Alien Clay, by Adrian Tchaikovsky

I absolutely love reading Adrian Tchaikovsky. He is incredibly prolific and yet is able to say something profound using meticulously detailed hard SF speculation on that very demanding calendar. The protagonist in the book, Arton Daghdev (the pronunciation of the name figures prominently), takes some getting used to. The book is written from his first-person perspective, and as a narrator he can come off kind of flip in a very 2024 way ("you'll never believe what's coming next"). But in my view this is Tchaikovsky doing something very subtle with the narrator--he's distancing himself from his story with the wisecracking. The story he's trying to tell is horrible and sad, and he has to get some distance from it in order to tell it at all.

Daghdev doesn't come off as a true revolutionary, at least not until the end. But again I think this is deliberate. Daghdev regularly refers to himself as a small-time revolutionary, much more talk than action, surprised that his minuscule actions warranted a response from the State. He and his circle played at revolution, and he compares himself poorly to others that he viewed as more committed.

The scientific speculation is amazing stuff--symbiosis taken to the maximum. Organisms have evolved to be able to interface with each other, and any macro level organism (and probably micro too) is made up of many other more specialized ones. They are figuring out how to interface with humans too, which seems pretty awful.

The ending is quite wonderful and highly scary. Tchaikovsky is truly a master of his craft, and his work definitely worth savoring.

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Service Model, by Adrian Tchaikovsky

This is a very serviceable (ha ha) stand-alone novel. Tchaikovsky is very good at main characters, and this is no exception, but it might take some effort to see that. Charles the robot valet is designed to derive satisfaction from ticking off his assigned tasks, and is "conscious" of this. I put it in quotes because it's hard to say that Charles thinks of himself as conscious (see how hard this is? How does a robot that explicitly denies that it has consciousness and free will demonstrate it?). This tension becomes a core of the book as Charles has to leave his manor job and become Uncharles, in search of employment. The plot is a pretty standard robot rebellion with hero's journey, but that tension between Uncharles's developing consciousness and explicit denial that this is happening makes it interesting. Tchaikovsky is an ambitious writer and wants to take on big questions. He is also a prolific writer, and these two drives sometimes interfere with each other. Service Model is a really interesting read and wrestles with the biggest question of all, but in the end he needed to finish the book and get on to the next project.

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Children of Time, by Adrian Tchaikovsky

I've read several other works by Adrian Tchaikovsky and have gone back to read this one. Gotta say I enjoyed it tremendously.

The world building is done pretty quickly but really works if you are willing to buy in--the big leap is a nanovirus that will drive evolution and brain development in a species. I especially enjoyed the nod to David Brin's Uplift series--and the fact that the book took the concept in a new direction.

The plot summary you can get from other reviews. Some things that stood out for me:

1. Tchaikovsky does a nice job of taking the spiders' perspective without getting so awkwardly alien as to be difficult to read. One of the things he does that is very telling is to have continuity in the spiders' names over generations and even millenia. They're all Portia, Bianca, or Viola (females) or Fabian (male). It gives you the real sense that spiders have a different idea of identity than humans, and it informs their motivations. But in other ways they form a hierarchical society and fight just like humans do.

2. Some people felt like the middle section got long-winded. I think they missed some things. The spiders fended off two existential threats to their civilization, both of which changed them thoroughly. The humans visited a second terraformed planet and fought to keep their creaky, hastily built ark ship alive. We got an extended view of the contrast between the spiders' generational changes and the central core of human characters, which did not change because they spent extended periods in cold sleep.

In all my reviews of Adrian Tchaikovsky's work, I highlight the bit in his bio about being trained in stage fighting. You can see this in the construction of his plots, never more clearly than in this book. We have early indicators that there will be conflict. The initial clash with the remnant of Dr. Arvada Kern. The enemies separate and regroup, each following their own dramatic path. They come together for the final conflict, including various reversals of fortune. It makes for very exciting reading. Not all of his books work like this--he has several novellas that tell stories in different ways--but his large scale series do seem to follow this pattern.

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The Lords of Uncreation, by Adrian Tchaikovsky

I absolutely loved this conclusion to the Final Architecture series, for some of the same reasons that other reviewers didn't like it so much. There's a lot of battle sequences--I think they are really exciting and Tchaikovsky's background shows (he shares in his bio that he's trained in stage fighting, and that experience clearly informs the battles). He manages to make something as ridiculous in scope as saving all sentient life in the universe scale down to something we can get our heads around.

The whole series is worth reading for the relationships between the crew of the Vulture God (a deep-space salvage tug). Through all the insanity they are deeply devoted to each other, and particularly to Idris. Idris is endearing for his over-the-top depiction--he's only got one job, that of saving the universe, and he is conspicuously and self-consciously terrible at anything else. He is the most vulnerable lead character that I remember reading, and the rest of the crew is symmetrically devoted to him. I am sad to come to the end of the story--I will miss these folks. I also think Tchaikovsky has effectively closed off the series so that we can truly miss them.

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Ogres, by Adrian Tchaikovsky

"Ogres" is a cracking good story, one actually worth award nominations. Yes it's told in the second person but for good reason. The setting is a dystopian future where humans are ruled by massive beings who lord over all and keep technology to themselves due to their sheer size. It's an exciting story and moves right along--I am good about putting books down, but really struggled to stop reading this one at bedtime. There's a good cautionary tale here--even though society has advanced considerably, and you don't have to be physically strong to succeed in politics, we still defer to the large and strong--in the person of men. It really helps to be tall to succeed in politics. Attacking this issue at its root may be a key to resolving oppression.

There's a series notation attached here, but don't worry about it--it was applied after the fact to three of Tchaikovsky's novellas.

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Eyes of the Void, by Adrian Tchaikovsky

This is the middle entry in the Final Architecture series. Middle books often fade a bit, but this one really impressed me. It seems to be hard to be original in Space Opera these days--so many of the award-nominated books in most of the majors are fantasy, alternate history, or barely speculative at all. Tchaikovsky manages to tell a real grabber of a story and at the same time add something to the subgenre.

All space opera is really sea stories--a technology is introduced that makes voyages between stars possible, but difficult, like a long hazardous sea voyage. The sea here is Unspace, a place where nothing seems real but something is present. Idris Telemmier is one of the few remaining identified talents at navigating, and bearing the strain of, this space.

The plot is amazing and convoluted, and the fights are somehow realistic among all the speculation. I still don't know how writers do that--what incredible world building goes into making aliens and technology come together in believable combat. There's a lot of it here and it's really well integrated and satisfying.

What I like best about this series, though, is the relationship of the crew. There are plenty of intrepid, marginal spaceship crews pulling off amazing feats through their devotion to each other (the Rocinante of the Expanse is the best). The great thing here is the crew's unique devotion to utterly damaged, fragile, crucial Idris Telemmier. He is so obviously vital to every player's plans that he can't move without an army chasing him. He is also utterly helpless in most circumstances, such that the Vulture God crew would do anything for him and yet it's not at all weird or cloying, just charming and inspiring. Even those who want to use him utterly tend to soften up. His specific strengths allow him to come through and save the day.

Am looking forward to reading the last one in the series, and if it's the end, I will miss this bunch.

My Goodreads Review

Elder Race, by Adrian Tchaikovsky

I haven't read much Adrian Tchaikovsky (just this year, Shards of Earth), though I know he's written a lot. I get the feeling from the reviews that his recent work is more character driven than in the past, when he was more into plot twists. I would say that is the case with this book. The characters of Lynesse Fourth Daughter and Nyr Allem Tillich (Nygoroth Elder to Lynesse) are the heart of the story, and they make it a great read. Lynesse is from a culture of woman warriors on a colony founded from Earth but abandoned in a technological retreat. Nyr is there to study that culture as Earth has recovered. But during his time there Earth has retreated again. His struggles with his mission vs. his conviction that it is meaningless can seem forced, but that is explained by his bigger struggle with depression. No surprising twists or turns, but a very heartening tale of people being their best selves. Great action and adventure, pretty horrifying at times but overall fun.

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Shards of Earth, by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Well--I just finished Cat Rambo's You Sexy Thing, and had commented on how many times the "tightly bonded crew of an old but trusty ship" thing has been done, and it's done again here. But I'm really glad I read it, as that crew is compelling. Actually it's mostly the protagonist, Idris Telemmier, that is compelling. He's been altered beyond understanding by a process that allows one to navigate deep space and potentially interact with the book's nemesis, the Architects. It has cost him his ability to sleep, and to age as well. He is simultaneously frail as a kitten and far stronger than anyone around him. The other characters, though they get their space, are really a supporting cast. The universe of the Architects is a desperate one--they are constructs of godlike power, nearly invincible, and bent on the destruction of humanity, and they're doing well at it. Idris is one of a handful of people with the capability to do anything more than slow them down a little, and the enormity of that weight is very aptly conveyed. The book starts off a bit slowly but really comes along as the stakes of the situation become clear. I think it could be a pretty good movie adaptation, as centered as it is on a lead character.

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