Ancillary Sword (Imperial Radch, 2)

Great story but the She stuff is hard to adapt to. I had 7 sisters so may be it harder for me. The story line is wonderful and still a mystery.

Ann Leckie's debut novel, ANCILLARY JUSTICE, was one of the most successful first novels of all time as measured by the number of awards won in 2014: Hugo, Nebula, Locus, BSFA, and Arthur C. Clarke. It was shortlisted for a few other awards too. It was heralded, in part, due to its treatment of gender and for me, its concept of ancillaries, the hive mind of the starship that is at once part of the ship and the ship itself. In my opinion, the accolades it received were well deserved.ANCILLARY JUSTICE was book one of the Imperial Radch series, and knowing that, many people were looking forward to book two, ANCILLARY SWORD. ANCILLARY SWORD has already garnered lavish praise and a couple of awards, this year's BSFA and Locus awards, and was nominated for the Hugo and Nebula. It didn't win the Nebula, and the Hugos are to be given out next month, so it still may end up with three major awards this year.A little bit of background never hurts. Anaander Mianaai, the Lord of the Radch, has split into two different personalities. One is against the military expansion of her empire, and the other, well, wants it to continue. Breq, our ancillary of Justice of Toren from ANCILLARY JUSTICE, is adopted into Mianaai's house, made a Fleet Captain, put in charge of the ship Mercy of Kalr, and sent to the Athoek system to protect it. The other returning character is Seivarden, who really doesn't seem to have much place in this story. Breq, Seivarden, and a 17 year old Lieutenant Tisarwat, who Anaander forces Breq to take as part of her crew, head for the Athoek system and, as you might expect, find more than a few things out of place going on there.What follows is a series of events that do not seem to have that much of a relationship to each other. Breq, who is called Fleet Captain so much so that the reader almost forgets that her name *is* Breq, attempts to make reparations with Basnaaid, the sister of Awn, whom Breq loved in ANCILLARY JUSICE. She also meets, however briefly, a translator for the feared Presger alien race. She survives an attempt on her life. And there is the question of the missing transportees from worlds that have been conquered by the Radch, who Breq suspects have been handed over to a ship looking to stock up on ancillaries, a practice which has been banned by the Anaander who is Breq's benefactor.There appears to be a lot going on here, but on the flip side there really isn't. The Imperial Radch series is billed as a space opera, but ANCILLARY SWORD reads almost like a *soap* opera, what with all the family squabbles and intrigue. And to be a bit nit-picky about the whole thing, most of the action takes place upon a space station in the Athoek system, which hardly qualifies it as a space opera. There's a lot of character interaction and development going on, but nothing much else actually *happens* until the aforementioned attempt on the Fleet Captain's life.ANCILLARY SWORD seems to suffer a bit from "second book in a trilogy" syndrome. It is clear that Leckie is setting up the story for the final book, ANCILLARY MERCY, due out later this year. And while that's okay, my feeling is that in my mind, the book falls far short of not only the quality of its predecessor, but of the expectations that were predating its release. The two major selling points of ANCILLARY JUSTICE, its treatment of gender and its concept of ancillaries, are almost nonexistent in this volume. All the characters are refered to as *she*, and the only time one of the characters is addressed as a male by Breq is when it was appropriate to do so based on that character's societal norms. It's almost as if Leckie is saying "been there, done that", rather than exploring that concept even more than she did in the first book. Ancillaries, while not non-existent, take a back seat in this story. The concept certainly plays a part in this story, but ancillaries are nowhere near as important in this book as they were in the original.Having said all that, I actually didn't dislike the book. Rather, I was disappointed in the book. It feels more pedestrian than it ought to be. Leckie has built a universe which contains some fascinating concepts and which appears to be set up for a climactic battle between the two Anaander Mianaais. I hope ANCILLARY MERCY lives up to the expectations that were set by ANCILLARY JUSTICE; if so, that would redeem a series that started with much promise.

It was probably inevitable that the second book in the Imperial Radch series would not live up to expectations after Ancillary Justice won all the awards (look it up). What I did not expect is just how weak a book it would be.Ancillary Justice at its essence had three things going for it: the Radch view on gender and the use of only feminine pronouns, a simple but effective rhetorical trick; the diffuse AI ship Breq and the legion dictator Anaander Mianai; and an otherwise very solid all-around space opera story and world. I was worried the pronoun thing would begin to grate. It did not, in part because Leckie wisely chose to shift focus away from it (apart from a bizarre festival that proves not distracting by being so forgettable). But it also doesn’t add anything here in the way it did in the first volume. As to the second (and much less appreciated) great strength of Ancillary Justice, there are no flashbacks to Breq when she was a ship and Anaander Mianai is almost entirely absent. Ordered to a new station, Breq doesn’t even interact with the Station AI! But Ancillary Sword’s real failure is that it isn’t a very interesting story.Ancillary Justice ended with the two factions of Anaander Mianai now at open war with each other. Breq has been dragooned into the service of one. To that end, she is sent to an obscure, out-of-the-way system that is hinted to be more important than it looks (SPOILER NOT SPOILER: we finish the book without ever finding out). Breq, now raised to the exalted rank of fleet captain, spends the rest of the book ordering people about on the station and “downwell.”Second acts in a series are difficult by nature. The author has typically blown a large portion of her expository load, you can’t have full resolution (and usually get even less than in book one), and the primary burden is to get from Point A of a great idea for a series to Point B of a desired climax. I’m not sure if Ancillary Sword fails for that because so very little happens and what does happen appears to have so very little to do with the universe-spanning empire stakes. There are a couple hints that may become the key to the whole thing, but we only get very bare hints. Perhaps this is one of those books that, rather than building on the first book, runs almost in parallel instead, with both books together building toward book 3 (Larry Correia’s Grimnoire trilogy does this to a certain extent, and Cormac McCarthy’s Border trilogy goes all in).The main story is already burdened by its perceived irrelevance. The problem is exacerbated by a story that isn’t really interested on any level. It is almost structured as a mystery, but the components to the climax and resolution are either obvious or unknowable. The basic structure is Breq swoops in, sees obvious problems, dictates obvious solution, with an obvious reaction. There are a couple of good twists, but we don’t get a payoff for either. The climax would have served as a good faux climax, with a bigger and better one behind it, but is unsatisfying by itself.On another level the story is no better. The Radch empire already had a bit of a British empire thing going on, and the planet in question is a tremendous producer of tea. The station has an ethnic underclass living off the books and downwell there is an oppressed worker class on the tea plantations. The local elite of course are utterly unable to see the problem. Breq, who knows just a little bit about everything, jumps in and starts fixing everything. The obvious problem there seems to have occurred to Leckie, hence regular rounds of oppressed folks reminding Breq she doesn’t know much of anything about them. But given the role of Mary Sue Breq has been given to play, they just come off as childish, kicking their heels at being made to take their medicine.It’s unfortunate. I’ve long been an avid reader of fantasy and every other kind of speculative fiction, but Ancillary Justice was one of the books that finally sparked an interest in science fiction for me. I hold out hope that Ancillary Mercy will capitalize on considerable potential.

Ancillary Sword is a somewhat disappointing midway journey that started wonderfully with Ancillary Sword.I found it hard to keep up with to be fair until three-fourths of the way in. Even if you do stick to finishing it, you are the risk of having the book suck out the joy of having a cup of tea. Read the book to understand this joke/jibe.Yet it remains an integral part of Anne Leckie's fascinating 'modern' robotics universe, which gives you the complexities that you want to swim in after dipping your feet in via classical robotics stories by Asimov et al.This why I would still recommend reading it.

Me he leído ya las trilogía de los libros y me ha gustado muchísimo, además me ha servido para aprender ingles

This sequel is maybe a little too slow-paced indeed, but it succeeds in not being boring, due to more original details on the Radchaai system. It also builds up some expectancy for the 3rd book.

After the first book, I have really high expectations of this one, but I have to say that this book isnt near the level of the previous one. The story is plain and not so original. Lets see what happens with the third one (Ancilliary Mercy).

A good middle book for the trilogy. It develops the main characters in the first book, adds detail and maintains the pace. I am looking forward to completing the trilogy.