ARRP: A Memory Called Empire Review
This review is for A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine (aka AnnaLinden Weller). It is a science fiction book published in 2019. It was the 2020 Hugo Award recipient for Best Novel.
Mahit Dzmare has been appointed as the new ambassador of Lsel, a station on the outskirts of a galactic empire. She is sent to the city planet at the heart of the Teixcalaanli Empire to represent Lsel. When she arrives at the heart of the empire, she discovers the previous ambassador is dead; hence, the demand from the city planet for a new ambassador. Mahit is suspicious of her predecessor’s death and starts to dig.
I predicted this book would be a 5-star read. Unfortunately, it wasn’t. However, I still enjoyed many aspects of this book and will read its sequel. Here’s the breakdown of my review:
Characters - Some of the characters were very interesting: Mahit, Yskander, Three Seagrass, Twelve Azalea, and Nineteen Adze (I had to look up what an adze was). The rest of the characters were a bit lackluster (except for Map. He’s too cute!). I did grow to care about some of the characters but not deeply enough to be that emotionally impacted. The way the book is written, I felt a bit disconnected from the characters. It seemed like I was reading an account of events and of the characters at times rather than really being immersed in the characters. Although, I think the Teixcalaanli culture is a character in itself. We explore parts of it quite in depth. That all being said, my rating for characters is a 2.
Worldbuilding - I enjoyed the world building. There was definitely depth (e.g., poetry’s role in the Teixcalaanli culture, the cloudhooks, the imagos, etc.). The naming convention for the citizens of the city planet was interesting. It’s a number + a noun (e.g., Three Seagrass). Which is similar to Mayan naming convention (maybe?). Martine spends a lot of page time describing the role of poetry and verse in the Teixcalannli culture and appropriate facial expressions for each situation. The latter part got a bit annoying. I didn’t find the worldbuilding to be confusing. Martine’s academic background seeps into her writing. But I did find it a bit frustrating that while a lot of pages were spent giving information about the world, I didn’t feel like the worldbuilding was very complete. We went deep in some areas but glossed over many others (e.g., life on Lsel, imago integration therapy). I didn’t find anything particularly unique about the world. For example, I’ve seen similar things done in Ancillary Justice. So my rating for worldbuilding is a 2.
Storytelling / Writing Style - Some people may find the worldbuilding a bit dry, but I enjoyed what we got - especially the part where people were basically rap-battling as a game. The way the information was given to the reader was consumable and not overwhelming. Martine’s writing is exquisite at times. There were parts where she painted a clear imagery in my mind with her words. Those parts were beautiful. One major complaint I have, though, are the excerpts that preceded each chapter. We get one excerpt from Teixcalaan and one excerpt from Lsel. Sometimes, the excerpts were a bit too long for my taste. I felt like the excerpts were pre-work the author did to flesh out the world and characters and were just slapped on to the final version of the book. The only ones I really enjoyed were excerpts of the fictional poems. Another qualm I have is the way humor was sprinkled throughout the book. For example, the naming convention was sometimes used to illicit laughter from the reader but I found that sometimes the names took me out of the story. Additionally, the humor felt a bit out of place - not well integrated into the flow of the story. There would be very serious and intense moments and then *pop* something would be said that is meant to be funny. I’ve read other stories where that works (e.g., The Murderbot Diaries), but the Teixcalaanli culture and the characters were all so serious that the humor felt disconnected. But I did enjoy the writing enough that I’m interested to read other things by Martine. For this category, I give a rating of 2.5.
Logic - The logic was fine. Martine explicitly explains pretty much everything she wanted the reader to get out of the book. She didn’t leave much to chance / doubt. For example, a character will say a sentence and Martine will explain exactly what she wanted the reader to get out said sentence. There were also interludes throughout the book that gave more backstory that explained motivations of certain characters. The plot itself was also fine. Nothing terribly complex. For logic, I give a rating of 3.
Enjoyment - While I give the logic part a 3 rating, having everything so clearly explained actually took away from my enjoyment of the book a bit. The intrigue was lessened because Martine explained so much as we went along. The way humor was planted in the book did not really increase my enjoyment as it felt a bit forced. I still enjoyed the book though. Mainly because the Teixcalaanli culture was interesting and Three Seagrass was a pretty good character. I probably won’t re-read this book. Unless the sequel is amazing and a re-read of A Memory Called Empire would provide a new reading experience. My rating for enjoyment is a 2.
A Memory Called Empire was recommended to me by StoryGraph. My averaged rating for this book is 2.3. Not bad. I didn’t love it but I liked it well enough to read the sequel and other works by Arkady Martine / AnnaLinden Weller. Out of all the 2020 Hugo Best Novel nominees, I’ve only read Middlegame by Seanan McGuire aside from this one. For me, personally, I enjoyed Middlegame more.
baratheonpilled
areudirty
turnnoffyourmind
ellievsbear
snowghoul
jbbartram-illu
theartofmadeline
dailybridgerton