A complex, detailed and fascinating book that completely divided my opinion, Too Like the Lightning is certainly unique! I left this book not knowing if I should love it, hate it or how much I should even care. This book will definitely make you think!

I'd avoided this book for a while, intimidated by the difficult philosophical concepts that I had an idea were in it, and by the supposedly convoluted writing style. I found the book to not be nearly as difficult as my impression of it had been, and the writing style wasn't difficult either.

However, after 100 pages the book had not succeeded in holding my attention. Why not? The whole plot revolved around a MacGuffin that was a stolen list of Who's Who which was filched previous to it being published. The narrator( who is narrating this from some point in the future of the book) frequently pulls back from the action to ask the reader "did you see what I did there?" "Did you notice this choice of words?" Basically nudging your side to make sure you see how smart and complex everything is. This alone is enough to make me suspicious of this narrator, let alone the fact that he's been convicted of a horrible crime and is being forced to write this work (in the fiction of the book). There's one chapter that's largely made up of a table of the top "newspapers" (or what they use instead of newspapers in the 24th century) cross-referenced with their top-ten Most Influential lists. You can look at it, but the narrator himself tells you not to bother with the details, and that the point is probably not meaningful from the reader's supposed time in the future (or us in the distant past). But yet, there are several detailed charts to peruse! Why do we need to see them if we don't need to understand them, if not to understand how smart the author is?

I had a friend who used to ask, when presented with something inexplicable, "are they so smart or are we so dumb?" This book seems to want to be so smart and to make sure the reader doesn't feel bad for being too dumb. But in fact it's not all that smart, because a book that's really smart doesn't need to make sure you can see how smart it is. You can just tell. Hannu Rajaniemi, Charles Stross, N.K. Jemisin, none of them have to pull me aside in the book and point out little things that are really clever that I need to know and may have missed because they were being too subtle. I suppose I've found another pet peeve, a book that's not quite as smart as it thinks it is, but can't stop talking about its own brilliance. I'm sure you've met people like this, right?

Anyway, the author has come up with an interesting, if seemingly improbable, social system for her future. Instead of family groups, people live together in groups of friends and mates that they choose as adults called bash'es. They also choose either one of six Hives, which have replaced political nations, or become Hiveless and choose which set of laws they live by This means that everyone essentially wears livery proclaiming their Hive (and thereby their chosen set of laws) so that people know the rules for interacting. This seems cumbersome- what if two different sets of law are in play during a crime?- and assumes that everyone can see and understand Hive affiliation. In addition, the author talks quite a bit about ethnic features, from Greek to Japanese, as identifying features, and some Hives still have nationalistic sub-groups in play. It's all more complicated than it's supposed to be in theory, of course.

Much of what the narrator does is transgressive. He talks about ethnic affiliation instead of Hive and bash' affiliation. Gender is supposedly no longer recognized except by people who want to have recognized gender, but he assigns gender to characters willy-nilly throughout the book, based more on clothing than on physical sex. Apparently now that gender is not a thing, actually emphasizing sex characteristics is hugely kinky and people are far more vulnerable to seduction when anyone does do any kind of gender display. Basically the narrator chooses to ignore the rules of the society in which he lives, and because we see things through his eyes, that means that we're not immersed in this new world. We are given a cynical (perhaps nihilistic) distance from which to understand this society.

Although gender is supposedly not a thing here, it ends up being a big deal (of course) through most of the book and either the narrator or author made me a bit uncomfortable with their feelings about sexuality and gender. This book already feels dated in the era of Me Too, and so does its fascination with African, Asian, and Caucasian facial features and ethnic mixes. The author clearly wants everyone to understand why the Enlightenment Era folk found men in stockings and heels and women in long tight-bodiced dresses sexy, because everyone in the book seems to engage in sexual cosplay from this era. Okay then. That's about as realistic as people today wanting to dress up like varlets and ladies and constantly revisit that time. Sure, we've got the SCA, and I myself think the medieval era was pretty interesting. But it's of a piece with Ready Player One and its fixation on having a certain time and place in our culture that's past become the obsession of our future.

Anyway, the long and the short of it is that I didn't care about any of the characters after the first hundred pages. I haven't thrown in a lot of other detail in the book because I didn't end up caring about those plot threads either. I have a suspicion that the author is carefully setting up this whole intricate world only to tear it down and show that it doesn't really work the way she's been telling us it works all along. At this point, I'm so jaded about this sort of twist that I find it hard to engage with the first paradigm presented in a book. I'm just waiting for the surprise twist. This book can't even entirely engage with what it's about to turn upside down, and has a narrator that keeps letting us know that we're seeing a show. Basically the book is telegraphing that this is all a trick- so why should I read it?

DNF at 42%.

I was lured to this book by the abundance of 5 star reviews. I was really looking forward to reading it... The first chapter had me baffled, confused and disappointed. But I decided to stick around to see if the story would actually get good and justify all those raving reviews... it didn't. And as you can see, I stuck around for almost half of the book waiting for something to happen, so I think I gave it more than a fair chance.

I have so many problems with this book this review would become a laundry list of complaints if I were to touch on all of them. So I will limit myself to the aspects that raked me the most.

First, this story is told to the reader post-factum by a narrator that was there for some of the events and collected oral accounts of witnesses for the events he wasn't part of. That can actually work, if done well. I read a few books told postpartum and loved them... But that doesn't work if the narrator constantly breaks the fourth wall and addresses the reader directly. I was about ready to throw my tablet at the wall after the third "Dear reader, you might not know but blah-blah-blah...". After the fifth one, I was contemplating murder.

My second problem is that a combination of good ideas doesn't make a good story. I got the impression that the author got so enamored with their worldbuilding, that they forgot to actually tell a compelling story. We get introduced to Bridger, this boy wonder who will supposedly change the world, in Chapter 1... then we don't hear about him again until almost 30% into the book. Instead, we are introduced to an endless parade of characters, places, and philosophies, that I honestly stopped caring about after about the third chapter. My reaction became "yawn, who are all these people?" 

It felt like a kid showing me their collection of random shinies they have accumulated over the years - they are all pretty and unique on their own, but they have no connection to each other. Like I said, a collection of ideas doesn't make a story.

The final nail in the coffin of this book, at least for me, was when at 42% mark we finally come back to Bridger... then the narrator has to recap something that happened before (and he wasn't present to witness, so it's a third party account of a third party account). Yay, we finally have some action, even if related post-factum! Things are happening. Shenanigans are afoot... and then the action grinds to a screeching halt because a new character is introduce and it takes three pages to describe him, and what he is wearing, and how they are standing, and how others are reacting to him... Momentum = dead.

That's when I threw my hat and decided to bid the book goodbye. This is a sad moment, because I probably won't bother checking out other books by this author because my first impression was so disastrous.

PS: I received a free copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Well, what a ride! I expected to love this one, from the company it’s been keeping, and it’s certainly a complex book with a lot of moving parts, some of which I really appreciated… and others which felt weird or even viscerally discomforting to me. I feel like this is one where I almost don’t want to judge it at all until I’ve read the sequels, because the sequels are so necessary to evaluate the plot and get all the revelations that make things fall into place… but I’m also not sure I want to invest the time into them in case the potential doesn’t realise itself and I’m left feeling just as ambivalent.

Let’s start with what the book is even about: Too Like the Lightning takes the form of a document prepared by a man called Mycroft Canner, with the help of some of the other people involved in the events it discusses. It’s set in an attempt at a utopian society of hyper-individual people, where laws are imposed by agreements and a flying car system connects the world with such speed that geography is no longer a divider. There are all kinds of new-to-us social groupings: with the most important being the bash’, a sort of intentional family of like-minded people which may or may not raise children, and the Hive. Hives include Humanists, Cousins, etc, each Hive having different aims and priorities.

There’s all kinds of philosophy underlying this world, and I felt very at sea with that. I have studied some philosophy, but only for a year, and none of the philosophers mentioned here; sometimes I’ve read their literature (Voltaire), and that helped a little. I did wonder if I’d feel more at home in Palmer’s world if I had done the prerequisite reading on philosophy.

There is also not a little theological debate, because on top of all the SF elements, there is a boy who can literally make toys come to life with a touch. A major element of the story also revolves around the work of sensayers, who help people discuss ethics and theology in private (any kind of public proselytising is illegal). And then (no, I’m not done describing the basics of this world), the societies are all basically genderless and use ‘they’ pronouns… but the narrator has definite opinions on this and assigns pronouns to people based on gender stereotyping (a nurturing type is obviously a “she” to him).

That latter is part of what skeeves me out with this book. I’m not sure to what degree it is meant to be about Mycroft himself, though the central importance of other characters who enjoy presenting in a gendered way despite the non-gendered society kind of gets to me as well. The way they do at times verges on sexual assault, to my mind: aggressively in your face gendered sexuality, enforcing traditional gender roles whether the person you’re speaking to is willing or not — perhaps this bothers me so much because I would adore the ungendered world Palmer presents and then has these characters transgress against. Do what you like for yourself, but “aggressively flirting” is not actually your gender identity and your right to do that stops where my body and my comfort begin.

All the politics and all the theology plots are not in the slightest resolved by the end of the book, though, and leaving all of that hanging leaves me unable to form my opinion on whether the gender politics aspect is just gross or integral to the story. Likewise all kinds of other things.

In terms of characters, Mycroft is awful, and the same applies: I’d need to know the motivation behind his past crimes and what he is doing in shaping his narrative in order to judge whether I’m okay with having read all this, and… I don’t know if I want to read on. It’s a bit of a conundrum. There is a lot of fascinating social commentary here, and many elements I really want to learn the answers to. But at the same time… ewwww.

[I wrote this review a month ago and set it aside to stew over a bit longer. I don’t disagree with anything I said before, but I’ve lowered my rating by a star. I don’t think this series is for me.]

Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer is a great look upon future developments of modern society. Her ideas are mindboggling and yet firmly rooted in the world that we live in today.

People organize in order of their ideology supposed to living in certain areas of the world. The need for national states isn't existing anymore, due to fast travel possibilities, so you can live and work whereever you want.
For this to work some of the freedoms we have in our society have been removed, like your right to express religion. Religion is deemed as a problematic topic that is capable of stirring too much unrest and upheaval. Talk about spiritual ideas is only allowed under the guidance of experts.

In this society the subtle power shifts between the main ideologies are often represented in top 10 lists of influencial people. One of those lists gets leaked and causes some upheaval. Meanwhile there's little boy that s capable of performing miracles, which could proof very problematic for a society like this.
And those developments are only the tip of the iceberg as events kick off in Ada Palmers utopian series.

This read is not an easy one. It demands attention to detail from the reader and the will to work yourself into understanding a society that seems almost alien to us, although you can dlearly see where it came from.
For readers who are willing to do this, the novel offers a plethora of unique ideas and characters. Definitely not for everyone, but I was intrigued and look forward to the upcoming installments.

The dialogue in this book seemed stilted to me. I wasn't blown away by it, but science fiction readers seem to enjoy it and it has circulated well.

I am no stranger to difficult reads or sci-fi books. I like having my brain bent in unexpected ways, it's why I loved Embassytown with such a fierce passion. I like having my expectations dashed (in a good way) and my prejudices challenged. I'm no stranger to a challenging book and for something that only clocked in at 400-odd pages, it feels criminal that it took me nearly a month to read Too Like the Lightning, especially on the Kindle where normally I am a much faster reader. I cannot blame cycling commutes, lack of time in the evening with my marathon training nearly coming to an end (just over two weeks to go!) or distractions from a new video games console. The truth is, Palmer's debut novel nearly broke me.

Too Like the Lightning is both a fantastic and a challenging debut. Its narrator is Mycroft Canner, telling us their story from a future as alien to our current way of seeing as the Enlightenment Age would feel about about us. This is a future in which religion has been abolished, in which we have flying cars and technologically-generated abundance, in which even mass murder can be, in a way, forgiven, so long as you dedicate your life to becoming a Servicer, someone who roams the world performing useful deeds. It is a world in which nations have been dissolved and people choose one of seven Hives, based on interests, a world in which gender markers and pronouns have been made illegal and language is policed, everyone referred to as 'they' (a concept that I understand is also a key point in Ancillary Justice, another book I need to get round to reading this year). Beyond this, there is a whole slew of concepts and ideas to battle, to understand, to wrangle into a semblance of cohesion and because Palmer doesn't hold your hand at all, it can get very confusing very quickly.

To me, the book genuinely hit its stride about 40% of the way through, which is a tall ask for most people. How can I recommend something that is, by turns, frustrating and convoluted and I nearly gave up. Trying to read for an hour before bedtime did absolutely nothing for me or my level of comprehension, so I found myself floundering. It's not helped that Mycroft is such an unreliable narrator (and as the levels of his depravity are revealed, it's hard to keep an open mind towards him, particularly as he arbitrarily decides how and when to gender characters -- with carers being relegated to female pronouns and the leaders referred to as men, even when their biology would indicate otherwise) and Carlyle, though interesting in his role as sensayer (the future equivalent of a priest or religious man), is not always enough to carry a scene. The politics are all entangled and incestuous, as Palmer clearly hints at the fall of this age of Enlightenment (and indeed, this book and its sequel Seven Surrenders are meant to be seen as one work).

But how can I possibly recommend this book by asking readers to hang out till nearly halfway through? It's strange, because I found myself comparing its difficulty level to The Quantum Thief, a book and series I absolutely adored, but there was a hint of playfulness in that first book that I found was decidedly lacking here. This is high stakes politics and a world so foreign I didn't quite know where I stood. Everything seems to be couched in layers and layers of deception and it's hard, at times, to keep things straight with Mycroft: not only is his narrative ostensibly being 'censored', but he's also prone to make subjective observations, including inserting his own comments about what he believes my reaction would be, leading me to frustrating moments where I wanted to shake him to his senses (again, I'm sure this is entirely intentional on Palmer's part).

The second half of the books is much zippier, the world revealing itself, the key players becoming more and more entangled as they aspire to keep their positions of power. The climax, the revelations, Saladin's entire existence, pretty up the whole of the last Martin Guildbreaker chapter... I was racing through the pages, all the pieces sliding into place and I was so annoyed that the Kindle version isn't available in the UK, because right there and then I was so ready to just read it, I needed to know what was going to happen. The house of cards is most definitely falling and I really want to see how everything will line up, how Palmer intends to manage all this.

Overall, I think this is a very clever book with a lot of twists and turns, managing to put in one hell of an emotional punch in its last few chapters. On the other hand, it can be quite slow to get going, it expects you to remember a zillion names and connections and for a while, the Mycroft and the Carlyle storylines are slightly parallel, until they converge to an incredible crescendo. Bridger remains the wildcard, the unknown in all this mess, the miracle worker who could bring about war and destruction. The parallels with J.E.D.D. Mason are staggering, but I feel I'm missing out on some of the detail (particularly as this isn't a book I read on a religious daily basis), so perhaps one thing I ought to do is attempt the re-read before I pick up the sequel. It also assumes that you're at least familiar with the names of the main cultural players of the Enlightenment (Voltaire, Delacroix, de Sade, Rousseau) or that you're very willing to open Wikipedia at least. Palmer is actually a historian and teaches at the University of Chicago (along with being heavily endorsed by Jo Walton), so you know that foundation is solid at least.

Too Like the Lightning is one of the cleverest books I've read since Rajaniemi's Jean le Flambeur series, but it is not an easy read. Stick with it, though, and you may find yourself surprised.

Too Like The Lightning is a masterpiece, thoroughly researched and very complicated. It's hard to get into but once you figure out how things work you're pulled headfirst into a complicated story of a utopian world where the struggle for power is as real as ever. The reveals, the characters, the setting - everything is explored and nothing short of perfection. The intricacies of human nature - that's where this book truly shines. It shows us what it means to be human and leaves us exploring a sea of grey, uncertain yet so captivating.
The book explores various philosophical ideas that seem to be relevant in a futuristic setting as much as during the renaissance. I was left in awe of this book and I can't recommend it enough. You will be holding your head by the end of this one and left shaking with withdrawal, aching for the next installment. You'll be going over it again and again to figure out what just happened and how the story is going to turn out.