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A review by klreeher
Winter's Orbit by Everina Maxwell
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
3.5
I was a little put off by the tagline " Ancillary Justice meets Red, White & Royal Blue", and I don't really think it's an accurate summary. It's some space opera. It's much more towards something like Honor Harrington in terms of the world setting -- reading the scene where Kiem is first called in front of the Emperor reminded me vividly of David Weber's March Upcountry.
That's not to imply it's military sci-fi, but only that that's the kind of world building context we're in, not something as serious as Ancilliary Justice.
All I can say for the Red, White, and Royal Blue reference is that, yeah, this started out as something posted on AO3 first too.
About a third of the way through, I was losing my mind trying to figure out if I'd read this book before, and when I complained to my wife about it, she was like "oh you probably read it on Ao3." Because apparently it was initially posted there. To the author's extreme credit, the published novel version is much better than the original posted online. The pacing is much better, and the world building is much more built out. I found the whole "impact of distance and communication on galactic politics" stuff reminiscing of Left Hand Of Darkness, albeit that may just be because of the snow.
Jainan's characterization and plot line is much more fleshed out -- I enjoyed him a lot more, and he's much less a Dire Woobie Caricature.
I tend to like this tropey pairing a lot -- the slightly dim social butterfly and the socially anxious academic -- and one thing I particularly liked about Kiem in this is how much it's shown that he's just, genuinely interested in people. And kind. Jainan's characterization has a depiction of social anxiety that's not super cringy, which is nice.
I do want another novel of Jainan's home planet and clan politics and such -- would be nice to have Kiem as the fish out of water.
That's not to imply it's military sci-fi, but only that that's the kind of world building context we're in, not something as serious as Ancilliary Justice.
All I can say for the Red, White, and Royal Blue reference is that, yeah, this started out as something posted on AO3 first too.
About a third of the way through, I was losing my mind trying to figure out if I'd read this book before, and when I complained to my wife about it, she was like "oh you probably read it on Ao3." Because apparently it was initially posted there. To the author's extreme credit, the published novel version is much better than the original posted online. The pacing is much better, and the world building is much more built out. I found the whole "impact of distance and communication on galactic politics" stuff reminiscing of Left Hand Of Darkness, albeit that may just be because of the snow.
Jainan's characterization and plot line is much more fleshed out -- I enjoyed him a lot more, and he's much less a Dire Woobie Caricature.
I tend to like this tropey pairing a lot -- the slightly dim social butterfly and the socially anxious academic -- and one thing I particularly liked about Kiem in this is how much it's shown that he's just, genuinely interested in people. And kind. Jainan's characterization has a depiction of social anxiety that's not super cringy, which is nice.
I do want another novel of Jainan's home planet and clan politics and such -- would be nice to have Kiem as the fish out of water.