This is kind of a longish book and the perfect start for a trilogy or longer. The blurb on the back would make you think this is a military story, with battles and tactics. Hold your horses, that's only part of it. You will not believe what else is waiting for you.
We have Evie, who has another name. She is conscripted into the Savage Legion so she can find someone who is missing. He partly plays the trophy of the quest several people are on. But don't pay him much attention now.
We also have Dyeawan. She is a young woman who grew up in an area of the capital city called the Bottom. It's basically a slum where people who don't fit the definition of a useful citizen try to live. People in the Bottom seem to have nothing but more children. When Dyeawan was young, she had an accident that crushed her legs. She was picked up during a conscription raid for the Legion, but her useless legs kept her out. Instead she is taken to the Planning center for the entire country. This center is a place that only the people who live and work in it are aware of.
We also have Lexi, a woman who runs a Gen which is a general company or corporation that has a franchise to do a thing, provide a service or produce a good, for the population at large. Lexi's Gen provides what we would call lawyer services to the poor in the Bottom.
All three of these women provide 1/3 of the story. Their stories weave round each other. At first, I wasn't sure what they or their tales had to do with each other. The book is structured so that we see each woman in alternating (by three) chapters. I said at the start that is wasn't a military story. There is a war, but it's really not a war that we would understand as war. There are no news reports from the front to the citizens at large. There is also a lot of politics in this book.
The country all three women live in is called Crache. Schools, where there are schools, teach a strange sort of history. Crache was formed when the population rose up against the nobles and royalty. Hereditary accumulations of wealth and power were outlawed and the Gen system was put in place. Call them nobles, call them the 1%, groups of people will try to acquire and keep wealth and power. After a while, the bigger Gens were all related and the family system reemerged. Like I said, the book tries to hide the politics but it's there.
I like my science fiction. This one is a stellar example of the "what if". What if the power structure tried to hide itself within a system of organizations, agencies, and companies? How would it keep power? What would be the dangers and troubles it could face? I really like how this book is suggesting answers to those questions and more.
We have Evie, who has another name. She is conscripted into the Savage Legion so she can find someone who is missing. He partly plays the trophy of the quest several people are on. But don't pay him much attention now.
We also have Dyeawan. She is a young woman who grew up in an area of the capital city called the Bottom. It's basically a slum where people who don't fit the definition of a useful citizen try to live. People in the Bottom seem to have nothing but more children. When Dyeawan was young, she had an accident that crushed her legs. She was picked up during a conscription raid for the Legion, but her useless legs kept her out. Instead she is taken to the Planning center for the entire country. This center is a place that only the people who live and work in it are aware of.
We also have Lexi, a woman who runs a Gen which is a general company or corporation that has a franchise to do a thing, provide a service or produce a good, for the population at large. Lexi's Gen provides what we would call lawyer services to the poor in the Bottom.
All three of these women provide 1/3 of the story. Their stories weave round each other. At first, I wasn't sure what they or their tales had to do with each other. The book is structured so that we see each woman in alternating (by three) chapters. I said at the start that is wasn't a military story. There is a war, but it's really not a war that we would understand as war. There are no news reports from the front to the citizens at large. There is also a lot of politics in this book.
The country all three women live in is called Crache. Schools, where there are schools, teach a strange sort of history. Crache was formed when the population rose up against the nobles and royalty. Hereditary accumulations of wealth and power were outlawed and the Gen system was put in place. Call them nobles, call them the 1%, groups of people will try to acquire and keep wealth and power. After a while, the bigger Gens were all related and the family system reemerged. Like I said, the book tries to hide the politics but it's there.
I like my science fiction. This one is a stellar example of the "what if". What if the power structure tried to hide itself within a system of organizations, agencies, and companies? How would it keep power? What would be the dangers and troubles it could face? I really like how this book is suggesting answers to those questions and more.