A Desolation Called Peace (Teixcalaan, 2)

I read the first one, Empire, and found it a satisfying read. A completely different perspective on a science fiction novel at least for me. Up there with stranger in a strange land, left hand of darkness and several of Bank’s books. This is just as satisfying.

Great book, fascinating universe, thought-provoking, exciting, highly relevant to our time, SO worthy of the praise it's getting. This is the second book of the great Teixcalaan duology; best to read A Memory Called Empire, first; it sets up the series.

Really just a lovely, beautiful, novel. The interplay between Mahit and Three Seagrass is very sweet and painful, I’m sad I won’t get to see more of them! I have some weird feelings about how the Fleet/military are handled, but it’s fun to think in a world where the empire works like it’s supposed to, even when it’s an imperialist mess. Idk it’s a good book! I hope the future stuff has more trans ppl in it (that’s a hope from me, not a criticism of this novel)

Loved "A Memory..." and liked not loved this one. Two issues, in summary: - while interesting and the heart of this book, the internal thought process descriptions of the various characters was frequently excessive, making the story plodding and distracted, at least until 3/4 of the way thru. The narrative would have been fine with 30% less. - the treatment of the 11 year old was not credible. There was hardly any difference between the youth's treatment and the adult's, as if humanoids of the future don't grow in wisdom and sophistication after their teens. Good story, if slow most of the way, and still enjoy following these characters. Worth the read, just don't expect lightening to strike twice...

Like A Memory Called Empire, this is an intelligent and subtle book. If you love an author who can only be understood by readers who think, then Arkady Martine is for you. Read the dedication and the epigraphs. They help set the context for the story. The second epigraph explains the title (also, perhaps, the title of the previous book). It is the well-known quote attributed to Calgacus by Tacitus, "To ravage, to slaughter, to usurp under false titles—this they name empire; and where they make a desert, they call it peace." The Latin word here translated as "desert" is "solitudinem", which is Martine's title becomes "desolation". The main characters of A Desolation Called Peace are Mahit Dzmare, Three Seagrass, and Eight Antidote. (That is a slight spoiler, because Three Seagrass doesn't become an important part of the story until 14% of the way through the book. Thus in the beginning I was left wondering if she would join us. She does!) Mahit and Three Seagrass were of course main characters of A Memory Called Empire. Eight Antidote, now Emperor Nineteen Adze's heir, was a minor character in the previous book, but becomes an important point-of-view character in this one. The novel has an unusual structure. It is a multiple point-of-view story. The main POV characters are the three just named, but POV sometimes switches to minor characters. Now, multiple POV is not unusual in science fiction. I think I first noticed it in William Gibson's Cyberspace trilogy (but I'm sure he wasn't the first to use it -- he just made it conspicuous). In Gibson's books and many other works of science fiction, each chapter is told from the POV of one character, and the focus character rotates among several characters -- as many as five. This can be confusing, as the story may not be told in linear order. There may be a Rashomon-like effect of seeing the same events from different POVs. In A Desolation Called Peace, narration switches among many characters, but not by chapter. Each chapter is divided into short sections, each section told from one POV. (It is possible that A Memory Called Empire also had this structure, and that I didn't notice it.) This sounds confusing, but it really isn't. In fact, by allowing Martine to tell her story in linear order, it makes it easier to follow a far-flung tale. Everything that happens in one chapter happens at (roughly) the same time. Generally Eight Antidote tells us of events in the Teixcalaanli capital while Three Seagrass and Mahit tell of us events out on the military front in space. I have to speak of the story in generalities to avoid spoilers. It mixes far-flung space opera with deeply personal stories. For Mahit, especially, all choices are fraught because, as in the first book, the interests of Lsel station and Teixcalaan are not identical, nor is either's interests identical with her...