi, is moving in a different direction, seeking to escape, and is the subject of invasions and intrigues from the two sets of dying worlds.
None of this world-building is heavy handed, all of it is unveiled slowly over the course of a story that is told in the alternate first person by Zan, an amnesiac who led assaults on Mokshi, and Jayd, the manipulative daughter of the Lord of one of the warring worlds. Despite some dragging in the middle, the book is deftly plotted with the mysteries of suppressed memories unfolding over the course of the action.
Overall one might be tempted to read something into the all female cast or the scent of dystopia that hangs over the entire novel, but I think that would be a mistake. The Stars Are Legion is primarily a fascinating work of imagination with a generally good plot and vividly drawn, interesting characters. I would recommend it.
The setting is an age old battle between two separate sets of worlds, both dying and decaying and fighting over the limited scraps to keep themselves going a little longer. Another world, the Mokshi, is moving in a different direction, seeking to escape, and is the subject of invasions and intrigues from the two sets of dying worlds.
None of this world-building is heavy handed, all of it is unveiled slowly over the course of a story that is told in the alternate first person by Zan, an amnesiac who led assaults on Mokshi, and Jayd, the manipulative daughter of the Lord of one of the warring worlds. Despite some dragging in the middle, the book is deftly plotted with the mysteries of suppressed memories unfolding over the course of the action.
Overall one might be tempted to read something into the all female cast or the scent of dystopia that hangs over the entire novel, but I think that would be a mistake. The Stars Are Legion is primarily a fascinating work of imagination with a generally good plot and vividly drawn, interesting characters. I would recommend it.