Mahit Dzmare has been sent from her home on Lsel Station to replace the Station’s ambassador to the empire of Teixcalaan. Her predecessor, Yskandr Aghavn, has been murdered and now it’s up to Mahit to keep her home station from being swallowed up by the Empire.

Now, imagine the great Empire of Teixcalaan as like the galactic French and British Empires of the 19th century combined with modern American culture and its tendency to show up and force everyone else’s culture into the background. That’s Teixcalaan. Teixcalaan is massive and constantly consuming other planets, stations, star systems, etc. in its wake. Sometimes, these other planets and stations let themselves be consumed willingly because, hey, it’s Teixcalaan, why not? Teixcalaanli literature and culture is considered to be a cut above everything - knowing how to speak Teixcalaanli and reading Teixcalaanli poetry and literature on a place like Lsel station makes you “cultured.” The feeling is decidedly not mutual: in Teixcalaan, anyone who isn’t Teixcalaani is considered a barbarian. Mahit, as the fricking ambassador from Lsel is frequently referred to as a barbarian.

And, since this is an epic Space Opera, let me clarify: the Teixcalaani are human. The people on Lsel station are all human. There are some aliens referred to in A Memory Called Empire but all the main characters are human. Though the Teixcalaani consider themselves to be the standard for actual human. They’re kind of dickish that way.

Alright back to Mahit. On Lsel station they have this super-nifty-cool tech called an “imago” which is a lot like the Flame from that CW show The 100, a show that is so bad that I absolutely love it and never miss an episode. Anyway, an imago is a cybernetic implant containing the memory of a specific person. A person with an imago basically has a whole other person in their head who can talk to them and such. Lsel station has been preserving the memories of multiple generations this way. Normally, receiving an imago is a whole long process involving a lot of psychotherapy, but Mahit had to get hers in a rush due to the whole sudden opening in the Teixcalaani ambassador position. Mahit’s imago is that of her predecessor, Yskandr Aghavn. Kind of. See, the last time Yskandr Aghavn uploaded his memory into the imago system was 15 years ago. So, in her head, Mahit has a version of her predecessor that’s 15 years out of date. Useful! If all this is confusing (and for me, it was a bit at first, but you get used to it real quick) just imagine the imago of young Yskandr is Colin Hanks and the older, more experienced, and now very dead Yskandr as Tom Hanks.

Seriously, picture it just like that, it really helps.

As I was saying, Mahit is stuck with Colin Hanks while the Empire had been dealing with Tom - so she has little to no idea what older Yskandr up to this whole time on Teixcalaan. Her Yskandr had only been working on Teicalaan for a few years - older Yskandr was there for two decades. What did he do to get murdered? Are the people who killed him going to want to get Mahit, too?

Also not helping: the moment young Yskandr sees (though Mahit’s eyes), his own older self in the form of a dead body, he promptly freaks out and Mahit’s imago fizzles out. Now she’s alone in her own head on a new planet with people who maybe want to kill her and her only source of diplomatic info, however outdated, gone. Somehow, Mahit has to maintain her station’s independence from the ever-expanding Empire while solving the murder of Tom Hanks Yskandr while somehow, hopefully, not getting murdered herself. With no functioning implanted neurotech to guide her through the process. Mahit’s only friend seems to be Three Seagrass, her Teixcalaani cultural liaison, but can she be trusted? Can anyone in the Empire be trusted?

Holy crap, A Memory Called Empire is absolutely epic. It’s got everything you could want in a Space Opera: small-time station holding its own against the Big Mean Empire, political intrigue, a murder mystery, a potential civil war, an Imperial succession crisis, and poetry analysis! Ok, that last one I’m more “meh” on - Martine goes to great lengths to describe Teixcalaan’s long history of complex poetic symbolism, but all it did for me was give me some horrible college flashbacks. Martine’s writing style is a bit dense, which is not surprising as in real life, Martine herself is a historian and a scholar and generally someone who sounds way smarter than me. She has a doctorate for cryin’ out loud! I just have a lowly Master’s. But if you’re not big into a kind of academic style of fiction writing, you might find A Memory Called Empire a bit daunting. I can’t really complain too much - as with most of the books I review here, I read an Advanced Reader’s Copy, which isn’t a finished book, so maybe the final round of edits will cut down on some of the sections where things tend to drag.

Arkady Martine wields language beautifully in A Memory Called Empire. Lsel ambassador, Mahit Dzmare, is obsessed with the Teixcalaanli empire, known for its poetry and literature. She has wanted to travel to Teixcalaan since she was a child. But dreaming of a place and actually being there are two different things. She struggles to make her way in a world in which she will always be a barbarian. And on top of this she has to figure out what happened to the ambassador before her. A Memory Called Empire is a mystery wrapped inside a space opera decorated with poetry and intrigue. I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys a wild ride with clever characters and mysterious surroundings.

Young ambassador Mahit Dzmare is sent from her small, independent mining Station to the center of the multi-system Teixcalaanli Empire (that she has thoroughly studied) carrying in her head the memories (though outdated) of the previous ambassador.

When she arrives, she learns that her predecessor died, and soon afterwards a violent attack (on a meeting she was holding with her predecessor's assistant) occurs. Violence escalates and Mahit requires all her wits - as well as her predecessor's - to survive.

It's well written, with excellent world building.

This book follows the adventures of Mahit, who is a young woman who is chosen to replace the Ambassador of their Station in the Teixcalaan Empire. Her predecessor died unexpectedly, and so she wasn’t given all the preparation that she could have had, and gets sent almost immediately.

You see, what the Empire doesn’t know is that people from the Lsel Station have some forbidden neurological implants. They have the memories and personality of their predecessor implanted in their brain as preparation for this sort of thing, somewhat as an AI. Another personality that they meld with over time. While Mahit does have the memories of the prior Teixcalaan Ambassador, Yskandr in her head… he’s about fifteen years out of date.

And when they arrive and face his corpse, he disappears from her brainspace entirely.

So she is left to navigate the often-complicated Teixcalaan culture with only her Teixcaalanli liaison to help, while simultaneously figuring out who almost-certainly-murdered the previous Ambassador, and preventing the ever-expanding Teixcalaan Empire from moving right in to the Lsel Station.

I really liked Mahit as a character, and I thought she was easy to root for. She’s a little foul-mouthed (internally, anyway), a little sarcastic, and a little snarky at times, and those are three things are what I liked the most about her. I didn’t know what I could expect from the Teixcalaan characters, because this story starts out thrusting you into this sort of imperial culture which is quite different from anything I’ve ever known, and I expected they were going to be very uppity and stodgy, considering that most of their culture is rooted around poetry and verse. That said, I ended up really liking a few of the Teixcalaan characters, most notably Three Seagrass, her liaison, and Twelve Azalea, her courtier friend. Reed and Petal. Twelve Azalea especially was all of the foul-mouthed, flagrantly rebellious sidekick that I could hope for.

The mystery that unfolds during this story was also really well plotted out. The intrigue that comes from the imperial court of a very, very large empire blended into the mystery and the story quite well. This was a wonderfully unique idea, and the Teixcalaan culture was very well thought out and executed well. There were twists and turns that I didn’t at all see coming, and I had some feels at times that I wasn’t expecting either. I thought in the very beginning that I might have bitten off more than I could chew and that it was going to be confusing with all the number/noun names and verse and what have you but it wasn’t at all confusing, and I quite liked how easy it was to read while still having some lovely prose and imagery.

And so, I went into this book expecting a really hard sci-fi space opera that I was going to like… but have to work a bit to like (in a I-have-to-pay-attention-to-details sort of way, to be clear that this is not a detriment, lol), and what I got was a really interesting story that was easy to read, and easy to like, with characters that were also easy to like. It gave me a vaguely Foundation-like vibe at times, while still being modern-feeling and fun.

Thanks to the author and Tor via NetGalley for the review copy. :)

An interesting debut sci fi novel first in a series. While I had some trouble with the writing style and put it down several times it was well worth finishing

Epic Sci-fi elements plus a murder mystery equals the recipe for success. I don't know how else to describe this book, but everything about it, from the story to the writing, was splendid. Full of adventure and amazing characters, A Memory Called Empire was bound to be a fantastic book.

I really enjoyed how at the beginning of every chapter there were those news/facts/things that were happening in the Empire parts, it was very fascinating. If you're a fan of Sci-fi, don't be intimidated by the size of this book. Pick it right up and you won't miss out. I, on the other hand, really need the next book!

I’m going to put my cards on the table here, before going any further. I think Arkady Martine’s A Memory Called Empire is an absolutely brilliant book. It has everything I want in sci-fi, wrapped up in one very imaginative package. It asks complicated, thoughtful questions about society, about culture, cultural appropriation, and what empire actually means. It even provides some answers, and not all from the same perspective. It does this by giving us complex characters, with their own hopes, drives and fears, and putting them into a rich, vividly imagined world. It’s a world with tensions between great political powers and those just outside their reach, and where politics can have swift and deadly personal consequences.

Yeah, I liked this one.

It starts with Mahit Dzmare, the new ambassador from a small, single system mining concern to the towering (and difficult to spell) Teixcalaanli Empire. Mahit has immersed herself in Teixcalaanli culture since childhood to prepare for this role, but been thrust into it not entirely prepared, due to the sudden demise of her predecessor. Teixcalaanli is the lead weight on the surrounding galatic sheet. Their ships are everywhere, heavily armed and exuding authority. But what the story shows us is more about their soft power. The way that Teixcalaanli culture wraps itself around and through the cultures surrounding it, so that the songs they sing are Imperial songs – or derived from them. So that the books they read are Imperial books – or drawn from them. So that, eventually, the habits of thought for these non-Imperial territories become conditioned into Teixcalaanli habits of thought. So that they see themselves as outsiders in their own cultures, so that they see Teixcalaanli as the Teixcalaanli do – as the centre of the universe. Mahit is a product of this strategy; she knows the culture of the empire she is being sent to treat with. Though proud of her own people, and what they’ve accomplished, she is riven by cracks of cultural confusion. In being proud of her differences, or conforming to their expectations of her differences, is she perhaps falling into the mode of the outsider that the Teixcalaan expect? Or can those be leveraged to her advantage? Similarly, in finding a lodestar in Teixcalaan, in appreciating its traditions, literature, media, politics – is she left little more than an ersatz portrayal of an outwith barbarian? Or is there the potential to craft a unique seeming from the blending of these values? Mahit is smart, pragmatic, incisive – and even as she’s thinking about who she is, and the way she portrays herself, those around her are doing the same, adjusting their expectations in light of her arrival.

So yes. This is a book that has a lot to say about identity. About what the conception of self entails, and how we shape ourselves in a given environment. At the larger level, it explores this by looking at the differences between the Teixcalaanli and Mahit’s station home – and at the casual arrogance and force, along with an undeniably rich history which allows the Teixcalaan to see themselves as the centre of the universe. At the micro level, it’s about Mahit, and the way she handles being very far from home, and how she starts asking and answering questions around what home actually is.

Which may sound frightfully esoteric, but…isn’t, really. It’s a big question wrapped in more immediate ones – in the day to day politics of the empire, in Mahit’s investigation into the demise of her predecessor. In the poems sung during marches by protestors, and at wakes. In the way that the Teixcalaanli see and question themselves. It’s everywhere, and that means you get to think about the big question of identity while also wondering whether Mahit will, for example, manage to survive her first night in the Teixcalaanli Empire without being assassinated.

We’ll come back to that in a second.

Before we do – I’ve talked about Mahit’s struggle with identity, as part of an exploration of one of the text’s larger themes. And it’s fascinating, multi-layered, and like all good questions, raises more off the back of itself. But I also want to talk about Mahit more precisely.

As our interlocutor, she’s fiercely clever, thinks fast and speaks fast as well. Having been flung into this shark-pool at short notice she, like us, is somewhat at a loss, and this allows us to be brought along for her journey while looking on her with a sympathetic eye. I felt for Mahit throughout. Her confusion, hurt, damage and determination all hit with the punch of precision-crafted steel. Not a super-powered avatar of justice, but a person trying to do their level best in difficult circumstances – something we can all, perhaps, identify with. I cheered her victories, and sorrowed in her defeats. What I really want to say here is that Mahit felt real. Lovingly, sympathetically, but honestly rendered, and entirely believable.

This extended out to the rest of the cast as well. The Teixcalaan have something of a stiff upper lip approach, cloaking emotion behind a façade – but in between the cracks of those Mahit runs into, you can feel a fire absolutely blazing. They are, much like Mahit, fierce people, proud of their culture and what they do – and if their empire is an engine of expansion and slow cultural infusion and homogeneity, the people within it would perhaps argue that it has to be so, and that the propagation of their civilisation and culture to the outer reaches is a necessity. Arrogance, yes, and it leaves so many questions about colonialism, and the liminality of both physical borders and ephemeral identity – but arrogance which comes well argued, and makes both Mahit and us stop and think before challenging them, as they must be challenged.

As part of that, it’s a pure delight to see The City, the capital city of the empire, whose name underscores what its inhabitants see as its central nature to the universe. It’s beautiful, connected, and in many ways vital. It feels like a real city, with its soaring columns, utilitarian government ministries, and suburbs you might not want to visit on your own at night It contrasts wonderfully with the claustrophobic, intimate spaces of Mahit’s home station, where the sky is something which happens to other people, and where their methods of cultural retention are less orthodox than the Teixcalaanli’s worldwide network.

Anyway, that’s the big questions again. But in between those, we see a mechanical beast of a station, ticking along through the centuries, with a lively cultural scene of its own, determined to hold its independence against the far larger and viciously enticing Teixcalaanli, Again, both feel like real places. Both have completely different moods, the people who we see are, on both sides, still people, but their viewpoint is coloured by their environs and their history to make their approaches totally different. The history of the Teixcalaanli oozes off the page, and you’ll find you suddenly know a lot about it, perhaps unconsciously. What we get of the station is perhaps more direct, but no less impactful. Both feel like lived in spaces, both feel like you could wake up there tomorrow, feel the clank of your feet on the station deckplates, or breathe the scent of the flowers in a Teixcalaanli night garden.

The story though. OK. It’s great. I’m not going to spoil it, but it starts with a mystery. What happened to Mahit’s predecessor? And how can she keep the charming, intelligent, beautiful, thoughtful Teixcalaanli from absorbing her station? Should she even want to? There’s…a lot going on in the answers to those questions. Some of it involves politics – the dialogue there is absolutely pitch perfect, often wry, often viciously funny. Some of it involves violence, politics by other means. There’s assassinations (as alluded to earlier!), murders, explosions and investigations. Underneath all that is a slow-boiling tension which kept me turning pages until late in to the night, because I needed to know what happened next. The story, like any good mystery, hides a lot from you, and then lets you back behind the curtain as it goes on. The pace remorselessly ratchets up, and the conclusion left me breathless.

As I said earlier: Yeah, I liked this one. There’s so much going on, and it all manages to fit together absolutely perfectly.

Short version: If you’re here for the world-building, this book has your back. If you’re here for the characterisation, this book has your back. If you’re here for a plot filled with political intrigue and occasional explosions, this book has your back. If you’re here for the big ideas, the way that this text asks them and weaves it through the narrative is incredibly impressive – reminiscent of the best of Iain M. Banks, while being startlingly original in its approach. So there, too, this book has your back.

Should you be reading this? Yes, yes you should. It’s a brilliant debut, and I’m already craving more. Go out and pick up a copy right now, read it, and thank me later.

I tried reading this book, but unfortunately it was just not for me. As per my personal review policy, I do not review or rate books publically that I don't finish. I certainly don't think this is a bad book, but it simply is not the kind of science fiction that I enjoy reading. I liked the premise and was intrigued by Ann Leckie's blurb, but I didn't feel that the story matched my expectations.

The story is will written with some interesting cultural world building and well developed characters. Unfortunately, I just found the narrative incredibly slow. and dry. I wanted so badly to like this one, but I was dragging myself to keep reading. I do think there is an audience for this book, but I am personally not that reader. While it's marketed as space opera, it will most appeal to more literary readers who enjoy slow, intellectual stories.

I know this has gotten a lot of positive press and a lot of hype but it felt too much like Ann Leckie or Mur Lafferty fanfiction to me--clones and permanent, immortal memory, and uprisings and politics and etiquette. It often dragged and the characters weren't terribly interesting. Protagonist Mahit Dzmare veers from being merely unprepared to being ridiculously silly in her actions and choices, and the thriller aspect--who killed her predecessor?--turns out to be revealed in one of those non-mysteries wherein the villain reveals themselves after the protagonist can't figure it out, making them all look dim. I never truly got a sense of the culture or the why behind many of the events and intrigues conjured up.

Superb sci-fi that will draw you and provide a great payoff with an engrossing plot and characters. Martine is definitely an author to watch

I enjoyed this book very much throughout, but I think I wanted more answers and explanations than it gave me.

Like, it gave me the politics and the comparisons between two very different cultures. It gave me an interesting world and interesting characters. Though it was slow at times, there were scenes that made up for it (though it's not action-packed by any means). It even gave me funny and clever quips and wlw romance! But it did not give me answers to all my questions. Not even in a way where it communicated that these questions wouldn't be answered, that they were being left for the sequel or for the reader to imagine. It was as if the author simply forgot to answer — who sent that assassin, or what did that politician want?

Granted, there are also many threads left dangling for sequels, and I'm not upset enough about my few quibbles to not read them.

It starts off slow and kind of dense, but once the action begins, it's hard to resist the story as it drives forward. It reads as a true epic, one that makes you feel the world really has been reshaped as you read it. Would recommend.

I’ve been following updates about this novel for the last few months. Not just because of the promising synopsis but also because of the great cover it has. ‘A Memory Called Empire’ is the first novel from the North American writer Arkady Martine. An ambitious book full of details and also a bit challenging at the beginning. However, once you get familiar with it, I don’t think it is difficult to follow and enjoy.
The book starts when the Lsel ambassador in Teixcalaan is found dead. Mahit Dzmare is the new ambassador assigned to the position. When she reaches her new status she will found out that the death of Yskandr covers a complex plot of betrayals, revenges and secrets. These are the key elements in the novel and finding out who and why has committed the murder is the main topic along the novel.
Opposite to what I thought before starting reading, this is not a galactic adventures novel, nor an interplanetary travelling or space battles novel. However, these are mentioned in some kind of brief introductions to each of the chapters which allows the reader to have some context of what is going on but they are not the main topic. Arkady Martine has written a political novel based on secrets owned by the powerful people of Teixcalaan and Lsel. Because of that, most of the novel takes place in closed and luxury places, where the decisions that affects the people are taken. Dialogues and silences of the powerful guide the resolution of the mystery in the novel.
‘A Memory Called Empire’ has a never-ending list of features which can be discussed for long and all are included very smoothly in the novel. Mahit, the main character, carries a secret implant inside her body with the memories of her predecessor. However, the last fifteen years are not included as the memory is not working properly and it will make the management of the knowledge within much more difficult. Very soon in the novel the questions will start arising. Was this memories intentionally hidden? How can this memories be recovered? And finally, what can fascinate us the most, what is the power that these implants can give you and what are the complications?
The novel is also full of Teixcalaan terminology which, although unknown, allows the reader to understand the rules and structure of this world and culture. One of the best thing of this read is figuring out how to properly communicate with the Teixcalaans and how they react to some events. As a complement the novel has a very useful appendix at the end of the book. I highly suggest keeping an eye on it while reading the book. And don’t be scared if you are unable to pronounce some of them!
In addition to this, the novel has multiple socio-political views. Since how the Teixcalaan government is structured and how they manage their society to how a small planet like Lsel fights to avoid being colonised by the powerful Teixcalaans. Keeping your own culture, language, identity and being independent sometimes requires to reject some other advantages. Religion, ethics and honour are not missed within the topics in the novel.
The novel is not perfect. The pace during the second third of the novel drops after an exciting start, lowering the expectations created in the beginning. Fortunately, the last quarter of the novel reveals most of the secrets making the read much more effective and increasing the interest. Although it is at the expense of some decision and events which draws attention.
It is worth mentioning that ‘A Memory Called Empire’ is just told from the point of view of Mahit, something I am not convinced about the result. I really think that another point of view would have been an interesting addition to the way the novel is being told and some of the events that take place.
In the end, I would recommend reading ‘A Memory Called Empire’. The novel catches you with a powerful beginning, an ambitious world rich on details, even with a few elements I disliked. A world pending being expanded in future releases. Personally, I will come back to Teixcalaan with the next book.

Thrilling political machinations, alien yet relateable characters, and a compelling space opera aesthetic combine for the start of an epic new series

Writing long form book reviews is sometimes very hard. Sometimes, that's because there's not much to say about a book, or because life is busy and finding time to bash out a thousand words on recent reading is a step too far. Occasionally, though, it's because it feels like there's nothing to say about a book except "I loved it, I loved it, I loved it," which while not totally uninformative for a prospective reader, probably isn't going to be terribly useful (unless you really trust me). Somehow, in these moments, more words must be found, from somewhere.

So, A Memory Called Empire. I loved it.

This is the start of a new epic science fiction series from Arkady Martine, an author who is new to me, and to novels, but already has a very interesting-looking short fiction bibliography. In it, we follow new ambassador Mahit as she is posted from the stations of Lsel to the Teixcalaanli empire, a hugely powerful neighbour where conformity with social norms is everything. Luckily for Mahit, Lsel has perfected the creation of the "Imago" - imprints of personalities from deceased people which impart their users with the skills and understanding of their predecessors. Less luckily, Mahit's predecessor Yskandr hasn't updated his imprint for fifteen years - long enough for fashions to go out of date, political movements to change course, and for his networks and, more importantly, the identity of his apparent murderer to be a total mystery. Both Lsel and Teixcalaan have problems greater than the death of a single man, though, as the former finds itself under threat from a larger alien power, and the latter gears up for a potential succession crisis once the current Emperor dies. At least Mahit should have the first few years of Yskandr's experience and his company to rely on! But, nope, her imago malfunctions almost immediately on arrival, leaving her almost entirely alone in the tensest of political situations.

Fans of Ann Leckie and Yoon Ha Lee (not to mention the Hainish cycle) will find Martine's worldbuilding an absolute delight. It's in the same vein, of spacefaring human cultures that take in the full richness of human potential to create worlds that are utterly alien to each other and to us as readers, while not being derivative of anything specific from those other examples. In Teixcalaan, people smile just by widening their eyes; parties get exciting when everyone gathers around for impromptu poetry about station cleaning methods; peoples' names are all made up of a number and a noun; and it's impossible to so much as open a door without a "cloudhook", a wearable personal computer only issued to citizens. Though we don't spend much time there, Lsel's culture is a little more recognisable in its hard-nosed spacefaring utilitarianism, but there's uniqueness injected here too, particularly the "imago lines" passing down generations of skills and personality in expert industries, as well as some fascinating (though thankfully not heavily explored) references to ritual cannibalism.  

The dynamic between the huge, outwardly glorious Teixcalaanli empire and Mahit's own culture - Lsel station holds just 30,000 people - is also very well played out. Mahit is desperate for friendship and connection with the Teixcalaanitlim, having grown up steeped in the culture and art from afar, but is also all too aware that, to them, she is a "barbarian", who will at best be humoured for her inability to ever fit in. It's left ambiguous how much of this is Mahit's own hangups and how much is genuinely coming from the people around her, but Teixcalaan's sense of cultural self-assurance is vividly present in all aspects of the worldbuilding, particularly the city's language and technology. At almost every turn, Mahit's already complex circumstances are further complicated by being an outsider in an empire that simply doesn't know how to accommodate difference: not through malice, simply through the weight of internal homogeneity. That her perceptions of being an outsider are confirmed not by the malice of those around her, but by ignorance, makes the whole situation that much more heartbreaking.

With all the weirdness and tension, the world of A Memory Called Empire could have become quite a dry, unpleasant affair, but Martine completely avoids that fate. Indeed, what surprised me most about the novel is how imbued with humanity and compassion it is, despite the subject matter and the relative isolation of the protagonist. Much of this is down to the interactions between the core characters: in particular, all the scenes with Mahit (a competent but fallible young woman in politics, my FAVOURITE), her cultural liaison Three Seagrass (previous parentheses also apply), and her childhood friend Twelve Azalea bursting off the page with life and feeling at every turn. Because Mahit's outsider position is such an integral part of the plot, there's a careful balancing act to be done between demonstrating that outsider status and the very real shortcomings of the Teixcalaantlim in addressing it, while also imbuing the rest of the characters with their own alien-but-recognisable motivations, sympathies and responses, and it's pulled off remarkably well. 

Plotwise, the novel also delivers, although Mahit is a very particular sort of protagonist: a young woman with a non-violent skillset who is completely out of her comfort zone, whose sense of agency is calibrated accordingly. Again, I think this is a feature rather than a bug, both in terms of Mahit's specific characterisation and in having an immensely human-driven narrative. For example, in one section, our heroes are caught up in action and unable to sleep for 30+ hours, and the sense of exhaustion and tiredness is so very well realised, in the decisions that the characters make and the way the situation is described. There's something very accomplished about developing an "alien" city of far-future humans, and then having some of those humans sit on a college green far too early in the morning eating ice cream and napping off two days of exhaustion, without making either element seem contradictory. If I have a criticism, it's that the weight of the "institutional" threats can't quite keep up when the personal isn't involved; that's not such a problem when the threat of civil war is looming large over characters' emotional and physical wellbeing, but it does make the long-term threat to Lsel harder to connect to.

Still, at the end of it all, I came away from A Memory Called Empire feeling so lucky to be a reader in this moment: that this particular brand of smart, interrogative, fun fiction is being written and published and put in conversation with similar work, right here and now. This is a hugely exciting work - hopefully the start of something big and equally exciting - and I highly recommend you offer it a space on your 2019 TBR.

The Math

Baseline Assessment: 10/10

Penalties: -1 Still some room for growth in the wider plot, with the looming alien threat.

Nerd Coefficient: 9/10

Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan Tor/Forge for the eGalley of this novel.


After reading the preview excerpt of this novel I was really looking forward to reading the entire book. Yes, this can be classified as a Space Opera, but it is not going to satisfy readers who expect a great deal of action. Everything takes place in this story at a slower pace, more low-key action than battle episodes. As an example, we find that a war has begun from a sentence in the middle of a paragraph. The book relies heavily on language, vocabulary, specific words to set scenes. There is a lot of emphasis on the poetry of the Teixcalaan world and how that figures in their politics. The language in this book is beautiful and the story revolves around the formulas of correct communication which govern every aspect of life on this planet.

Mahit Dzmare has been appointed as the new Ambassador to the Teixcalaanli Empire - which is huge, from her home, Lsel Station - which is very small, because a new ambassador is required. No explanation is given for why, just send someone immediately. Now Mahit has landed in the City and her job is to use diplomatic means to keep the Station from being gobbled up by the Empire. She also has to keep a certain technological advancement from coming to the notice of the rulers of Teixcalaanli while trying to discover how the previous ambassador died. A tall order since she has found that things aren't going nearly as well on the planet as she had been lead to believe.


There is a long Glossary of Persons, Places, and Objects which I made frequent use of. The language of this planet gave me no clues as to what word meanings might be and you will thank the author for including this listing of words. There is also a section on the "pronunciation and writing system of the Teixcalaanli language" for your use if you are interested in the formal construction of the language. This part didn't help me because I didn't use it. This novel is an amazing accomplishment for a debut author. It would be an amazing accomplishment for an author with great experience in crafting a novel. Congratulations, Ms. Martine.

This book deserves the praise it's been getting prior to its release. It's an astonishing debut novel.

Mahit Dzmare is the new Lsel ambassador to the Teixcalaan empire. Her predecessor died unexpectedly and Teixcalaan requested a replacement as soon as possible. She's educated and competent, but not as prepared as she ought to be for this role. She has the benefit of an imago of her predecessor, or a neural chip connected to her brain stem which carries the living memory of everyone who wore the imago before her. Thus, she has the experience of the previous ambassador to guide her through this new role--but only to a point. You see, the imago she's wearing is 15 years out of date, and the previous ambassador was a bit cagey about what he'd been up to in his role. While she knows protocol and other basic information about the empire, she has no idea what the man was up to before he died. And, of course, she's walking into a place with far more unrest than she thought there would be.

I love the careful world building that went into this novel. Communication is deeply rooted in poetic forms and literary allusions, which listeners must analyze to grasp the different nuances of meaning. Thus, a person may be technically fluent, with the vocabulary to translate the exact speech of what is being said, without having the cultural knowledge to understand it's meaning. Gestures are also subtle (and often different from our own). There's a great emphasis on symbolism, in everything from Teixcalaanli names, epithets, architecture and city planning, etc.

The novel takes on themes of assimilation and imperialism. Teixcalaan is a powerful empire with an alluringly beautiful culture, while Lsel Station is small and (by necessity) provides a more spartan lifestyle for its citizens. Lsel is threatened with not-quite-voluntary annexation, a conquest effected more through trade and the influx of Teixcalaanli culture, which is popular with Lsel youth, than outright war.

I can already say that this is one of my favorite reads of 2019. It's an intricate science fantasy full of political drama in a culture where everything is expressed through poetry and other subtle literary allusions. What's not to like? I'm eagerly awaiting the next book in this series.

Although it is New Years Eve 2018 as I write this review, I think I can confidently claim that A Memory Called Empire will be my favorite debut novel published in 2019. This book not only checked every box for me: unique and interesting worldbuilding, likable and complex characters, a plot that kept me on my toes, and a sapphic main couple, it also added a new box: dissing your political opponents through passive aggressive layered poetry.

My favorite part of this book was the worldbuilding. The Teixcalaanli Empire is this massive space hegemony with a culture inspired by a mix of Byzantine and South American cultures. The central focus of this book is in the language of the Teixcalaanli Empire, and, through language, poetry. The main character, Mahit, is the newly appointed ambassador to Teixcalaan from her small space station, and through her eyes, we get to explore the amazing depths of this culture that Martine has put together. By her side is her cultural liaison, Three Seagrass, who helps Mahit traverse the capital of Teixcalaan as they attempt to discover the fate of her predecessor.

One thing I love about Mahit is that though she starts as the equivalent of a Teixcalaan weaboo, completely obsessed with its culture, her mindset changes as she slowly learns how ridiculously ostentatious Teixcalaanli culture is. Teixcalaan, in a way, reminds me of how stereotypical elves or fae are portrayed: arrogant intellectuals, constantly talking purple prose, looking down on outsiders, and willingly behaving in tropes. The mark of an ideal Teixcalaanli citizen, apparently, is their ability to bust out impromptu poetry about literally anything, as demonstrated by Three Seagrass at one point about sewers. While Mahit still clearly loves the culture, she's also completely willing to call out Three Seagrass and others on their ridiculousness later on.

A large portion of this book is the political intrigue, both within Teixcalaan and internal matters from Mahit's home station. As such, there's very little in the way of the space battles and inter-galactic travel that usually make up the space-opera genre. Nevertheless, I found the pacing very quick and exciting. There was never really a dull moment in this book. There was always some mystery that led to a new clue, or a new character with hidden motives introduced.

Overall, I rate this book a 5/5. I think I can easily say it'll be one of my favorite reads of 2018 and my favorite debut novel published in 2019. Between the political intrigue, worldbuilding, characters, and poetry slams, A Memory Called Empire has much to love.

/r/Fantasy Bingo 2018 Squares:

Novel featuring a Non-Western Setting
Subgenre: Space Opera
Novel from the /r/Fantasy LGBTQ+ Database

Reivew posted to my blog on 22 Feb 2019

There were a lot of things I really liked about this book but, I have to be honest, the pacing at times let A Memory Called Empire down a little. Still, that might be a little unfair for what is both a first novel and also the first in a trilogy with all the world-building requirements that entails.

The basic premise of the book is that we follow the newly-appointed ambassador for Lsel Station who has been unexpectedly called to the heart of the nearby all-consuming Teixcalaan empire. On Lsel, it's traditional for the memories of past individuals to be paired with a new person on their death, so their experiences and expertise are passed on without subsuming the new 'host' and their own life. When Mahit is summoned, she is only able to be given an outdated version of the previous ambassador's memories and hastily packed off in a ship, only to discover on her arrival that the summons was due to her predecessor's murder.

At this point, Yskander's previous memories stop working and Mahit is left to try and navigate the empire she admires and figure out just what Yskander did to get himself killed. This turns out to be offering the memory technology to a dying emperor who is desperate to continue to live through his clone, which is both unacceptable to Lsel and also considered immoral by the empire. In the background, there's also the threat of alien invasion which Mahit is eventually able to use to try and keep Lsel from being swallowed up.

Overall, I really liked the clash of cultures taking place here, with Mahit as a big fan of Teixcalaan culture but eventually realising she can never quite fit in with them. I found it a little annoying that the potential clash between Yskander-as-was and the machinations of his older self were underplayed by the memory device malfunctioning at the least opportune time. As mentioned earlier, at times the pacing was a little uneven but in general I enjoyed A Memory Called Empire a lot and look forward to seeing where the rest of the story goes.

Este era sin duda uno de los libros más esperados del año, no solo por una portada arrebatadora, si no por todos los rumores que había alrededor de la publicación de esta primera novela.

Y es que las referencias a autores consagradísimos en la space opera como mi admirado Iain M. Banks no hacían si no aumentar el hype, algo quizás contraproducente para la lectura.

Afortunadamente, A Memory Called Empire es un libro que se mantiene perfectamente por sí mismo, sin necesidad de tantas comparaciones.

El universo en que se sitúa la acción está dominado por un Imperio que ha conquistado un territorio tras otro y que mantiene una tensa paz con otras colonias mineras, en un equilibrio inestable con as colonias mineras que depende mucho de los intereses comerciales y de las ganas de conquista que tenga el emperador de turno. Y sin embargo, hay algo que planea en el horizonte que puede llegar a cambiar la difícil situación de status quo actual.

Esta idea, obviamente, no es original. Y sin embargo, el punto de vista con el que trabaja la autora, dándole voz a la embajadora de una de estas colonias mineras, da la posibilidad de ver el imperio desde la perversa admiración que puede provocar el depredador que te amenaza. Y es que la seguridad que provee el imperio a sus habitantes permite que florezcan las artes, mientras que en los otros territorios bastante tienen con luchar por la supervivencia. Esta fascinación por el lenguaje, por la prosa y los versos más elaborados, se hacen patentes en los aspectos de la vida cotidiana. Por ejemplo, me asombra que la clave de cifrado de los mensajes de gobierno sea el último poema de moda, a pesar de la fragilidad inherente de una cifra basada en la sustitución.

La novedad más importante que nos trae la autora son los imagos, algo semejante a los implantes de antepasados que ya utiliza Aliette de Bodard en su ciclo de Xuya, pero dando un paso más en la integración entre las memorias pasadas y las presentes. La persona a la que se le implanta un imago, se “transforma” en otra, en una mezcla homogénea entre el pasado y el presente que permite avanzar hacia el futuro sin perder el conocimiento ya acumulado. Es una idea fascinante, sobre la que gira toda la novela, desde el punto de vista ajeno a esta costumbre, incomprensible para muchos de los que la conocen por primera vez.

Otros detalles también son entrañables, como los nombres de los miembros del imperio, consistentes en un número y otro nombre común. El hecho de que aún con esta nomenclatura tan extraña haya hueco para el cariño con motes personalizados aumenta la empatía que el lector siente por unos personajes, que ya de por sí se hacen de querer.

Existe un esfuerzo considerable por parte de la autora para que el lector se acostumbre a la terminología del universo de una forma natural, administrando la información pausadamente y engarzando cada fragmento para dar lugar a un mosaico complejo y hermoso a la vez.

El ritmo de la novela está bastante bien llevado, menos algunos momentos que rebajan la tensión creciente y un final para mí algo precipitado. Pero A Memory Called Empire es una estupenda primera novela, con ideas conocidas pero con nuevas perspectivas y una atención al detalle muy agradable. De las mejores lecturas del año, sin duda. No me extrañaría nada ver el premio Locus a primera novela en las estanterías de Arkady.

{Note: This review is scheduled to be published on the 1st of March 2019 on my blog. The link to my blog (shared through Twitter and Goodreads) will not work before this date. I will also be publishing it on my Goodreads profile and a shorter version (written at the bottom of this review) via my Litsy account on the aforementioned date.}
https://thedigressiveapproach.wordpress.com/2019/01/03/review-a-memory-called-empire-by-arkady-martine

Thank you to NetGalley and Tor/Forge for providing this eARC in exchange for an honest review.
---
Ambassador Mahit is sent to the center of the Teixcalaanli Empire to save her Station from the Empire's unending expansion. She arrives and discovers that her predecessor was murdered and that the political environment of the Empire is far from favouring her mission.

The blurb is very well-written with just the right amount of information given to the reader to entice them. It was the theme of cultural identity that attracted me the most. There were a lot of positive aspects in this story and some negative ones as well.

Firstly, the world building is executed very well. The language, mannerisms, habits and other cultural aspects of the Empire and of the Station are explained in such a way that the differences between the two are emphasised and yet the few similarities are also present as a bitter reminder of there being some common ground even between such stark opposites. Although there wasn't a lot of info-dumping, there were instances where the dialogue and the situation felt very 'manufactured' just for the sake of explaining a concept that the reader would need to understand.

The characters and their relationships were well-rounded and believable, despite the rather short amount of actual time in which the events of this book take place. When that short span is taken into account, it may not be believable to have such deep character relationships, however, this is balanced out by Mahit's desire for allies in an unknown world and other characters' political scheming.

As for the actual story, I would say that the political scheming could have been done better. It could have been more complex than involving a handful of characters and their motivations. The concept of Mahit's technological secret and that of her Station's is not a new one, but it has been used in a new way. I also felt that the identity crisis she suffers as a result of her technology malfunctioning was explained and developed better than this concept has been in other works.

Overall, this was an excellent book and a good way to start off the series. I am eager to know more about this world that Martine has created and will definitely be open to reading the next work in the series.

Overall rating: 4/5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐

---
Short review on Litsy

eARC provided by NetGalley and Tor/Forge in exchange for an honest review.
An excellent first book in a promising new series. I enjoyed the world building and fast-paced storyline. Although the political scheming could have been more convoluted, overall this was a great story and I'll be eagerly waiting for the next installment.

Overall rating: 4/5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐