Review of Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie

Author:  Ann Leckie.
Title:  Ancillary Justice.
Publisher:  Orbit.
Copyright:  2013.
Pages:  422.
Price:  $16.00 (US).

Overview & Impressions:

Breq, the narrator of Ancillary Justice, is an AI trapped in a female human's body.  She was in charge of the Justice of Toren, a troop transport in the service of the Radch Empire.  Her vessel is destroyed and she left desiring vengeance.  She encounters one of her old officers, Seivarden, who was trapped in a stasis unit after his ship was destroyed a thousand years before.

This book makes use of impersonal pronouns in the Radchian language.  At the beginning, it took me a little while to figure that out.  A race of aliens have introduced a virus that divides the Lord of Radch into a dozen competing parts.  This brings about civil war.  Breq and Seivarden are trapped into serving the "good" Emperor of Radch who manages to destroy his rival AI components.

Having an AI as a narrator was original.  But I was turned off by Leckie's abuse of she to describe masculine characters.  I think it defeats the purpose of English pronouns.  However, what do I know?  She won a Hugo and Nebula for her debut novel.  First of three in the Imperial Radch series.  Interesting reading...

More reading of Twilight of the Hellenistic World

I read another 75 pages in Twilight of the Hellenistic World concerning Philip V of Macedonia's Social Wars in late 220 BCE.  Different Greek city states allied with or against Macedonia.  Both sides were worn out by several years of fighting.  I didn't realize Sparta, Thebes, and Corinth still had fight left in them after three centuries of constant warfare.  I'm curious to see where the author leads me to now that I've seen Ptolemy of Egyptians and the Selucids meddle in Greek affairs despite their Macedonian rivals...

Late February Reading: Part III

I read another chapter in Ancillary Justice today.  Not as much I would have liked.  But some progress.  It's an interesting book having a female AI as the narrator.  The whole pronoun thing is burdensome.  I don't think I'll bother with the other books because of it once I'm done with Ancillary Justice by Anne Leckie.

Mad dash to find Vietnam, Indochina, and Korean War books...

I listened to Combat Colours (Steve Hood) the other day.  I decided to finish my Cold War book collection for now.  I bought the following:

Six Silent Men:  Book Two, Six Silent Men:  Book Three, Streets Without Joy, The Last Valley, and The Coldest Winter:  America in the Korean War.  That should round out my Cold War reading.

I also purchased the following:

Once They Moved Like the Wind and Empire of the Summer Moon.  Once They Moved Like the Wind is about the Apache Wars and Empire of the Summer Moon is about the Comache.  I want to expand my limited knowledge on the Pony Wars.  I'd thought about gaming it.  I can't find a rules set I liked and didn't want to be the one putting everything together (like I did on 15mm SYW and 28mm FPW).

I also purchased speculative fiction.  Namely Poseidon's Wake by Alastair Reynolds and Vicki Peterwald:  Survivor by Mike Shepherd.  They go on the to read pile.  Like everything else...

15mm SYW Game, 20FEB16 - AAR

Here are photos of a 15mm SYW game that pitted the French against the British/Hanoverians using Koenigs Kreig rules.  This game pitted Steve Hood (Combat Colours) vs. Glenn Wilson (Mute Bystander) in the first game I've hosted at my house with new gaming tables:

                                          15mm SYW initial battle lines.

                                          The armies advance.

                                          The cavalry battles separate from the infantry engagement.

                                          Hanoverian Horse take on French Gendarmes.                                        

                                          The game ended on Turn Eight when the French failed their Army Morale.

Mid/late February reading....

I spent today reading the beginning of Twilight of the Hellenistic World.  It's set in the Alexandrian Successor states in the late 3rd/early 2nd century BCE.  I'm reading about the different Greek city states and their various alliances.  It seems Macedonia would play different factions off in the quest for predominance on the Achean mainland.  Sparta and Athens were still two large players.  There were others.  Rome put an end to all this when it consolidated its holdings in the eastern Med against the crumpling Greek states.

I'm just getting into the internal politics.  This had been going on since the death of Alexander the Great in the fourth century BCE.  Right now, the author is just covering mainland Greece.  There were other parts of the Successor's empire.  I think this was the time of mercenaries, too.  I'm only 50 pages into the book, so I'm not a point where I can really comment.  Other than it's interesting stuff... 

Late February reading: part II and other musings

For my nonfiction, I started an ebook called Twilight of the Hellenistic World on my NOOK.  It's by Pen & Sword Publishing.  It looks interesting.  The Alexandrian Successors have been an interest of mine for a long time.  I can't justify the cost in lead and time in order to game with them.  I had 28mm Bronze age Greeks and Trojans.  I got rid of those figures during the move...

I have a retired friend I regularly game.  He isn't in good health.  I noticed he and I game a lot together.  I don't know what I'll do when he finally passes.  My friend Don has gotten me into all sorts of periods.  I'll be able to game with others on the weekend.  However, Don is someone I can get together on a regular basis and roll dice with. 

He loves 28mm Romans.  He loves 30mm WH40K.  Don loves 28mm British Colonials.  Don's vision is getting to point he can't see.  I don't know when his doctors will fix his cataracts.  Don and I talked about gaming 28mm Ancients.  No one else would bother. 

When I moved, I made a concerted effort to downsize.  So the 28mm ancients went.  Now, Don has the figures.  But he literally has no room in his house.  I have room and a place to finally game.  And books on ancient Greeks and Romans.

The 30mm Warmachine figures have been assembled and bagged.  I'll be working on 15mm SYW Reichsarmee. 

I have the following in the painting queue:

15mm SYW Saxons
18mm SYW Prussians
28mm Masai Warriors
28mm Colonial German Marines
30mm Warmachine Rhulic dwarfs
30mm Warmachine Steelhead Company mercenaries

Afterward, it's:

28mm Sudanese Mahdists
28mm Viet Cong
28mm ARVN infantry
28mm 1960s US Marines
28mm 1860s French Foreign Legion
28mm 1860s Mexican infantry

I got rid of a lot.  However, I have nothing to sell in a local used gaming auction (love the irony when I had the stuff to sell, but no room to store it).

Looking at my nonfiction reading queue, I have the following books:

History of Ancient Egypt:  Vol. II by John Romer
Finland at War:  The Winter War 1939-40
The Coldest Winter, America in the Korean War
Such Men as These
The Last Stand of Fox Company
Marine Sniper, 93 Confirmed Kills
The Tunnels of Cu Chi
Six Silent Men
Sunrise at Midnight
They Marched into Sunlight
The Battle of the River Platte
From Eden to Armageddon
Conquer or Die!
Devil of a Whipping:  The Battle of Cowpens
The Road to Guilford Courthouse
 Chief Joseph and the Indian Wars
Armies of the War of the Pacific, 1879-1883:  Chili, Bolivia, and Peru
The Defeat of Rome

That's what I remember.  It's a lot.  I'll post reviews as I get through the books.  But, it's an eclectic mix of stuff.  Outside of my 28mm Vietnam, I'm not going to be doing anything else with it....