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Alright - be warned - this is the lead book in a series. They want to sell you more books, LOL!
Science fiction? I don't think Lee's story is strictly SF. There is some resemblance to SF, and some to fantasy. Lee has written something different here.
There is no real attempt to explain, or to lean upon science. Lee has some almost magical force, largely based on numerology, or more accurately, the Calendar, which the characters manipulate in various ways. Space opera? Ehhh - maybe. There are only a limited number of characters that are truly developed. And, those characters don't get to meet each other very much, so it's not really opera.
I asked in the poll thread, whether this was likely to be a SJW's idea of science fiction. https://soylentnews.org/pollBooth.pl?qid=104&aid=-1 There is some of that, but it's not the purpose of the book to put across one of the currently favored SJW themes.
Mr. Lee is Chinese, and he seems to draw on Chinese mythology, legend, or maybe even history. Sadly, I'm not sure that I'm getting the full story, because I know so little of the Chinese culture. [Yoon Ha Lee is Korean.]
All the same, this has been a pretty action packed space adventure. The heroine is a military commander (captain of infantry) whose pastime is math. The math that enables and manipulates this mysterious force. As a military commander, her task is less to bring firepower to bear upon the enemy, as to keep her troops in formation. The formation is mathematically calculated to focus the force on the enemy, or to defend freindly troops. A "gun" may or may not fire a projectile, at all - and if it does fire a projectile, it is unlikely to be a solid, physical projectile. Call it magic - the gun merely focuses the magic that the commander intends to use.
Kel Cheris' math abilities help her to defeat an anemy in the opening chapter, which her colleagues have been unable to touch. This brings her to the attention of the high command, who has a far greater challenge to be met.
Enter the hero/madman/villian/anti-hero/traitor. Shuos Jedao can be described as a disembodied mind, kept as a pet of the Heptarch, and routinely trotted out of his "black cradle" to solve insoluble problems. Jedao will be "anchored" to Cheris mind, and body.
Cheris and Jedao are approved as the most likely solution to a rebellion on a Heptarch fortress that threatens the very existence of the Heptarch. The parameters defining "success" are pretty strict - the impregnable fortress must not be destroyed, if, in fact, they can gain entry.
There is plenty of intrique, with the Heptarch holding the end of a long leash, which Jedao must not escape. Cheris herself is also on a leash. But, the higher echelons don't understand the game that Jedao has been developing for the last four centuries.
This story is a wild ride, and just when you think you're nearing the end of the journey, you find that you have only just begun!
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday March 29 2017, @12:39PM (11 children)
I'm kinda annoyed that there's a lot of sniping at Korean this vs Chinese that about the theme when for a variety of geopolitical reasons there's not much difference between Chinese, Korean, and Japanese culture. You can complain all you want about how bad the bad old days were but the fact of the matter is the bad old days HAPPENED so large swathes of Korean culture are Chinese culture or are Japanese culture. So that's where nine foxes come from, apparently, whatever.
I'd like to talk about the other half. Apparently the author is officially not American (well, according to us, I wonder what the author thinks about themselves) but is Hyphenated-American and from the American culture side I'm curious how much resonance there is between the famous (probably?) Honor Harrington character and the Kel Cheris character.
I've read some Honor Harrington series, the first book is pretty good, very Space Opera. I mean everyone into SF probably knows Honor Harrington, right? Shes sort of a Tasha Yar like character except instead of dying in the first season she gets command of a ship and gets into some interesting space opera style battles. Her later books in my opinion are more boring as she rises higher that starship commander. But whatever.
I do have a copy of this book in audiobook format waiting on me probably over easter holidays, so I'll find out for myself the hard way, but I do kinda wonder if the similarity ends at "they both military women" or if she's essentially a photocopy of Harrington or if there's some shoutouts ... Please let her not have a pet that perches on her shoulder like a parrot and lives in a cage in her quarters.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday March 29 2017, @02:49PM (4 children)
"they both military women"
Is there supposed to be some significance to when you drop into grammatically-incorrect mode? You kept going on about "we was kings" in the other article.
Or is this one of those tongue-in-cheek things that if you explain it it'll start a big fight and downmods :P
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday March 29 2017, @04:06PM (3 children)
Type at 100+ wpm, blink the wrong way, $#& dropped an apostrophe. If you read glyphically entire words at a time then proofreading nonsense like relics relating to strange non-fiction unironically described randomness slips right thru, although a major missspelin would be instantly caught because thats a malformed glyph. Even worse they both military women is not only spelled correctly by is conceptually correct in that both imaginary characters were captains. You know who else was a fictional female sci fi captain? Janeway. I wonder how Janeway fits in WRT Kel Cheris.
The "we was kings" is not my invention that's a self described by a racial revisionist history group. They have some impressive although incredibly unrealistic alternative facts relating to African pre historic civilization. There are some fascinating youtube videos. In the other discussion about an alt-hist sci fi novel there are people who more or less unironically believe in it to one level or another as non-fiction. Ancient Egyptians were black and built the pyramids. Africans invented philosophy and writing and horses and pretty much everything but the whites stole it and there has been a multi-millennial multi-cultural coverup in place to make sure black folks don't get credit because, um, we'll skip the because part... Also Africans discovered America before Columbus because there's evidence of maps of the new world in African relics none of which unfortunately are present in museums or scientific study. Pottery in Scotland was occasionally made with black pigment drawings of people therefore ancient Scots were black skinned aka Africans, ditto Greeks and Chinese and Romans and Japanese (Africans were also the first Ninjas, and I'm not making this up). Its strange, kinda interesting stuff.
I remember reading an interview or biography of Tolkien where he more or less admitted the Germans and Nords had cooler mythological supernatural prehistory and origin story, so he kinda made one for England out of what dumpy fairy tales the English had. Beowulf is cool let me write an even better fanfic and set it in England, kinda. "We was kings" is kinda the same thing in Africa without the self awareness that its mythological fiction. Sorta their Atlantis mythos. It mostly comes from people in America not Africa which makes it weirder yet.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday March 29 2017, @04:21PM (1 child)
"we was steampunk kings"
"we wuz kangs"
because we was steampunk kings.
I wasn't questioning the idea of the African steampunk thing, I was questioning why you kept purposely writing it grammatically wrong. It comes off as as some sort of backhanded Ebonics "haha, black people can't talk properly."
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday March 29 2017, @04:49PM
I looked it up and the technical term for it, which is useless to search for, is "Pan-African Black Afrocentric Egyptian Hypothesis". Or something like that.
Its a cultural appropriation to steal lines out of their youtube videos but much like "white men can't dance" its more straightforward to appropriate their own phrase than to try and express it in another vernacular.
Umm... most of the people commenting on the Pan-African Black Afrocentric Egyptian Hypothesis on the internet are making fun of it and their people, something like "the old negro space program" as seen on youtube is probably the most polite mocking you'll see probably because it splits its time between making fun of Ken Burns and his SWPL fans while also making fun of "Pan-African Black Afrocentric Egyptian Hypothesis" if it were logically extended into an alternative history of the 50s/60s space race. And that being the most polite and respectful video I can think of, while also not being safe for work, you might find other commentary on that academic topic somewhat toxic. There is a two video series by people in the "Pan-African Black Afrocentric Egyptian Hypothesis" movement, I can't remember the name, something with "colors" in it, that's not supposed to be a comedy yet is somehow more comedic than the space program video.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 29 2017, @11:10PM
Maybe you shouldn't type so fast.
But that does explain your stream of consciousness style.
Typing at 100+ wpm is fine for copying something from dead tree format.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday March 29 2017, @03:15PM
I wasn't struck by any strong similarity between Honor and Cheris. Yeah, they're both military females. Their characters come from different backgrounds, their history is different, Cheris is primarily infantry, where Honor is fleet. I'd have to re-read some of the Honor books to refresh my memory, but they really don't look very similar to me. Possibly a shoutout or two, but if so, they aren't very blatant.
It's also possible that I didn't make the bonding thing clear enough. Prior to Jedao being anchored in her mind, she was merely a somewhat exceptional infantry officer, a company commander. I don't want to give to much away, but Cheris' accomplishments after meeting Jedao can't be claimed as "her" accomplishments, or as Jedao's - they have become a team. If one falls, the other falls, if one triumphs, the other triumphs. In this universe, one may learn to dominate the other, but they are almost literally inseparable.
IMO, Cheris promises to become a - uhhh - more complex? character than Honor Harrington. Or not. We'll see where the next book takes us.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday March 29 2017, @05:56PM (1 child)
there's not much difference between Chinese, Korean, and Japanese culture.
How about compared to Houston, TX, where the author was born? You know, the type of fact someone writing a review might be bothered to look up.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday March 29 2017, @07:16PM
With the further irony that in theory its a sci fi novel about space. With all due respect to the Koreans and Houstonians I have no interest in nerdy Koreans or nerdy Houstonians in space, I want to read an imaginative somewhat hard sci fi story that makes me think about something other than sources of delicious BBQ.
Its almost like fate is daring me to write a hard sci fi novel about delicious BBQ in space. I'm not liquored up right now but this is the kind of challenge that does fire me up. Might be seeing me in the nebulas next year or two, never know. Maybe a bottle of liquor and some take out Korean BBQ could get me to write the first chapter.
Just think how you could rotate the meat as is cooks without any contact in space. Might be some tenderness advantage to drop the air pressure so if boils in its own juices concentrating flavor. Could I sear with ultraviolet light enabling lower cooking temps for more tenderness? Semi-seriously, has anyone in the real BBQ business ever fooled around with air pressure and UV impingement? I could also BBQ during solar flares to rely on proton flux to sterilize the meat. Hmm.
I could franchise the marketing rights out to the usual suspects in the BBQ industry. I could turn it right around and cross market a sauce of my own. Soylent flavored of course. Made of people, for people. Jones soda uses submitted pix on their labels... I'm thinking /pol/ memes on my labels, I mean what could possibly go wrong? Spicey!
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Wednesday March 29 2017, @07:44PM (2 children)
for a variety of geopolitical reasons there's not much difference between Chinese, Korean, and Japanese culture.
You know, that is strange, because there is not much difference between Greek, Roman, French, German, British, and American culture. And Star Wars. Something about the Hero with a Thousand Faces. VLM, your shallow generalities about history and culture are almost as amusing as your suggestion for concentration camps for immigrants!
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday March 29 2017, @09:54PM (1 child)
your shallow generalities
Now wait a minute, see I'm the only guy in the conversation that hasn't read the book yet, are you implying it some super deep dive into the heart of Korean culture? Where's there's no point in reading unless I already know all about fan death and eye shopping and watch taekyeon on TV every night? Like don't read this book unless you got a hanbok in your closet? I work with a Korea-bro so I know all about that stuff. Or at least I believe the stories he tells, some of which are probably BS. Vending machines full of beer in Seoul. Sure whatever. Its not all fun and games, he microwaved something using fish sauce he smuggled from home and pretty much evac'd the building. At the time that was not funny. Years later its epic, sure. But not funny at the time.
Cause I had the impression the book was pretty shallow WRT to being Korean and more of a sci fi book. There's a difference between star trek with some Korean BBQ for flavor vs some kind of graduate level history of Korea textbook. I donno anything about intersectional third wave feminism in Korea and if I have to know that much to enjoy the book I'm not really gonna bother with the book, life's too short.
concentration camps for immigrants
Illegal ones only. And only until safely and legally deported using the normal channels. The hard core folks want to use a trebuchet over Trumps Wall. Which is a little off topic from... what were we talking about? Oh yeah you weren't contributing anything interesting, that was it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 29 2017, @11:07PM
Last time I needed fish sauce I bought it at the local supermarket....
In flyover country....