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Provenance
by Ann Leckie
By the author of the excellent Ancillary trilogy, this novel is set in the same universe on one of the many far-flung planets that can be reached by "gates" (which are like wormholes). There is no one like the central character of those books in this one, and in fact the only representative of the Radch empire is a reluctant ambassador to the alien species called Geck, and that person has only a minor role.
Like the Ancillary books, this is solid, super-interesting science fiction. The Geck are fascinating, and we almost don't see enough of them (in fact, we barely see them at all) — but they're not the stars of this show. Instead, the story centers on a young woman, whose age is not specified but who sometimes seems like an adolescent. She's clever and smart, and she's hatched a risky scheme to impress her mother, an important person with an inherited title that she can pass on to any of her children. Ingray doesn't expect to be named the heir, but just once she'd like to surpass her brother in their mother's view.
The scheme goes slightly awry at the very start of the book, and the results — as well as the unexpected involvement of the Geck — become the story. It's a good one. I liked the characters, and I liked the thread that runs throughout about the importance of "vestiges" to the people of Ingray's planet, called Hwae. Vestiges are relics or antiques that have meaning through connection to important people or events; some of them might be just a souvenir, like a signed ticket or postcard. The role of vestiges is peripheral and yet some vestiges form the very core of Ingray's daring scheme.
One thing I especially enjoyed was the use of language in two different situations. The one is the speech of the Geck ambassador, who speaks through a mech (a robot) that resembles neither Geck nor humans. One particular long speech she gives reveals (and yet doesn't, not enough) the relationship her species has with humans who share the Geck homeworld. In the other situation, some threatening military officers from another planet are speaking in their own language, which Ingray does not understand. Ingray has an implant or app that translates it, but poorly. So she's hearing a translation of what the officers say to one another, but the grammar is rudimentary, and it can be challenging to figure out what they might mean — but Ingray is clever, and even the confusing translation is helpful in a near-death circumstance.
.
Like the Ancillary books, this is solid, super-interesting science fiction. The Geck are fascinating, and we almost don't see enough of them (in fact, we barely see them at all) — but they're not the stars of this show. Instead, the story centers on a young woman, whose age is not specified but who sometimes seems like an adolescent. She's clever and smart, and she's hatched a risky scheme to impress her mother, an important person with an inherited title that she can pass on to any of her children. Ingray doesn't expect to be named the heir, but just once she'd like to surpass her brother in their mother's view.
The scheme goes slightly awry at the very start of the book, and the results — as well as the unexpected involvement of the Geck — become the story. It's a good one. I liked the characters, and I liked the thread that runs throughout about the importance of "vestiges" to the people of Ingray's planet, called Hwae. Vestiges are relics or antiques that have meaning through connection to important people or events; some of them might be just a souvenir, like a signed ticket or postcard. The role of vestiges is peripheral and yet some vestiges form the very core of Ingray's daring scheme.
One thing I especially enjoyed was the use of language in two different situations. The one is the speech of the Geck ambassador, who speaks through a mech (a robot) that resembles neither Geck nor humans. One particular long speech she gives reveals (and yet doesn't, not enough) the relationship her species has with humans who share the Geck homeworld. In the other situation, some threatening military officers from another planet are speaking in their own language, which Ingray does not understand. Ingray has an implant or app that translates it, but poorly. So she's hearing a translation of what the officers say to one another, but the grammar is rudimentary, and it can be challenging to figure out what they might mean — but Ingray is clever, and even the confusing translation is helpful in a near-death circumstance.
.