But the backup of Yskander she carries is a full fifteen years out of date, and no one knows why he was never able to return to the station any more recently to refresh it.
This is a technology that Lsel has managed to keep secret from the empire. In the back of her head, she carries an “imago”, an implanted backup of Yskander. Finding out why, or by whom, will not be easy. Mahit’s predecessor, Yskander Aghavn, did indeed meet with foul play. Through many years absorbing herself in the empire’s culture, in particular the poetry that comprises so much of its artistic, literary, and even political expression, Mahit has a powerful affinity for Teixcalaan, even though her job is going to involve doing all she can to prevent the empire from annexing her home. You would think such a post would be intimidating, to say the least, but Mahit relishes the opportunity to undertake a job that, by her own description, is everything she’s always dreamed of. The story opens as our protagonist, Mahit Dzmare, is appointed as Lsel’s new ambassador to Teixcalaan and very hurriedly dispatched to the city, where her first duty will be to find out why the previous ambassador was killed. Lsel is a distant mining station of some 30,000 inhabitants on the empire’s outskirts, that has managed to retain its independence. It all takes place in a deep-spacefaring future, in which the empire of Teixcalaan, governing from a majestic and very Trantorian city-planet called the Jewel of the World, is facing internal unrest, rebellion from outlying colonies, and an unknown alien threat from its most remote frontier. It’s exciting, witty, suspenseful and a real kick in the pants. It sweeps us into a lush, interstellar future where we get to take a good look at ourselves without judgment. A Memory Called Empire does everything science fiction at its very best manages to do in ways other literary genres don’t, examining the human condition through multiple lenses science, history, and imagination. It’s frankly incredible that a novel this layered and satisfying in its humanity as well as narrative complexity was Martine’s debut, but I suppose that just goes to show you what can happen when a writer needs to burn off excess steam after completing their Ph.D.
AnnaLinden Weller - makes her story personal, through the eyes of richly drawn characters navigating an ever-shifting political landscape of propaganda and power. But rather than playing the detached observer, Byzantine historian Arkady Martine - real name: Dr. After all, what has human history been except an ongoing cycle of the rise and fall of great civilizations?Ī Memory Called Empire explores this fascination with the concept of a culture and a civilization too big to fall but in constant danger of doing it anyway. In the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, John Clute discusses the classic science fiction trope of the galactic empire as a “necessary invention,” and “an imaginative framework which could accommodate any number of ‘Earth-clone’ worlds on which writers might deploy ordinary human characters in confrontation with any imaginable social and biological system.” It’s a trope that got what you might call its first real intellectual workout in Isaac Asimov’s Foundation novels, and it’s easy to see the enduring appeal of stories set against vast interstellar empires.
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