Ancillary Justice (Imperial Radch, #1) in Crazy Challenge Connection

Mar 09, 2018 ☘Misericordia☘ ⚡ϟ⚡⛈⚡☁ ❇️❤❣ rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: menu-reading-is-served

Q:
Thoughts are ephemeral, they evaporate in the moment they occur, unless they are given action and material form. Wishes and intentions, the same. Meaningless, unless they impel you to one choice or another, some deed or course of action, however insignificant. Thoughts that lead to action can be dangerous. Thoughts that do not, mean less than nothing. (c)
Q:
Luxury always comes at someone else’s expense. One of the many advantages of civilization is that one doesn’t generally have to see that, ...more

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Aug 20, 2019 Veronika rated it it was amazing

Shelves: female-author, favoriten, sci-fi, romantic-gen, military, drama

Ich liebe Bücher, die mich mit ALLEN Gefühlen zurücklassen und das hat dieses hier wirklich geschafft.
Was für ein wilder Ritt.
Es ist eins dieser Bücher, das ich definitiv mehrmals lesen möchte, einfach weil ich jetzt schon weiß wie viele weiteren Ebenen man entdecken wird und wie viele verborgene Kleinigkeiten sich einem enthüllen werden, wenn man es zum zweiten oder dritten Mal, mit anderen Augen und mehr Wissen liest.

Ganz vorne weg - ich bin überhaupt nicht Sci-Fi erfahren, habe bisher Null ...more

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Feb 26, 2017 Chaitra rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: science-fiction, first-of-a-series, hugo-winners, space-opera

ETA: 02/25/25: Same rating, because I'm not completely sold on the book. But two things: 1. Adjoa Andoh is an exceptional narrator who made this a much more enjoyable experience and 2. Happily, my Libby has the audiobook for the second book of the series, so I'll finally read that one soon.

**

A couple of things make Ancillary Justice unlike anything I've read. One, the main character happens to be a sentient spaceship with corpse ancillaries. Two, the language of the Radch, the human civilization ETA: 02/25/25: Same rating, because I'm not completely sold on the book. But two things: 1. Adjoa Andoh is an exceptional narrator who made this a much more enjoyable experience and 2. Happily, my Libby has the audiobook for the second book of the series, so I'll finally read that one soon.

**

A couple of things make Ancillary Justice unlike anything I've read. One, the main character happens to be a sentient spaceship with corpse ancillaries. Two, the language of the Radch, the human civilization that has most of space colonized, has no specific gender modifiers, the one they use is feminine. In theory, the two points gave the book a lot of potential, but practically, it didn't quite get there.

As for the first point, I loved everything that involved Justice of Toren, the troop carrier. This was the backstory. In the present story line, Justice is gone. Everything that's left of her is in one corpse ancillary - One Esk Nineteen, the nineteenth segment of the One Esk decade of the ship. One human body. The present story line therefore had none of the complexity of a hive mind juggling several hundred tasks at once, and that made it pretty regular. But because she's a ship, the lady is necessarily cold and distant. Unless she isn't - she isn't too consistent and makes some strange choices that she can't justify to herself, which I thought wasn't possible when you're an AI and - see? It's pretty regular. The past was great, and I liked the weirdness of it all, but at around 2/3 of the book, the past catches up and we're stuck with one storyline. Which is kind of boring.

Second, I did not like what the ship's sidekick Seivarden was doing while we waited for the past storyline to finish. He slept a lot. And when he was awake, he contributed nothing, because Breq (the ship) and whoever she was talking to was speaking in a language he didn't understand. But he was there. Why? Why could Breq not have come across him after she achieved phase 1 of the plan, and when he would actually be useful to her? That would give her vast intelligence some credibility. She's supposed to kick ass, and she does a bit, but because there is this main thing she does - picking up Seivarden - that she cannot justify to herself for a large portion of the book, it looks half assed.

The gender thing was about as annoying as the first year I learned Hindi at school. Hindi is one of those languages that assigns gender to non living objects, and from what I still think, it's an arbitrary assignment. As I learned the language it became better, but the first year was extremely annoying. That's pretty much how it was here - it bugged me because most of the people they come across do have male or female characteristics, including the Radch. Everyone who isn't Radch use gender modifiers, and it would have been easier to just concentrate on the story if Breq didn't have the kind of trouble with it that she did have - she's a ship, and even though she's just an ancillary, the idea is that she is one and the same as her ancillaries. Anyway, I may have a better handle on this as I read the rest of the books, just as Hindi bugged me less as I became used to it.

It's not that there are no positives. Obviously I really loved the portions that dealt with Justice of Toren intact. The politics and the action (or lack of it), the heirarchy, the whole deal with the Lord of the Radch, I loved all of those too. But it's not wholly the book I anticipated, and I'm slightly disappointed because of that. I'm pretty sure the second book will be a better reading experience, if only because I've tempered my expectations a little. ...more

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Aug 17, 2014 Beth marked it as did-not-finish

Shelves: personal-failings

"It's not you, it's me." I know this book is good but can't get into it, so I'm giving up and hanging it next to Dracula and Pride and Prejudice on my wall of can't-finish-it personal shame.

It won Hugo and Nebula awards (and more). The idea of artificial intelligence simultaneously inhabiting several conscripted human bodies is fascinating. The use of across-the-board female gender references is something new.

But it got confusing. Between the gender neutrality, a raft of unusual character names ...more

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Dec 25, 2016 S.L. Berry rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: audiobooks

This book one of a three part series. Read this book first, then the next two, for Ancillary Justice sets up the other two. The world created by Ann Leckie is not one that will be familiar to most readers, even those who read primarily science fiction. Part of it is Leckie's writing style that to this reader seemed a lot like Ayn Rand. It is terse prose that admits little feeling even though there is a lot of emotion under the surface. I felt detached from the narrative the entire time, though i This book one of a three part series. Read this book first, then the next two, for Ancillary Justice sets up the other two. The world created by Ann Leckie is not one that will be familiar to most readers, even those who read primarily science fiction. Part of it is Leckie's writing style that to this reader seemed a lot like Ayn Rand. It is terse prose that admits little feeling even though there is a lot of emotion under the surface. I felt detached from the narrative the entire time, though it is well-plotted and the characters, some human, some machine or robotic-like, some a mix are complex.

Another aspect is that the characters are somewhat different than and also somewhat similar to others in science fiction novels and story lines (such as Star Trek) -- machines and ships are able to form human-like attachments to their masters; they have feeling;

some of the machines were once humans and for all the world look human;

there is a lack of the use of gender in one of the worlds (the Radch) but yet the protagonist, an ancillary (Justice of Toren aka Breq) refers to other characters sometimes as she or he which can be confusing until you learn to read past the switch in pronouns; and

there exist multiples of humans and ancillaries that can be, and are in, different places at the same time, connected to each other (in a way like the Borg on Star Trek, but the collective in Ancillary Justice is not a homogeneous one-mind controlling all bodies) though not in all ways and they can be disconnected from each other and still function, even contrarily to each other.

The plot boils down to Justice of Toren seeking to obtain justice after her master, a Lieutenant An is ordered executed by the Lord of the Radch. Justice of Toren is the executioner. The rest of the book is what led up to Justice of Toren's master being executed. The reader however doesn't start out knowing any of this when the story opens. There is a flow, a mixed up one that goes back and forth between present and past but it makes the narrative great.

Ancillary Justice is an entertaining read (or listen-to in my case). Given the above, it is however not a light easy read. There are also slight nuances that the author puts in that are critical to the rest of the story. Read it slowly and deliberately. ...more

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Aug 19, 2014 Erin rated it liked it

Shelves: own, nook, science-fiction

This one was teetering between 2 stars and 3 stars but I did enjoy it at enough parts to go with 3 stars. But overall I was just never sure what was happening. Maybe beginning of this semester was not a good time to read it because of my busy course load and rehearsal schedule so with that in mind I *might* still read the sequel maybe

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