Overview
Mahit Dzmare, ambassador from the small independent Lsel Station, arrives at the capital of the Teixcalaanli Empire to replace her predecessor. Who died under murky circumstances. Mahit carries in her head an 'imago' of her predecessor's memories, a Lsel neural technology that lets each ambassador inherit the last one's expertise. Only her imago is fifteen years out of date, glitching, and possibly sabotaged.
Arkady Martine. The pen name of a Byzantine historian named AnnaLinden Weller. Has built a civilisation whose obsession is poetry, whose emperor is chosen by a fifteen-line coded verse, and whose citizens communicate through allusion and quotation as a matter of daily politics. This is a novel where the political thriller depends on whether a small-nation diplomat can compose a good enough couplet at a state banquet. It works.
The sequel. A Desolation Called Peace. Is nearly as good, and closes the two-book arc cleanly. There are no plans for a third book. This is the right length for the story, and I hope Martine holds the line.
