skybridge

lbrunner.net · @lbrunner.net@bridge.neodb.net

Rated Perhaps the Stars 8/10

v\Reviewing this book is hard. Because it's the last book of a saga which I both loved but also disliked. Because its world building is top notch but some of its characters are also very irritating. Because it's a really deep and dense book touching a wide range of subjects (theology, philosophy, ethics, politics, identity, etc) which also make it very difficult to make sense of it and understand how it all fit together or even what it means.



I liked this book, I think it works way better than 7S or WtB which I either disliked or was just neutral towards. Knowing that this saga went from a trilogy to a quadrilogy, it makes me wonder if these intermediate books might have been more enjoyable if they had been cut differently, balancing the actions of the war in multiple books instead of cramming it all in the last one (which is noticeably bigger).



I think the easier way for me to express my complex feelings about this book (and, ultimately, the whole series) is just a good ol' pros and cons list.



Pros:



World building: that's the part that made me fall in love with Terra Ignota and this book only deepens it further, going into more details about how reservations or geographic nations continue to exist or the diplomacy between Hives. It would be easy to keep the Hives as stereotypical (e.g. Mason = angry, Utopia = scientists, Cousin = nice) but I think this book really makes them more realistic, showing that all Hives are a bit mixed and that there isn't a clear boundary. This book also goes more into details about religion and a bit less about gender but they are still present and discussed. One of the main things that isn't really touched in more than a superficial way is the economy, little details are known apart from the existence of landlords or factory owners (capital-based then?) and the Masons being really rich (as they have the biggest population: does that mean tax exists?). This isn't an issue but more details would have been nice.



Representation & Empathy: as with previous installments, the book features a very varied cast including varied sexualities, genders, gender expressions, family structures, religions, ethnies, disabled/non-disabled, neurodiversities, etc. This diversity is approached with a lot of empathy and respect, apart from "set-set discrimination" which continues from previous books. Apart from Mycroft's narration, characters all use the neutral "they" (as in previous book) and even Mycroft's base his usage of pronouns on the way he perceives people's expressed gender instead of biological (e.g. Jin Im-Jin or Charlemagne <spoiler>Accursed-Through-the-Ages-</spoiler>Guildbreaker). There are some really nice exchanges in the book around sexuality or gender expression (notably <spoiler>Cato-Helen coming out as asexual or Sniper's euphoria of using "it" as a pronoun and how it can feel too much, reflecting well this matter in my experience</spoiler>). Finally, the core family structure, the 'bash from (Japanese "ibasho"), lends itself well from mixing all this diversity together, especially in terms of family structure, which is mainly divided generationally, instead of around 2 parents and their children, and not rigid on matters of lineage (notably <spoiler>Ockham and Lesley having a child and Sniper being the next parent to be pregnant</spoiler> or <spoiler>Martin Semaphoros' turn to carry a child after Xiaoliu did</spoiler>). 9A's comments about the gender of leaders was interesting (i.e. <spoiler>how Madame's plan to reinstitute gender norms from past centuries ultimately failed as proven by three women basically ruling the world</spoiler>) but I felt a bit uneasy about the way it was presented (i.e. <spoiler>only women = no penises</spoiler>). While this is later contrasted, breaking all leaders in more granular categories (e.g. <spoiler>these are definitely male, those are arguable, etc</spoiler>), it just seems like a weird/slightly indelicate comment even though the spirit of th excerpt was good.



Plot: there is a lot of actions and things happening in this book and it's great. And I don't mean that in the sense of action scenes/movies with violence and such (even though there are a few), which is great as I dislike them in books and find them pretty confusing. This is a great improvement on previous books and I would have loved to have maybe a bit less in this one and more in previous ones, alas.



Ending: a lot of the plot points do get explained, some are easy to extrapolate and while the ending stays open in a certain way, it opens on something new without letting too much hanging in the rest of the books. This is done pretty skillfully, with very few exposition dumps. Some elements aren't explained directly and must be reasoned by yourself. As always you have enough room to also disagree with some of the conclusions the characters make (e.g. <spoiler>the nature of JEDD has an Alien or just a neuroatypical human</spoiler>). Overall the ending is fairly good and positive despite the horrors of war (lots of losses: <spoiler>Ganymède, Cookie, 9A, Cornel, Ando, a ton of Utopians, the Almagest, Cookie, lots of utopians dead, Almagest gone</spoiler> but also some underwhelming changes <spoiler>Humanists not changing, kind of a weird punishment for Gordian (opening up Brill's system), Mason just helping new Hives and avoiding majority in senate (no legal requirements), lots of people (Kosala, Faust) get off easy, even with the whole semi-servicer stuff (which is nice on its own)</spoiler>).



Cons:



Some characters: I loved 9A and was so sad to see Mycroft come back to the narration after a few chapters (but, afterall, it is his history). Some characters, notably Mycroft or JEDD, are really difficult to follow. Between the way they talk, what they talk about and the analogy they use to make themselves understood, it is just difficult to parse and to make sense. I love the use of Latin or Greek inline but it also doesn't help comprehension. Moreover, Mycroft is as crazy as always and a lot of what he writes is either plain insanity, hallucinations, etc. His contant (seemingly random at times) references to different Greek gods and their different aspects doesn't help. One thing I found fairly unrelatable as well was the emotionality of a lot of characters. Sure it's nice for them to be emotive and cry but 9A or Mycroft really seem to cry all the time for nearly no reason. It's not really a problem but I found it a bit ridiculous.



Plot: because the plot is so deep with so many threads and subplots, it is also so so so confusing at times. Trying to keep all the sides of the multidimensional conflicts in your head, while also keeping track of the different plot lines and what you really want an answer to as a reader can be pretty difficult.



Theology: while its presence is heavy in the book, that isn't really my main grip. My issue is mainly around how it basically feels like magic. A lot of potentially supernatural things happen or are told by people and they are mostly accepted as face value. I found the credit given to the whole Illiad theme very dubious.



In summary: it's a good book and I would recommend it to people who enjoyed Too like the Lightening even though the intermediate books might be not as enjoyable. It is a satisfying end to a great saga.



Also in order to try to sort out the plot in my head (and for future, confused me), here is how I interpret the plot points of all the books (spoilers for all the books and the ending up to the last page):

<spoiler>

Just a massive brain dump



As humans we are created in the image of our creator. This is reflected through Dominic grasping for JEDD (The One Who Reached for his Kind) but also through Mycroft (who represents the worst tendency of mankind and therefore our Maker) or any other characters.



Bridger is less a self-insert than a hook, a way for our Maker to directly influence our fate, which doesn't really explain the lack of belly button (apart if our Maker cannot influence us enough to make us do what They want directly so they need to create someone from scratch).



JEDD is pushed into power by both the love of His multiple parents (representative of our Maker love for Their new Friend) and also His purity, making us want to leave the heavy responsibility of leadership to such an ethics-focused Being. JEDD is a God, like our Maker, contacted and imported into our finite universe for the sake of our Maker's company. Because we are made in our Maker image, this means we will find aliens, representing how They found JEDD.



Hives are more aspect of mankind, and by extension our Maker, than exclusive clubs or nations. Utopia are nothing but the inventive and audacious scouts of Mason, which is the human representation of power and unity, Cousin is our emphatic side, Humanist our desire to exceed and succeed, Europe or Mitsubishi our traditions. I think Gordian probably goes against our Maker directly (I am not sure how it fits apart as a representation of our Maker adapting to Their Guest's demands to stop Distance). Hives are different sides of the same coin, how we perceive and present ourselves. This explain why Humanists are the most Hiveguard (followed by Mitsubishi, one half of tradition), they represent the desire to succeed independently, against all odds and the Alien.



All of these, start from the PoV of JEDD being a God and our Maker existing which is the only way to explain Bridger's, and their relics', existence.

Mycroft's hallucinations (including the Mardis) are bleed-through from the future where he is awakened with various historical figures (Hobbes and the other philosophers from previous books, and probably the Mardi) and encounter them again. The reader is thus not a representation of us as could be initially understood in previous books but actually a reader from the future as Mycroft says in the first pages of the first book (funnily, this has very Homestuck feel to it).



I am still fairly confused about Mycroft's beliefs around the greek pantheon (Our Maker is thus all of the gods at the same time, just using different aspects for different situations?) and how it ties with his belief in Providence (which does seem to exist due to our Maker actions behind the curtains).

JEDD staying a Minor because They don't think They could be independent without a legal guardian due to their lack of object permanency doesn't really exclude the fact that They are just not neurotypical and in the context of the books: a really particular kind of set-set. This had always been my personal theory as I didn't (still don't?) believe that JEDD is properly Alien (even though it is mentioned multiple times how Their brainwaves and such are different from other humans, still doesn't preclude it IMO).



I long wondered if the book was in some way a critique of our "Exponential Age" but between the ending which reveal that the Reader was really from the future and not much being said apart from environmental and free speech abuse. Sniper's mention of our "golden age for gender" is a net positive mention though.



I can't help reading Mycroft's beliefs as Palmer's, for some reason those are interlinked in my mind. All this talk of Providence but also Greek Pantheon, Distance/Time/Death or our Maker making stepping stones for us... It feels a lot like proselytism at times.

</spoiler>



Read to the tunes of:

- Gojira: notably This Emptiness (associated with JEDD), Backbone (associated with MASON/JEDD), Adoration For None

#book

Published 2019-08-14 12:21 UTC · bridged from Atmosphere