When Captain Kel Cheris of the hexarchate is disgraced for her unconventional tactics, Kel Command gives her a chance to redeem herself, by retaking the Fortress of Scattered Needles from the heretics. Cheris’s career isn’t the only thing at stake: if the fortress falls, the hexarchate itself might be next.
Cheris’s best hope is to ally with the undead tactician Shuos Jedao. The good news is … news is that Jedao has never lost a battle, and he may be the only one who can figure out how to successfully besiege the fortress. The bad news is that Jedao went mad in his first life and massacred two armies, one of them his own.
As the siege wears on, Cheris must decide how far she can trust Jedao–because she might be his next victim.
‘Starship Troopers meets Apocalypse Now – and they’ve put Kurtz in charge… An unmissable debut.’
Stephen Baxter
‘I love Yoon’s work! Full of battles and political intrigue, in a beautifully built far-future that manages to be human and alien at the same time.’
Ann Leckie
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To be honest, I was initially put off by the cover (Babylon 5 called, they want their concept art back), but Ninefox Gambit had been blurbed by so many high-profile SFF authors that I had to give it a try. Glad I did, there’s a lot of fresh stuff to love in this grim-toned military space opera: characters struggling to be human in the face of an empire with absolute control of its subjects, conspiracies across deep time, strange quasi-magic tech powered by the mathematics of collective belief in the imperial calendar. I’ll be picking up the sequel for sure.
The author just throws you into this world, so it took me a bit to get my bearings, but I enjoy that feeling. Ninefox Gambit won multiple awards and was nominated for both the Huge and Nebula. Lots of very out-there ideas in this military space opera. I’m looking forward to picking up the sequel Raven Stratagem .
This was a great book. After finishing it, I immediately bought the other two volumes of the trilogy. Original, wonderful world building, military science fiction. It immediately grabbed my interest and held it throughout. Yoon Ha Lee goes on my list of writer’s whose work I want to read.
After almost an incomprehensible beginning, it gets a bit better. The math and tech and calendar don’t work at all — they are just words that can be substituted with any other words. The “magic system” used in the book never makes any sense. But there are some good ideas, and there is a sense of immersion into the alien culture. So despite the frustration, I still gave it a good rating, but I see no reason to read the rest. I tasted the dish, found it amusing, but not worse another bite.
One of the most original, well written sci-fi books I have had the pleasure to read in a long time.
A very thought provoking story. Somehow the author has made parts of his world as un-understandable as the future would be if we could see it.
This is the first of three volumes, so far, in the “Machineries of Empire” series. They are all top-notch.
Military sci-fi isn’t my cup of tea, but this one came highly recommended, and it wasn’t bad. The story is basically one long campaign to stem a heretic rebellion that threatens the stability of the entire system, by all means necessary. Reader goes into the story thinking they’re meant to root for the campaign, only to start questioning the sense of upholding the brutal system in the first place.
This wasn’t an easy book to get a hang of. The world is very alien and it’s explained only a little and only as the story unfolds, with a minimal descriptions for what things look like. The battles and the people in them remain a bit abstract throughout, with no emotional connection to them. Even Cheris as the main POV character remains distant. It isn’t until the end that change happens and then it’s like reading a different book.
Phenomenally inventive space opera setting, with a hilarious and yet tense conflict between the protagonist and the psychotic general whose spirit is trapped inside her. The beginning is kind of gory, but the rest of the book is less so.
While this book was very military (which I don’t usually like), I couldn’t put it down! I was so intrigued by the main characters and the story of Shuos Jadeo.