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Published by: Tor Genre: sci-fi space opera Pages: 560 Format: ebook Review Copy: Courtesy of NetGalley
Shards of Earth is Adrian Tchaikovsky’s first bona fide attempt at a space opera, the opening to his
Final Architecture trilogy, and one of the best science fiction books I’ve read this year. Tchaikovsky’s ambitions for this series are made clear early on—
Shards opens with a story of cosmic struggle against an enemy so vast, even humanity’s most advanced weaponry does no more than pinprick them. The Architects are “moon-sized entities that can reshape populated planets and ships” (as per the Glossary) into crystalline sculptures of staggering and repulsive beauty. These cosmic leviathans are utterly unaware of the uncountable lives snuffed out in the process of the transformation they induce.
The first world targeted by these staggering intelligences is Earth; and so Tchaikovksy’s future humanity is orphaned from its cradle, which has turned into little more than a confederation loosely held by multiple factions under the name “Hugh” (or Council of Human Interests) by the time the crux of the narrative picks up. Forty years have passed since Intermediary Idris and two of his “siblings” at last managed to make contact with one of the Architects and so buy humanity a reprieve. The very same Idris, working now as navigator atop a shabby vessel by the name of the
Vulture God, makes the deep-space discovery of a vessel that has gone through the same crystallization process as so many of humanity’s central worlds did, in that great war. The discovery sets off a series of events that affect, as you’ll imagine, forces far outside the
Vulture’s crew.
While this is an overt simplification of one main thread of the narrative, Tchaikovsky tells a far more intricate story. By the point the
Vulture makes its discovery, the ship’s crew has picked up a new recruit—point of view character Solace, a Myrmidon Executor of the Partheni, the genetically engineered sisterhood of humanity, battle angels sworn to the defence of human space and the most militarily advanced strand of humankind. The nation of Parthenon is “composed of parthenogenetically grown women,” who are considered by their creator to be “an ideal version of humanity”. For that very reason, they are feared by much of humanity, especially the Nativists and their extremist faction, the Betrayed. During the great war, all of humanity was held together by the common threat of the Architects; forty years later, fractures between the two strands of humanity have widened to the point that tensions might give way to open war at the least provocation. The Parthenon’s one great disadvantage? They lack Intermediaries of their own, those capable of travelling outside the Throughways and into deep space at a faster-than-light speed. Solace has a history with Idris from all the way back in the war, when the Int was her responsibility to look after—pulled into active duty from cryosleep, she’s been sent to make Idris an offer, one he may not be able to refuse. Here’s the essence of Parthenon in Solace’s own words:
“I know that in the Colonies they say a lot of things about my people. I’ve seen the Hugh propaganda too. We’re warmongers, we’re man-haters, we’re unnatural, born in a lab, indoctrinated. Programmed like machines. All that, I’ve heard. And nobody remembers we died for the Colonies, above a hundred worlds, during the war. We were the line.” And the softer edges of her voice were ablating off, revealing only steel beneath. Kris belatedly remembered this wasn’t just third-generation ancestral pride; Solace had been there. She had fought in the war, faced the Architects. “We were the shield and sword of the Colonies,” the Partheni went on. And then, when the war was over, you started asking why we had to keep on being different to you. Why couldn’t we just come back and be your wives and daughters again? You really think we quit Hugh because we had some designs on your planets? Because we wanted to line all your menfolk up against a wall, and make everyone else like us? We left because you hated us and would have used your laws to break us if we’d stayed. … All we ever did was put our lives on the line for you. And you still hate us for it.”
After a quote like this, I bet at least a few of you know if
Shards of Earth will work for you.
But you see, I haven’t even mentioned the FTL travel. In true space opera fashion, it is a common occurrence. Tchaikovsky uses the concept of “unspace” to have the races of his galaxy cut through vast spaces; staying awake during voyages through unspace holds dangers all its own, for anyone who has braved it feels an uncanny presence, seeking, searching to close the distance. There’s something of Warhammer 40k’s Warp there, something Lovecraftian, too—presented in such a way as to be novel rather than tired. The explanations that this is a shared experience triggered by the staggering alone-ness at play here, hallucinogenic in nature, rings very false indeed:
…the fact that everyone who came out of unspace sane and hale reported the same ‘delusion’ was not a comfort. Because Kris couldn’t stop thinking, surely there was only one logical explanation to everyone having the same experience . . . That, despite everything, there really was something out there. Unspace had a single and inimitable denizen, and she was trapped in here with it.
Humanity is far from alone—rather, it is part of a bustling galactic community. In addition to the strands of humanity under Hugh and Parthenon control, there’s the Hegemony, a much older civilization controlled by the inscrutable Essiel, possessing the knowledge to protect worlds from the Architects’ transformative touch. The Essiel seek to expand their control over humanity but are unwilling to do so through their strength in arms, electing to persuade through the promise of safety and harmony. We never see a proper Essiel-controlled world, but the Hegemony’s culture promises to be a starkly different one compared with the bustling, staggeringly multitude humanity has to offer.
There’s also the Hivers, autonomous distributed intelligences created by humanity but now with distinct goals and interests of their own; the unkillable killing machines that are the Tothiat; the crab-like Hannilambra aliens, and several others I won’t get further into. I reserve a special place for the Originators, however, an ancient space-faring race responsible for the Throughways, fascinating artifacts, and ruins whose every mention fed me serious nostalgia from my adventuring days aboard
Mass Effect’s Normandy. Plenty of that if you’re a space opera fan –
Shards of Earth recalls the very best of the genre, makes familiar tropes fresh anew, and falls in nicely next to other works by the author. I’ve seen Tchaikovsky deal with some of the themes touched in
Shards of Earth before – vast intelligences that find it difficult even to acknowledge human existence reared their head in
The Doors of Eden. Further, both the dangers of capitalism pushed to eleven, as well as the possibility of distributed intelligence networks growing far more complex than intended and acquiring personhood made for the thesis statement of
Dogs of War.
Its characters are ridiculously easy to root for. In addition to Idris and Solace, we’ve got Kris Almier, a lawyer as deadly with a knife as she is with her words; Olli Timo, a mechanic and specialist whose ingenious use of robotics allows her to overcome her physical disabilities, and the
Vulture God’s captain, Rollo Rostand, whose dialect has a number of peculiarities which define spacer speech in ways that read across as a natural drift away from our own language. There are a few others—an alien, a Hiver—and the crew dynamics between them all are exactly what you’d hope they would be. They feel like a family, even when they’re at each other’s throats. Whether the focus is on Olli and Solace’s very different understandings of what the Partheni way of life entails, the bond between Solace and Idris, neither of whom look to have aged since the days of the Architect war forty years ago, or Kris’s clever tongue-lashing, these characters work together perfectly. If you grew up with
Star Wars or
Star Trek, they’ll feel like home, reminiscent of the crews of the Millenium Falcon and the Enterprise.
The dangers of this galaxy go far beyond the civilization-ending threat of the Architects. From a rogue Essiel to a nobleman from one of humanity’s most prosperous worlds to a secretive operator of Hugh’s Intelligence Service, “Mordant House”—the threats to the
Vulture God’s crew are numerous and multifaceted. Action scenes are written with a precision I envy, often shock with the suddenness and brutality, and engender in the reader a sense of danger for everyone involved—I recall a point early on when I realized just how high the stakes are, and the words that made me do a double take are still burned into my mind.
The environs, the different planets the crew is thrust between, the majestic ships and decrepit space stations, are all memorable. Here is an excellent description that showcases some of my favourite features of Tchaikovsky’s writing:
Jericho was the last habitable world to be found by explorers from Earth, before there was no longer an Earth to be from. A survey team exploring a dead-end Throughway burst into a virgin system. They found a planet a little closer than Earth to a sun a little cooler than Earth’s. Then they found a biosphere crammed full of riotous life whose biochemistry overlapped with Earth by at least forty per cent. An Eden! surveyors crowed. Then the planet’s biochemistry ate two of the landing party and they quickly revised their estimate to A monstrous death world! But there were still scientific grants for that, and a permanent research presence was established only months before an Architect appeared over the skies of Earth. That research team was intended to be the sole presence on Jericho: an opportunity to conduct pure research into a thriving alien ecology, untouched by humanity save the luckless surveyors. Then Earth fell, the Polyaspora began, and Jericho received its shipments of refugees – same as everywhere else. Establishing a colony on-planet was not the nature-red-intooth-and-claw experience everyone had expected. Desperate humans in need of a home could tooth-and-claw right back, and twice as hard.
The clarity of description, the wry wit—I can’t describe to you how many times I’ve cackled hysterically at some passage or another in
Shards of Earth.
Allow me to point out, also, that I love books that pack a Glossary at the end. This one has a timeline slapped at the back, which makes for some encyclopaedical reading, preferably after you’ve finished the novel itself. I loved getting most of this information through dialogue, description and voice; seeing it then presented chronologically makes for an excellent reference tool for later.
Adrian Tchaikovsky shows a craftsman’s care and a visionary’s imagination in constructing the universe, and does so while rounding up the first part of this trilogy in such a way as to make of it a gratifying experience that doesn’t frustrate you to no end for not having the second book immediately at hand. You should get this one if you love the genre. If you’re a newcomer, curious about space opera – this is a great title to start your interstellar journey with!
TL;DR: Adrian Tchaikovsky's latest novel has some excellent worldbuilding and character works and is a genuine pleasure to read, for new fans of sci-fi as well as old ones! It's also got a glossary, which is...y'know, dope!
Bingo Squares:
- Found Family;
- Mystery Plot (if there's a mystery, it counts, right?);
- Published in 2021;
- Cat Squasher;
- Title: ____ of ____.
(This'll be updated if my party members start asking questions) Nickname: Dark
Personality: Unknown
Race: (Not from this world)
Strengths: Unknown
Weaknesses: Unknown
Faction: Unknown
Attributes: Intelligence (Main),??, Strength,??, Agility,??.
Affinities: Unknown
(I'm not sure if they'll actually ask questions)
More information: "I'm a mage. I don't like fighting so I usually stay at the back casting support and healing spells to my friends. I'm pretty handy with a sword, you could say, I'm skilled." (To be updated as Dark goes on)
Spells he can use (some at least)
Burning Determination)Type: Pyro Manacost: Small Gives an ally a temporary health and attack speed boost. Health regen: +2 Attack Speed: +4.2
Reversify) Type: Primordial Manacost: Large Reverses a spell's effect entirely. Reduces the cooldown of 'Reversify' according to the cooldown of the spell that was reversed whilst regaining back lost mana according to the spell reversed. Mana gain: ??? Cooldown reduction: ???
Purify) Type: Nature, Light Manacost: Small Removes small debuffs and is able to cure poison.
Illuminate) Type: Light. Manacost: Small Increases vision in dark places and can be shot towards undead enemies for 20 Holy-type damage.
Life Siphon) Type: Dark, Nature. Manacost: Large Sucks the life out of enemies to heal self, can be used on allies to heal them at the cost of own life.
Sword Style: Imbue Fire) Type: Fire. Manacost: Small(Overtime) Imbues the sword in flames, causing extra burning dmg for each hit.
Higher Intelligence) Type: Passive. As Dark gains Intelligence, he passively receives extra benefits such as, faster mana regen(+3) and a higher mana pool(+5) for each point.
Paranoia) Type: Dark Manacost: Medium Instills fear into the target, causing the victim to run away, and, if scared enough, can cause suicide.
(I'll update it as I go adventuring or when a friend/party member starts asking questions)
An Introduction: This here I'll be informing information on each race and it's strengths and weaknesses, Classes and Element types.
Demons: Strength: Immune to Dark Magic and Fire Magic. Weaknesses: Holy Magic and Water Magic Demons come from Hell. The only for demons to get to the Overworld is through the ancient gateway of An'Huban Sal-Ak which is guarded by the gate-keeper demon, Abaddon. Abaddon is trusted by the both, the God of the Underworld and the God of the Heavens to protect the gate from demons that try to get through it. Noone really knows, the gate's mysterious purpose but one thing is for certain; noone is getting past Abaddon. There are many types of Demons such as the Fawn Horns, Succubus, Imps, Skull Bores, Death Sweeps and the most common, Reilds. All these demons have their distinct advantages and disadvantages but be wary, even an imp can cause panic and even kill a man if he's not careful.
Undead:
Angels:
Humans:
Elves:
Dark Elves:
Dwarves:
Otherworlder:
Ak'Thal:
Lizardmen:
Hydropods:
Gods:
Classes: All The Classes In The Story That I May Or May Not Mention
Swordsman: A classic role which must exist, the Swordsman. Not to be taken lightly, an expert swordsman can move as fast as lightning and strike accurately. The highest rank a swordsman can get is Blade Master. Unlike the Warrior, the swordsman relies on it's speed and damage but even a simple novice can cast spells such as "Burning Determination" and "Double Strike". Sometimes, you can't really rely on speed alone so learning a few skills here and there won't kill you.
Priest: Anyone can be a Priest, but only the chosen few can get to be a Bishop-ranked Priest. Priests are adept at healing and support magic. They rely on Light, Nature, Water and Fire magic and despise Dark magic. Another thing they despise are the warlocks and thieves that practice the so-called "cursed" magic. Priests can cast spells such as "Holy Heal", "Holy Light" and "Cleanse" as their basic spells. There are some spells that only high-ranking priests can cast and no other class can cast such as, "Divine Intervention", "Blessings" and "New Dawn"
Tank:
Warrior:
Warlock:
Sorceror:
Ranger:
Knight:
Beasten:
Thief:
(Type)mancers:
Elementalist:
Paladin:
(Type)mage:
(Anyone can have more than one class for example, a warrior thief)
Elements: Because some people never learn....
So,(In my descriptive mind) there are 8 main elements and (?) sub-elements. In the elements tree, each element branches out intoother elements. These converging elements are called "sub-elements". There can be up to 15 tiers of magic, each getting more powerful the higher the tier.
Fire: A well-known element useful for explosive counter-attacks or to set up traps. Although, without Dark Magic, concealing traps such as "Heat Warning" may prove tricky. Sub-elements- Flame(F+F) - Magma (F+W) - Explosive (F+E) - Ember (F+N) - Solar (F+L) - Dark Fire(F+D) - Heat (F+S) - Primordial Flame(F+P)
Water: A little hydro can never hurt anyone, right? Water is adept at curing some curses and heal wounds but it's main use, is for volatile, large area-of- effect spells such as "Torrent Up" and "Torrent Down". Sub-elements- Hydro(W+W) - Cryo(W+E) - Weather(W+N) - Refract(W+L) - Poison(W+D) - Primordial Water(W+P)
Earth: A strong element used mostly in defensive or support magic. A strong element in itself, it can boost any magic type easily and any skilled geomancer knows that Earth magic works best on groups of weaklings. Examples for Earth type spells, "Earthquake" and "Obsidian Core". Sub-elements- Land(E+E) - Forest(E+N) - Cosmic(E+L) - Necro(E+D) - Dust(E+S) - Primordial Earth(E+P)
Nature: "Swift and nimble". One of the mottos of an Elf. Just like the phrase is Nature magic being very flexible, useful for "crowd control" Nature magic has a wide variety from stuns to taunts, buffs to debuffs, healing and support and many more. For example, "Healing Winds", "Enroot", and "Green Haven". Sub-elements- Life(N+N) - (N+L) -(N+D) -(N+S) -(N+P)
Light:
Dark:
Sky:
Primordial:
There are many type of spells such as:
1)Instant -Takes effect immediately -Can vary between Low to High Manacost -The most common spell type -Useful to get in and out of tight situations -e.g. ("Paranoia","Thunderstrike","Holy Light")
2)AoT(Affects over Time) -Usually has a short delay -Not very common -Useful against healer that hide behind enemy lines -Can be devastating against tanks that rely on fast regen and high armor -Dubbed as "useless spells" -Low mana cost and some for some AoT spells, the spell can be triggered on and off but drains a certain amount or percentage of mana every second -e.g. ("Poison","Meltdown","Bleed")
3)AoE(Area of Effect) -Usually has a delay(can be short, can be long) -The second most common spell type but at least it is the most used -If used wisely and strategically, even a single AoE spell can be the difference between winning and dying(your character knows you're trying to keep him/her alive right?) -usually costs a medium amount of mana but depending on the tier of the spell, can cost high amounts of mana -e.g. ("Frost Field","Irradiate","Black Hole")
4)Global -Affects everyone, everything or both in a 100M×100M×100M room or area -Really powerful and really rare -Only the most powerful mages can use such magic -Costs a huge amount of mana and, can kill a novice mage instantly if not used in caution. -e.g.("Heaven's Helpers", "Cataclysm", "Restart") 5)Buff -Affects teammates(buff) and affects enemies(debuff) -Useful as most buff and debuff spells can be deployed easily and quickly -Usually for single targets only and has a low cost -e.g.("Speed", "Charge", "Iron Will") 6)Channeling
7)Support
8)Curse
9)Destructive
Prologue: The Part That Matters
For every soul that dies, they each go to Hell to do their time, and leave to go to Heaven. It is, what should be happening. Unfortunately for them, the more they've sinned, the longer they have to stay there, and to decrease that time, they have to be eaten by a demon. For the very few, pure souls, they get to go to Heaven; a pure, serene place for the chosen and most pure to reside after their death, but for most, even a single lie they've told adds to the time they have to stay in the cursed nether regions of the Inferno Realm. And that means they'll be eaten by a demon. However, getting in isn't the problem, getting out is. For a soul to escape Hell and enter Heaven, the demon has to willingly send that soul to Heaven. So, why would that be a problem? Because, demons need souls to get stronger, the more souls they have, the stronger they become. And besides, most of the demons in Hell can either speak a few words, or not speak at all. They have the brain capacity that of a newborn child, always curious, but never able to learn. And so, Heaven has became a quiet lonely place, with Hell, crowded with demons.
Chapter 1: Demons
At the spawning grounds, new demons emerge. Most Imps and Reilds that spawn would immediately fight anything that moves, except for one individual. A reild youngling is standing in a corner, trying to avoid as much conflict as possible. Suddenly, a small imp sees the reild and approaches it with deadly intent. However before the imp got close, another imp confronts the other and they fight to the death. After finishing the fight, both imps succumbs to their wounds and, flies toward the nearest vessel, the reild. The reild, consumes the souls and continues hiding. 3 months later, the reild has ate about a dozen more souls, and almost died once. Because of this, the reild's mind develops a sub-conscious and a conscious. It's instincts say it should kill everything in sight but it's newly developed consciousness told that it should stay away. "Those are very dangerous and you can't fight them alone." says the voice(sub-conscious). And so, for the next 2 months, that is exactly what the reild did. It ran when being chased, and hid to take a breather. And, occasionally, two or more demons, usually just two, would either die simultaneously, or succumb to the wounds and die, leaving the souls with the reild. Lucky for it, a huge magma wave erupted from the lava pools, killing a large group of demons and the young reild that stayed away, claimed the bounty. Soon, it evolved stronger, smarter and faster. It realized it could take on an imp and win. However, it just didn't feel like killing. It just didn't want to take another demon's life. It already had about 57 souls and the demon didn't want to lose them. The reild didn't even know what would happen if it died and it didn't want to find out.
Chapter 3: The Dark Truth.
It's already been a year since the reild first came to this Hell but as miserable as this situation was, at least the reild suffered zero deaths. It has collected a number of souls, around 500 in 6 years, all from scavenging. Thinking it has enough, it takes on a journey due West, whichever direction that is. After a few minutes of debating with it's inner conscious, the reild starts it's journey. After walking a few miles, it encounters a magma basilisk.
(Mega oof but at least I'll update I promise to upd-)
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