Ninefox Gambit

I've enjoyed Yoon Ha Lee's short fiction; now Ninefox Gambit is his first novel, the first book of a military SF trilogy (next one out in 2017), and it is also very good! I enjoyed the balance of combat strategy and political intrigue, the pacing of the action/plot reveals as mysteries unfold (really no first-novel clunkiness here at all), and I kind of don't want to spoil this for people who would rather read without knowing the premise, but the central character relationship is fascinating and unforgettable. There is a lot of war-typical violence here - platoons getting blown up, the wholesale slaughter of populations - but it never crossed my personal line of "jeez this author likes thinking of nasty things people could do to each other and describing them for us, eww". You might like it if you like chessmasters like Miles Vorkosigan, Adrian Veidt, various people in the Ender's Game books? You might like it if you liked the Ancillary Justice books, or Aliette de Bodard, or those Seth Dickinson Morrigan stories? Lee's universe is darker and more baroque and uncanny and arcane than the Vorkosiverse or the Ancillaryverse, I wouldn't have necessarily guessed I'd be so into it, but I was.

my Hugo ballot, 2nd and final part

Behind ye olde cut.
( Read more... )