Reviews

The Stars Undying by Emery Robin

Only show reviews with written explanations

happyrock's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

restless's review against another edition

Go to review page

3.0

Perfect for fans of Ancillary Justice and A Memory Called Empire, this space opera by way of Madeline Miller recasts the fates of Cleopatra, Julius Caesar, and Mark Antony among the stars.

If there was ever a sentence that was going to get me to buy a book faster than a jacked-up bunny, then this is it.

(Let's be real: Arkady Martine's A Memory Called Empire is political intrigue on steroids. Ann Leckie's portrayal of starships as autonomous beings was delicious. And don't get me started on Miller - I didn't cry at the end of A Song of Achilles - you did.)

Anyway.

Feminism! Political Intrigue! Queer Cleopatra! In space!

This book should have been catnip.

Alas, I found the first 40% un-fun-believably boring. There is a lot of atmospheric detail, a little bit of dialogue and very little new.

Sci-fi Cleopatra could have been the most exciting thing since cupcakes. I mean, she could have been a rogue AI, or the holographic projection of a sentient planet, or the inventor of cool technologies, or literally anything other than a girl on Earth 2.0.

Hell - she could have been a girl on Earth 2.0 with ideas.

Spoiler

Not suggesting that this version of Cleopatra doesn't have ideas (she does) but as she spends most of the novel lying to you, you don't actually get to enjoy them.

Instead, this is an insider's nod to the original source material. And if you know and love that source material, then you'll probably love this. But I didn't and I don't.

Don't get me wrong, Robin can write, but I lack the temperament for pages and pages of description when we could be doing plot:

We strolled through the streets, back towards the looming melted-cake outline of the palace. Alectelo was a patchwork city, built over centuries, and only the pearl roofs and steeples made it seem any kind of whole - that, and the fact that no matter where you stood you could always see the gleam of the sea. In this neighbourhood, the houses were low and flat, and their walls were grey-painted stucco, and all had square gardens of rock and caper bush and beach-weed.

I mean, one day Patramata is in space (hiding from her sister), and the next she is in Ceirran's room - rolling out of a carpet. You'd think that wrapping yourself in a carpet is a pretty big character moment. Like, let's be honest, if your kids wrapped themselves up in a carpet and had themselves shipped off half-way across the world to say "hi" to a stranger, you'd probably sit down and "talk" about it.

But no - the book spends all of 2 sentences on Patramata's decision to ship herself planet-side and about 300 on evocatively written beaches. It's like a really pretty fanfic where the author assumes you know the source material and so decides to the skip all the character development. This, by the way, applies to Patramata's relationship with Ana too - which was just odd?

I'm awarding 3 stars because the final 200 pages were enjoyable and this National Geographic article made the book posthumously interesting.

But will I read the sequel? Probably not.

amazingracerose's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark emotional fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

This is such a fascinating cleopatra retelling! Love the move to space and the ability to use it to talk about colonialism obviously (literally my capstone research). But the merging of historical and sci-fi elements is masterful

sidneyjdobson's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous challenging hopeful mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

princesstempura's review against another edition

Go to review page

mysterious tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.5

maggiemicklo's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous challenging reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

This book may have been above my reading level (lol) and it fell short in many ways but also the last third of the book really made up for it and I was left thinking a lot of thoughts!! Definitely considering reading book 2!!