The Stars Are Legion
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4.0 • 97 Ratings
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
“[A] thought-provoking space opera.” —Kirkus Reviews
“One of the most unusual and powerfully disturbing space operas we’re likely to see this year.” —Chicago Tribune
Set within a system of decaying world-ships travelling through deep space, this breakout novel of epic science fiction follows a pair of sisters who must wrest control of their war-torn legion of worlds—and may have to destroy everything they know in order to survive.
Somewhere on the outer rim of the universe, a mass of decaying world-ships known as the Legion is traveling in the seams between the stars. Here in the darkness, a war for control of the Legion has been waged for generations, with no clear resolution.
Zan wakes with no memory, prisoner of a people who say there are her family. She is told she is their salvation, the only person capable of boarding the Mokshi, a world-ship with the power to leave the Legion. But Zan’s new family is not the only one desperate to gain control of the prized ship. Zan finds that she must choose sides in a genocidal campaign that will take her from the edges of the Legion’s gravity well to the very belly of the world.
In the tradition of Iain M. Banks’s Culture novels and Roger Zelazny’s Chronicles of Amber, Kameron Hurley has created an epic and thrilling tale about tragic love, revenge, and war as imagined by one of our most celebrated new writers.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In a universe where the word for spaceship is the same as for world, two women struggle to escape a perpetual war in this dystopic yet hopeful space opera. Zan works to regain her memory of being the only survivor from a raid on a mystery ship, while stuck in a royal-court setting where she trusts no one but Jayd, her adoptive sister. Jayd, daughter and aide to the Lord Katazyrna, keeps her own secrets, including one that could turn Zan against her. Both are removed from their positions when the Katazyrna are ambushed by rivals, with Zan dropped down a recycler and Jayd taken as consort by the rival lord. Don't be led astray by the gendered titles; this universe is populated entirely by women. Hugo-winner Hurley (Empire Ascendant) gives the reader little, with both protagonists unable or unwilling to explain much. As they encounter the surprising practices (including blood sacrifice, experimentation on live subjects, and hunting of genetic mutants) among the different layers of the world-ships, the reader shares their astonishment and anxiety. Hurley places herself squarely on the side of love and trust over hate and fear, even as she details how trust can be abused and love can be manipulated. She excels at keeping the reader involved and supportive of Zan and Jayd when they seem most lost, and even when they are most opposed to each other. This gripping book is both hard to read and easy to appreciate.
Customer Reviews
Excellent. I do not want more.
Utterly bizarre and distinctly horrifying but brilliant, fascinating, and very well-executed. I would like to go back to more conventional space opera now.
Power Lesbian Cronenberg Warhammer 40k
And I mean that in the best way possible. 11/10
Not what I expected. In the worst way.
Though initially the world building of this novel is quite fascinating, you quickly we realize that the author was essentially working backwards from the concepts she wanted to make a book about, and hadn't fully thought it all through.
The book has the feel of having a fever dream inside the belly of a dying whale populated entirely by angry and violent lesbians. I guess that's pretty much it actually.