Ocean’s Godori is a strong debut novel by Elaine U. Cho, and initially interested me for being a book sitting firmly within the space opera genre so in I jumped after being approved for an advanced readers copy in exchange for this review. You probably know the drill - all opinions are unbiased, honest and mine alone. It’s the first book in a series, although I’ve no indication of how many books the series will consist of.

We primarily follow the book’s namesake, Ocean Yoon, who is a disgraced pilot for a unified Korean agency called the Alliance who dominates space exploration and the political relations surrounding it. Ocean and her team bounce around the galaxy from Seoul on Earth to Mercury and to other places flung far across our solar system. Other point of views from various and vastly differing characters are interspaced throughout, giving us a more rounded approach to both the story and its characters. We adventure with them across space for varying purposes, with each character injecting something unique and much needed into the storytelling. Ocean herself is somewhat of a closed book (no pun intended… or was there?) which helped pull the book and reader immersion more tightly together. Haven’s character interested me in particular, especially the slow unwinding introduction of his unique fictional cultural background and customs, and I felt he was a good compliment to Ocean’s shut off and at times downright cold demeanour.

It’s a decently sized read at 368 pages but the fast pacing and action sequences made it feel a fair bit shorter for me. And unlike most space operas, it keeps its politics quite light and easy to understand while still satisfying the need to learn about the world (well, worlds) that we find ourselves visiting. Korean culture features quite heavily for an English language novel, and I feel some readers unfamiliar with the culture might struggle somewhat with the smatterings of Korean language found throughout the book. Most is easy enough to figure out due to context although since English is my one and only language, I did find myself turning to a certain Korean American husband of mine to either clarify or outright ask what a few words or phrases meant. Having said that, don’t be me and find the glossary of Korean language terms at the back of the book AFTER you have completed the book! Although in fairness, I’m reading an ARC so it could be easier to discover it’s there after publication.

Overall impressions are that it’s an easy, well paced read and I’d recommend to anyone with a love of lighter yet fast paced space operas, travel and piloting in their science fiction. There is a nice touch of romance and a dash of spice to help keep things between characters interesting. I’ll be keeping an eye out for the next book!

This space opera starts slowly but builds to an exciting, incomplete finish. I found the world-building too vague for my taste; perhaps my unfamiliarity with Korean terms and culture in a Korea-centric setting undid me. Nevertheless, I found characters hard to differentiate and I still don’t really get the political structure nor the actual scope of the novel’s universe.

Over the course of the book, characters emerge as distinct people and protagonist Ocean, friend Teo, swaggering pilot Phoenix, and medic Sasani become real people with real, intertwined relationships.

While my initial read was, “not for me,” by the end I knew I would read the required sequel.

Not for me, but possibly for you if you're into K-drama (I suspect).

For me, the many untranslated Korean words (about half of which my Kindle couldn't translate for me either), the small amount of plot per thousand words, the multiple alienated and unlikeable characters, and the inexplicable inclusion of clutches, gearshifts, and brake lights on the spacecraft added up to a DNF.

A solid 4.5 stars, excellent debut space opera. And "Arghhh!" it is a cliff hanger! Must read the next book.

The first few scenes were challenging because we were introduced to four different people (and a few more) with little context and not much idea how they were connected. This was complicated by me conflating Hadrian and Hasan, so don't do that. But as soon as Ocean Yoon gets behind the controls of a space ship, the story is moving.

It felt like there was a new Korean-language concept every page or so for the first part of the book. Some of those could be figured out from context, but not all. That occasionally bumped me out of my reading flow. After I finished, I discovered the narrative glossary at the back. Future readers should refer to that and the writer might consider moving that to the front, even though prologues are not my favorite thing. Maybe readers can skip it, but know they can go back, like some pronunciation guides in other books.

And...still not sure how the godori game connects to this story, but I enjoyed it anyway.

I so want to read the next book.

This book would have been a magnificent anime. Stunning visuals, actions propelled forward by the rule of cool and good at distracting from loose ends & omissions in the story - because the momentum and the picture are compelling enough to let the cast of characters with two key personality traits and 50 shades of awesome make it a good show.

It doesn't quite work like that in the medium of the book. If you, like me, got hooked by the promise of Becky Chambers meeting Firefly -- Ocean's Godori is so far towards Becky Chambers ends of things that it ends up reappearing somewhere close to Portrait of a Thief. If you like these things, you will probably enjoy Ocean's Godori.

The premise sounded intriguing: we get Korea as the dominant power (and culture) in our solar system, which is a welcome new spin for the genre, and we are promised a nuanced exploration of colonialism and capitalism, as well as themes of legacy and identity. A superb ambition, one I can get behind any time -- but the execution fell short of the high stakes announced. The story takes its time getting to the announced murder for which Ocean’s best friend was framed, but this time is not spent digging into chewy exploration of colonialism and capitalism. Mainly, we are introduced to the characters and their respective quirks and circumstances - which oddly enough have very similar-sounding POV voices. They are all very special and amazingly skilled at a number of various things that would take decades to perfect, and - since this is the future - I would’ve maybe even bought it if there was talk of commonplace augmentation, but there is not. A trait they all seem to share - unwavering dedication to one another - hinges on strange reasons like “I followed my crewmate into exile because it was the right thing to do” (ruining pretty much every chance at a career in the process) or “I sought out a complete stranger because I hacked into a database and found her interrogation transcripts” (and I guess was so impressed as to try and get to know her personally?). The world-building I can only describe as done in broad strokes, and the plot development can at best be characterized as improbable. To give an example: at the eleventh hour, the main characters are rescued by the incredibly soft-hearted raider who picks up all the strays to the point that it’s his trademark and thus would’ve in all likelihood very quickly made him and his crew incredibly vulnerable to any kind of traps, attacks and blackmail. On top of that, the reader gets all the answers to anything resembling a mystery pretty much immediately or before they even think to ask, and most of those answers are again either improbable or simply don’t make sense from the cause-and-effect point of view. It seemed to me that the scenes that had the best flow (or felt like the author had the best time writing them, in any case) were the romantic, reinforcing my impression of colorful character vignettes.

The vignettes come generously peppered with: Shakespeare quotes and appreciation thereof as a sign of being cultured; food as a love language; characters having flashbacks showing their strained/difficult relationships with their parents or characters discussing aforementioned parents; characters lauding or explaining other people to third parties; and one scene with the title game that is maybe meant as a metaphor somehow, but honestly I’m not sure and I'm not seeing the significance that would warrant it being part of the book title.

Tl;dr: I feel like this book was trying to do too many things all at once and succeeded at too few. While some of those ideas seemed neat and more fleshed out than others (for example, Mortemians as a society and their philosophy or using certain Korean words as universally understood terms/slang), the main plot was more of a patchwork than a tapestry. As always, I continue to warmly welcome and loudly champion more books inspired by East Asian cultures, it just might be was not for me, or not for me in a book medium (as opposed to a graphic novel or animation).

Thank you #NetGalley and the publisher for an early copy of #OceansGodori.

This was not like any other story I have read, but to be fair this was also my first sci-fi/ space novel!

I am NOT disappointed in anyway. I loved how fast paced it was from start to finish. There was no room for feeling bored.

The ending was perfect but now I need MOREEEE.

The main character is the epitome of amazing.

Thank you Cho for being my introduction to this genre, I’m excited to see what else you write!

Thank you NetGalley and publishers!

5 stars, hands down. I loved everything about this and Elaine U. Cho is now on my must read list.

I think the original synopsis I read compared Cho to Becky Chambers, which I disagree with. Chambers' space operas always feel like such a microcosm of events - they are small scale, charactee centric and when I finish them I'm not wowed to get to the next. This isnt to say every space opera needs to affect the whole galaxy, but I need something a bit heavier in plot.

I see more similarities with J.S. Dewes, Alex White and James S.A. Corey (I loved The Expanse series, but they were crap at writing women characters - Cho is definitely an improvement on that front).

Cho builds a space opera setting with Korea reunified and the geocentric hub of the galaxy, similar to The Expanse, the martians have been prevented from terraforming and major corporations have a predominant say in who lives and who thrives. While it does take context clues to learn some of the Korean, I thought it was a great new perspective on global dominance. Having visited Korea in 2016 and learned more about its history and culture, I didn't doubt Cho's worldview - look at how influential South Korea is as a forced island in terms of technology and pop culture -- imagine having a land border accessible again.

I also appreciated her references for sci fi / pop culture fans - starting with boyfriend Adama a la Battlestar Galactica. These touches made it easier to connect to the story.

We have a wily group of core characters with distinct pasts and skills that complement each other - the plot here is both intimate to some characters, has larger galaxy implications and provides a solved mystery that leads to an ending that makes you want more without feeling like a massive cliffhanger.

The pacing of the story is fast - definitely take time with the first five or six chapters to understand who all the characters are.

I truly found this story to be phenomenal and I'm excited to read what Cho does next. Thank you to Zando and NetGalley for the ARC.