Ancillary Sword
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4.3 • 348 Ratings
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
Seeking atonement for past crimes, Breq takes on a mission as captain of a troublesome new crew of Radchai soldiers, in the sequel to the New York Times bestselling, award-winning Ancillary Justice.
Breq is a soldier who used to be a warship. Once a weapon of conquest controlling thousands of minds, now she has only a single body and serves the emperor.
With a new ship and a troublesome crew, Breq is ordered to go to the only place in the galaxy she would agree to go: to Athoek Station to protect the family of a lieutenant she once knew -- a lieutenant she murdered in cold blood.
Ann Leckie's Imperial Radch trilogy has become one of the new classics of science fiction. Beautifully written and forward thinking, it does what good science fiction does best, taking readers to bold new worlds with plenty explosions along the way.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Leckie's powerful sequel to Ancillary Justice is a touch less ambitious in structure, but every bit as incisive. As news that open civil war has broken out slowly percolates through the crumbling networks of Radchaai space, Fleet Captain Breq Mianaai arrives at Athoek. Subjugated by the aggressively expansionist empire six centuries before, Athoek should be an exemplary world of peace, wealth, and concord, but what Breq finds is a world where the Radch precepts of "justice, propriety, and benefit" have been twisted to justify negligence, outright exploitation, and willful ignorance by those charged with enforcing the law. As Breq methodically analyzes the intertwined networks of privilege, incompetence, corruption and spiteful cruelty, she learns that not all outrages can be punished and justice is often denied to those who most deserve it. Breq's struggle for meaningful justice in a society designed to favor the strong is as engaging as ever. Readers new to the author will be enthralled, and those familiar with the first book will find that the faith it inspired has not been misplaced.
Customer Reviews
A solid follow-up.
Though not measuring up to Justice, still a fun read, and exhibiting many of Justice's strengths.
Fleet Captain Breq’s First Assignment
“Ancillary Sword” is the second novel in Ann Leckie’s Imperial Radch Series. It’s a deep dive into her complex and different universe.
It continues to feature the culture and civilization of the Radch. They have built a interstellar empire by conquest, turning conquered planets into new citizens. When doing this they absorb their cultures and religions while imposing their own. They have mainly concerned themselves with other human civilizations, but there are at least three off-screen alien civilizations.
To support this military might, there are large AI controlled starships such as the Justice of Toren which was a troop-carrier with vast numbers of Ancillaries, which others refer to as corpse-soldiers. Each of these mind wiped, augmented, and repurposed human bodies is an extension of the ship. The ancillaries form a sort of a hive-mind with the ship’s AI, and should be little more than tools to be used and thrown away. However, when the Justice of Toren is lost through treachery, only a single ancillary that calls itself Breq remains. The first novel in this series followed Breq’s search for vengeance, and development as a person.
In this second novel, Breq has been appointed a Feet Captain by the Lord of the Radch, and given a military ship, the Mercy of Kalr. Breq has to bring together a troublesome group of fully human soldiers, and has been sent to the Athoek System to protect it and maintain the peace. Meanwhile, the Lord of the Radch fights a civil war with herself.
Breq finds that the Athoek system has significant problems brewing beneath the surface. The Citizens of the Radch should all be equal, and enjoy the opportunities of their enlightened civilization. The reality however, is quite different if one knows where and how to look…
This novel is quite different from the first, but I found it equally compelling. Breq continues to become a person, and develops as a character. Vast amounts of tea are consumed, and more details of the Radch Empire are revealed.
Entertaining but beware the Mary Sue
The first book in this series, Ancillary Justice, was pretty astonishing in its world building and choice of protagonist. That protagonist, the AI of a starship living in a more-or-less human body and working towards its own goals in an androgynous, space-faring human civilization with distinct religions and mannerisms and customs, is back in this sequel taking place immediately after the events of that first novel. And while the story is still good, with decent pacing and characters you can sink your teeth into, that protagonist is now so deeply Mary Sue that she might as well be a demigod. It’s still worth a read, but I do wish there was a little more weakness and an occasional mistake by the PIV character. Let’s see if it’s better in the third installment, which I’ll definitely read because the plot still holds me