Skyward Inn
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3.8 • 4 Ratings
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- £5.99
Publisher Description
ARTHUR C. CLARKE AWARD FINALIST 2022 Skyward Inn, within the high walls of the Western Protectorate, is a place of safety, where people come together to tell stories of the time before the war with Qita. But safety from what? Qita surrendered without complaint when Earth invaded; Innkeepers Jem and Isley, veterans from either side, have regrets but few scars. Their peace is disturbed when a visitor known to Isley comes to the Inn asking for help, bringing reminders of an unnerving past and triggering an uncertain future. Did humanity really win the war?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Beneath the veneer of understated English-village realism lies a mind-bending reality in this slow-moving sci-fi fable from Whiteley (Skein Island). Years ago, Jem abandoned her baby for a 10-year contract to plaster the newly discovered planet Qita with propaganda posters. Now she's back home in the Western Protectorate, a walled-off region of England that has chosen to return to a pre-industrial life, where she and her Qitan partner, Isley, run a popular inn. Jem and Fosse, her now-teenage son, both seethe with resentment and alienation; meanwhile, an unauthorized Qitan visitor sparks a chain reaction of uncanny physical ailments among the people of the Western Protectorate, and the strange symptoms cast the Qitans' peaceful surrender to humans in a new light. Much of the novel is bogged down by dreary characters and overly vague worldbuilding, but as Whiteley builds to the climax, her trademark subtle surrealism shines. Literary sci-fi readers with a taste for family drama will enjoy this molasses-slow, deeply weird story of missed chances, invasion, and assimilation.
