Book Review: She Who Became the Sun by Shelly Parker-Chan

 The tale starts in 1345 in ancient China with the second daughter of the Zhu family hunting lizards and crickets to stave off starvation.  Her brother is said to have a great destiny while she has nothing.  Then her father is beaten to death by bandits and her brother gives up his life.  After this she takes her brother's name Zhu Chongba and flees to the nearby monastery.

As Zhu Chongba, he is obliged to hide his gender, but rises partially on his intense desire to rise.  This time at the monastery when the eunuch general of the Yuan destroys it.

Zhu Chongba joins the rebellion with their Prince of Radiance and his Mandate of Heaven against the Yuan dynasty.  He rises rapidly through a series of near miraculous victories and clever ruses.  Eventually Zhu Chongba learns that their desire is a Mandate of Heaven as well.

This is an interesting story.  The setting seems to be China at the end of the Yuan Dynasty, the Mongol dynasty.  The character interactions are fun and in patterns that remind me of folks I knew in Honolulu.  The world building is also interesting.  It draws on Taoism and Buddhism in clear ways.  The prime minister of the rebels has ministers of both the left and right.  Interestingly, the Mandate of Heaven is a visible sign that inheres to individuals with a great destiny rather than being tied to dynasties.  These individuals can also see ghosts.

This story is well worth reading.  Especially if you want stories informed by Chinese history and culture.

Book Review: Winter's Orbit by Everina Maxwell

 The story starts in media res as it were, with our main protagonist, Kiem, Prince Royal of Iskat, facing the Emperor.  This is a situation that usually only occurs when Kiem has caused a minor scandal of some sort, which he did often enough as a student he knows how to handle it.  This meeting isn't for a scandal.  Kiem is to marry Count Jainan nav Adessari of Feria from the planet Thea whose Iskan partner, Prince Taam, died a month ago in an accident.  The Emperor explains that this is essential for a treaty renewal that must happen in only a few months when Kiem challenges her on the marriage.  At this Kiem yields, though he commits himself to being kind and understanding with the presumably grieving Jainan.

The idea is to get through the treaty renewal ceremony without hurting Jainan's feelings and giving him time to heal from his loss.  Things don't go to plan.  It turns out the accident that killed Taam was more of a murder and someone tried to pin the blame on Jainan.  Who ever it is, is also trying to disrupt the treaty renewal for unknown reasons.

Kiem is a fun character, a reformed Bertie Wooster sort, with a very competent secretary, Bel.  Jainan is quieter, more self-controlled, and much more analytical.  Jainan has a doctorate in regolith mining, which was less useful than might be expected given his previous partner was managing a major regolith mining operation.  The relationship between Kiem and Jainan is adorably awkward, especially because their unwillingness to talk openly leads to confusion about what each wants from the relationship.

There is one thing that maybe deserves a content warning.  The story includes scenes of domestic violence, though not between Kiem and Jainan.  Other than that, this is a fun story for folks that enjoy gay space operas.

Book Review: The Unspoken Name by A. K. Larkwood

 Csorwe is our main point of view character.  She is an Oshaarun, they are a race that looks like Orcs from Warcraft.  When the story starts she is the Chosen Bride of the Unspoken One, a chthonic god of death, privation, and prophecy.  She is expected to sacrifice herself in a month when Belthandros Sethennai shows up looking for information about the magical Mcguffin, the Reliquary of Pentrevesse.  He is a wizard from Tlaanthothe.  This race is described as very like the elves from Warcraft.  When Csorwe goes to sacrifice herself she meets Belthandros.  He gives her the choice of leaving with him, rather than being a sacrifice.  This kicks off the first part of the story.

They travel through the gates to a trade hub where Csorwe receives training in weapons and language.  Belthandros continues to search for his Mcguffin.  The plan is to restore Belthandros to his position ruling Tlaanthothe.  Eventually they succeed.  Along the way Csorwe meets Talasseres Charossa.  She doesn't like him.  After a transition the second part of the story begins.

Belthandros has read an academic paper.  He thinks the Mcguffin might be on a dead world, so he sends Csorwe and Talasseres to check it out.  They travel to the dead world and meet the archeological team from the Imperial Quincuriate led by the scholar that wrote the paper Belthandros read.  Csorwe hits it off with one of them a elf woman named Qanwa Shuthmili.  It turns out the Mcguffin is here and a necromancer is trying to get it first, they just need Shuthmili to get it.  From here the situation escalates with a series of high risk plans.

I receive the ebook as part of the Hugo packet because A.K. Larkwood is a nominee for the Astounding Award.  This is an award for the best new writer.  As you might expect this is a really enjoyable story.  Csorwe is straightforward, capable, clever, and sarcastic.  Shuthmili is brilliant, capable, and sweet.  The interplay and affection between them are lovely.  The worldbuilding makes me think that Warcraft is a major source of inspiration.  Having said that the worldbuilding works better here than I've seen in the games, where it is just background to the scenarios.

I've got two criticisms.  The first is that transition from the first section to the second.  The first section wrapped up all the major threads it was dealing with.  This made it feel like a complete novella.  This led to the second section feeling like it should be a separate book.  The issue is the pacing in that second section.  It felt like the fallout of each risky plan led to the next one being immediately created, and with each of the half dozen plus plans the stakes escalated.  This left me tired of the story before the final one actually brought a happy ending.  It would have been nice to have something break up the tension, perhaps a few short scenes of Csorwe and Shuthmili getting to know one another better.

Book Review: Across the Green Grass Fields by Seanan McGuire

 Regan is an intersex girl.  She just wants to be accepted for who she is, a girl that loves horses.  As she and her friends grow up Regan notices that she isn't developing like the other girls.  She asks her parents why and they tell her the truth.  She reveals this to her best friend, who she knows is very judgmental.  When she flees that rejection, she finds a door to the Hooflands and a destiny she doesn't particularly want.

It's a fun read.  The plot is straightforward.  This puts the focus on the characters, particularly Regan, and the worldbuilding.  Throughout Regan is portrayed like any unwilling protagonist might be.

If you like character focused stories or portal fantasies this is an excellent book.

Book Review: "What is Life?" by Addy Pross

In this book Addy Pross presents a theory on the origin of life.  He describes some recent research into the systems chemistry of self-replicating chemicals.  Using this he shows how this chemistry matches the behavior of simple living creatures.

Research into chemical systems indicates that these systems display properties that individual chemicals do not.  The one that matters for Pross’s argument is Dynamic Kinetic Stability (DKS).  DKS is similar to entropic stability of chemicals in that it is the tendency of a system to remain the same.  It differs in that the molecules in the system can all be constantly changing while the overall system maintains the same concentrations of those molecules.  The research demonstrates that some self-replicating RNA does tend to persist in this way.  It also shows that these RNA molecules exhibit other properties normally associated with biology.  Where there are several types the one that replicates better dominates and replaces the worse replicators.  When more than one competes for a single resource eventually one of them will replace its competitors.  Where there are several possible resources different types can dominate.

This is an interesting book.  The question is the origin of life and the evidence provided supports the argument Pross makes.  It is also a short book at just 200 pages.  It probably should have been shorter.  Pross has a tendency to layout familiar points in excruciating detail with multiple illustrations before getting to his point.

It can be bought on Amazon.

Book Review: "The King of Elfland’s Daughter" by Lord Dunsany

This bit of beautiful, lyrical, poetic prose was originally published by Lord Dunsany in 1924.  The plot is quite simple.  The characters are simple as well, mostly filling particular roles.  It couples and contrasts human ways with entirely alien Elf ways. 

The local Parliament of Erl decides it would be good for the town to have a lord that is just a bit magical.  The local lord sends his son Alveric to bring the Princess of Elfland, Lirazel.  He succeeds with the help of a witch.  When the princess is brought back to the human fields the priest has some difficulty identifying an appropriate wedding ceremony and Alveric becomes the Lord of Erl.  They have a son, Orion, and the witch is appointed the nursery maid.  Then her father sends a Rune to return his daughter to Elfland.  The priest’s difficulty is only the first as Lirazel mostly doesn’t adjust to human ways.  Lirazel is returned to Elfland.  Alveric goes on a quest in search of Lirazel and Elfland, abandoning his duties as Lord of Erl.  Orion grows up and spends most of his time in hunting.  Orion catches and kills a unicorn, in a mildly graphic scene.  The members of parliament are satisfied with this level of magic.  Orion, however, wants to hunt more unicorns.  In order to do this he recruits trolls to help manage the dogs.  A troll recruits will o’ the wisps to provide light for hunts during pitch black nights.  The members of parliament are distraught at the town being swamped with magic.  They ask the witch for a spell against magic and are told off.  The King of Elfland uses another Rune to answer Lirazel’s prayers.  This brings Alveric and Orion into Elfland, which incidentally draws the magic, and a little bit of Erl’s fields, back to Elfland. 

I enjoyed this book tremendously for the lovely flowing language and the beautiful otherness of Elfland.  Having said that this isn’t a modern story and it is very much not a swords and sorcery tale.  The plot is simple and lacks twists.  The characters are flat and mostly don’t change.  When they do, it is a transformation into another flat role.  It felt less like a novel and more like a spell calling, “Come away oh human child…”  Some are caught by that beauty while others just aren’t.

Book Review: "Trekonomics" by Manu Saadia

Manu Saadia first encountered Star Trek as a child in Paris.  The utopia it presented caught his imagination then and helped shape his thinking about how the world can be good.  In college he studied economic history and as an adult he sought an accounting of how economics works in Star Trek.  When he didn't find such a book he decided to write one himself.

Manu Saadia divides Star Trek into two sections.  The first part includes the original series and the movies up to Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.  This first part assumes an economic model more like our current experience.  In Star Trek IV that changes when Kirk says the Federation doesn't have money.  The book mostly focuses on the second section because getting rid of money is a much more interesting economic situation.

The book then covers several different parts of the economy.  Chapter one explores getting rid of money.  Chapter two goes into how work works in Star Trek.  Chapter three discusses the replicator and through it how capital works.  Chapter four considers natural limits.  Chapter five gets into the problems of free riding and negative externalities.  Chapter six steps back from Star Trek and gets into the roots of Star Trek in earlier science fiction.  Chapter seven returns to thinking about work and extends that into the way people in the Federation think about everything.  Chapter eight uses the Ferengi to consider how the Federation's economy interacts with capitalism elsewhere in the galaxy.  Chapter nine asks whether we can move towards Star Trek's economic system in the real world.  The book then concludes with a reflection on the meaning of "Live Long and Prosper".

This is an interesting book.  It is one of the best books exploring the problems and concerns of post scarcity.  It also points out the ways we're already approaching post scarcity in several fields.