How humanity came to the planet called Anjiin is lost in the fog of history, but that history is about to end.
The Carryx—part empire, part hive—have waged wars of conquest for centuries, destroying or enslaving species across the galaxy. Now, they are facing a great and deathless enemy. The key to their survival may rest with the humans of Anjiin.
Caught up in academic intrigue and affairs of the heart, Dafyd Alkhor is pleased just to be an assistant to a brilliant scientist and his celebrated research …
How humanity came to the planet called Anjiin is lost in the fog of history, but that history is about to end.
The Carryx—part empire, part hive—have waged wars of conquest for centuries, destroying or enslaving species across the galaxy. Now, they are facing a great and deathless enemy. The key to their survival may rest with the humans of Anjiin.
Caught up in academic intrigue and affairs of the heart, Dafyd Alkhor is pleased just to be an assistant to a brilliant scientist and his celebrated research team. Then the Carryx ships descend, decimating the human population and taking the best and brightest of Anjiin society away to serve on the Carryx homeworld, and Dafyd is swept along with them.
They are dropped in the middle of a struggle they barely understand, set in a competition against the other captive species with extinction as the price of failure. Only Dafyd and a handful of his companions see past the Darwinian contest to the deeper game that they must play to survive: learning to understand—and manipulate—the Carryx themselves.
With a noble but suicidal human rebellion on one hand and strange and murderous enemies on the other, the team pays a terrible price to become the trusted servants of their new rulers.
Dafyd Alkhor is a simple man swept up in events that are beyond his control and more vast than his imagination. He will become the champion of humanity and its betrayer, the most hated man in history and the guardian of his people.
This is where his story begins.
Published Aug. 6, 2024 by Orbit.
Starts dark and goes darker. Only shows a glimpse of sunlight toward the end. A very thrilling read that does an excellent job at mirroring the dreadful and slow moving time our human heroes endure. Their powerlessness is palpable and the books offers no respite until the smallest off a sliver on the last 20 pages. Loved it and look forward to the next iteration.
Ensemble characters. Characters that say "yeah" semi-resignedly a lot. Some characters will die on you. It's constructed like The Expanse, but the plot is definitely going to go very differently.
The Carryx suddenly swoop in to the world of Anjiin, where humanity lives but where their origin is lost to time. The Carryx quickly conquer humans, killing 1 out of every 8. Dafyd Alkhor's group is transported across the universe to a glorified prison planet where the team is given the task of making themselves useful to the Carryx. If they do not, humanity will be obliterated. Lots of intra-group conflict. Lots of conflict with other prisoner species. Lots of perceived conflict with the Carryx, who mostly ignore them until they've proven themselves useful.
Do they collaborate and maybe live to fight the Carryx another day, or go out in a blaze of glory since it's likely humanity …
Ensemble characters. Characters that say "yeah" semi-resignedly a lot. Some characters will die on you. It's constructed like The Expanse, but the plot is definitely going to go very differently.
The Carryx suddenly swoop in to the world of Anjiin, where humanity lives but where their origin is lost to time. The Carryx quickly conquer humans, killing 1 out of every 8. Dafyd Alkhor's group is transported across the universe to a glorified prison planet where the team is given the task of making themselves useful to the Carryx. If they do not, humanity will be obliterated. Lots of intra-group conflict. Lots of conflict with other prisoner species. Lots of perceived conflict with the Carryx, who mostly ignore them until they've proven themselves useful.
Do they collaborate and maybe live to fight the Carryx another day, or go out in a blaze of glory since it's likely humanity is going to die anyway so why not go down fighting? Climax is a giant trolley problem. Don't forget that trolley problems are largely constructed as thought exercises, and here it's a thought exercise to move the plot along. In other words, don't get too attached to the philosophy. Whichever way they go it's just a story.
Content warning Some spoilerish thoughts
My main and (almost) only complaint about this book is that it ends just about when it starts to get really good.
It starts a bit slow, and first few chapters feels like they were just backstory filler we needed to slog thru before the action starts in earnest. The frequent foreshadowing - and not very subtle, in some cases just stating things like "this is the last time he will see her again" - definitively contributed to this.
But then the alien Carryx arrive and it really takes of. One thing that stands out in hindsight is how this alien invasion avoids most of standard SF tropes. Reading this book felt a bit like when I read all those old (outdated even half an age ago) Golden Age of SF histories as a boy, when everything seemed fresh and wonderful. Except what happens to the humans invaded here isn't wonderful, it is horrible.
These aliens aren't Martians invading because they are jealous of our women/food/water - these aliens are a brutal colonialist empire just after grabbing planets to gather resources in their Endless War. This isn't a clash of civilisations - this is a gunboat showing up to a remote island, shelling the natives on first sight and kidnapping a boat load of them to see if the population is useful as slaves, or if they all should be exterminated. No hard feelings, just ice cold logic and calculations. The transport from Anjiin to the closest alien stronghold is reminiscent to the nightmarish transport on slaver ships, or the freight cars going to an extermination camp - except aliens at least attempts to keep most of their cargo alive. Freight across the stars is expensive after all.
On arrival the instruction is clear - be useful or die - but also frustratingly unclear, because the alien overlords doesn't care enough to understand their new slaves.
And this of course is mirrored in the captive humans own attitudes to their fellow slaves. Outside of Dafyd, none of the others even consider that the other species enslaved by the Carryx may have their own agendas or struggles. At least not until another group of alien slaves decides the humans are making too good progress on their tasks.
Hopefully this theme will be further explored in remainder of the trilogy. Because being human is to try to understand and have empathy.
Most reviews are filled with spoilers, it's good. I cannot wait for the next book.
