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magnumdanger's review against another edition
3.0
Interesting universe. Maybe not enough to keep me engaged with reading the sequel, but not angry I read it.
kbhenrickson's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
This was a fun and exciting military sci fi / space opera with multiple POV characters. I'll probably read the rest of the series.
thedragonswarrior's review against another edition
5.0
The first 100 pages of this book are kinda tough. The exposition is clumsy, I wasn't feeling the princess as a character, there's a lot of "tell not show" in a bad way for side characters. But by the time the wedding scene happened the book cranked up to 11 and didn't stop till the end and it really really worked. This is one of those rare action packed fast paced novels (for the last 4/5s of the book) that really pull it off and do it with style. I ended up really loving the book and feel great rounding my 4.5 stars up to a 5/5.
kabukiorigin's review against another edition
4.0
Solid YA/A Space Opera, and a good opening to a series. Bumped from 3.5 to 4 stars on merit.
aspain53's review against another edition
4.0
Action packed space opera
Nonstop action, intricate court intrigue, and space battles. What’s not to like? I plan going back and reading more of Kate Elliot.
Nonstop action, intricate court intrigue, and space battles. What’s not to like? I plan going back and reading more of Kate Elliot.
katsdc's review against another edition
5.0
I loved this book! The characters and world building are superb (as I would expect from any Kate Elliott novel) and the action is very fast paced. I wasn't ready for it to end, so I'm very much looking forward to the next two books.
Things I enjoyed: The way that the characters feel real - their motivations are complex and nuanced, and there's no good vs. evil, just shades of gray and competing interests. The complete lack of patriarchal norms -gender just isn't a factor in character's trajectories. Refreshing!
Things I didn't enjoy: There wasn't much, but some of the space battles seemed a bit confusing to follow upon first read. I need to reread to see if I can get a better sense of the action sequences.
Things I enjoyed: The way that the characters feel real - their motivations are complex and nuanced, and there's no good vs. evil, just shades of gray and competing interests. The complete lack of patriarchal norms -gender just isn't a factor in character's trajectories. Refreshing!
Things I didn't enjoy: There wasn't much, but some of the space battles seemed a bit confusing to follow upon first read. I need to reread to see if I can get a better sense of the action sequences.
mburnamfink's review against another edition
2.0
Good space opera is an indulgence: rich, creamy, flavorful, slightly embarassing but hard to stop eating. Unconquerable Sun is low-fat frozen diary space opera product. Technically dessert, and mostly unsatisfying.
Frozen yogurt
Princess Sun is heir to the Chaonian Republic, three systems with a host of valuable jump points caught between the much larger Yele League and Phene Republic. But Chaonia has two edges. First, the ruling Queen-Marshall is a skilled commander and has built up a powerful navy. Second, Sun is inspired by Alexander the Great and is destined to conquer a whole bunch of shit. I'm not spoiling anything, because that the main tagline and some of the references are painfully obviously, like Sun's battlecruiser named Boukephalous, but the whole book totters under the weight of historical analogies and a sense of capital-D Destiny rather than actually doing any world building or characterization.
We meet Sun coming back from her first victory, but still unable to earn what she truly wants in her mother's approval. Court intrigue swirling around her, connected to her foreign father and a secret project to gain the loyalty of the Phene empire's most fanatical soldiers. But it's not really actual intrigue so much as stagey Intrigue, characters making outlandish boasts, threats, and declarations of secrecy. Worse, the primary point-of-view swerves to Persephone Lee, a daughter of one of the seven great houses that rule Chaonia (it's a very flawed Republic). She's ducked out from family responsibility by enrolling in the military academy as a commoner under an assumed name, but is called back to replace her assassinated brother as one of Sun's Companions. Perse is an utter wet blanket, who mostly is around to admire Sun and be doubtful of her place near Sun. There's roughly 200 pages of slogging filler, dribbles of slice-of-life which seem to mostly be about an idiotic propaganda show called Channel Idol, and then the Phene empire mounts an impossibly bold attack. There's another 200 pages of serviceable action with land and space battles, though again it is so incredibly generic that it could come from literally any science fiction written since 1960, and Sun wins. Hooray.
Space opera is full of military geniuses. Ender Wiggin, Miles Vorkosigan, and Honor Harrington spring to mind. But I believe their genius because the story tells us the rules of warfare and how they break them. And even when they win crushing victories, it hurts on a personal level. Neither is true here, and it absolutely robs the military action of any tension or drama. The other major flaw is personal. All these characters feel like American kids, not militaristic noble scions. The "fun" part of fiction is that the fate of worlds is in the hands of hormonal erratic kids barely old enough to legally drink, as opposed to decrepit and senile gerontocrats. Sun's Companions and the nobles of Lee House are a wasted group of stock characters who mostly stand around to say "wow Princess Sun, looking good." I firmly believe that the stories of chivalric societies are so full of things like courtly love and undying loyalty because the actually reality was lots of adultery and betrayal, which are much more interesting subjects for a book. Again, Red Rising and theNew Moon series handle larger than life emotions and coming of age in a much more engaging way.
There are decent moments in this book, which serve to highlight how dismal most of it is. An actually sparking confrontation between two Yele admirals who disagree about how to contain Chaonia. An escape from massive sea monsters on boats. The Riders, the Janus-faced hivemind that holds the Phene Empire together with psychic FTL communication. And while Princess Sun is a lesbian, or at least female favoring bi, it barely comes up. Chaonia has Asian influences in names and cuisine, but it's P.F. Chang Americanized orientalism with nothing below the surface. Yoon Ha Lee, Aliette de Bodard, and the whole contemporary Chinese SF movement are actually writing non-Western scifi and a lot of it is quite good. While I'm all for more diversity in fiction, it feels so ham-handed here.
And ultimately, this book is just too long at 500+ pages. Even if you want to read pap, there's better pap. Serves me right for taking book recommendations off Twitter.
Frozen yogurt
Princess Sun is heir to the Chaonian Republic, three systems with a host of valuable jump points caught between the much larger Yele League and Phene Republic. But Chaonia has two edges. First, the ruling Queen-Marshall is a skilled commander and has built up a powerful navy. Second, Sun is inspired by Alexander the Great and is destined to conquer a whole bunch of shit. I'm not spoiling anything, because that the main tagline and some of the references are painfully obviously, like Sun's battlecruiser named Boukephalous, but the whole book totters under the weight of historical analogies and a sense of capital-D Destiny rather than actually doing any world building or characterization.
We meet Sun coming back from her first victory, but still unable to earn what she truly wants in her mother's approval. Court intrigue swirling around her, connected to her foreign father and a secret project to gain the loyalty of the Phene empire's most fanatical soldiers. But it's not really actual intrigue so much as stagey Intrigue, characters making outlandish boasts, threats, and declarations of secrecy. Worse, the primary point-of-view swerves to Persephone Lee, a daughter of one of the seven great houses that rule Chaonia (it's a very flawed Republic). She's ducked out from family responsibility by enrolling in the military academy as a commoner under an assumed name, but is called back to replace her assassinated brother as one of Sun's Companions. Perse is an utter wet blanket, who mostly is around to admire Sun and be doubtful of her place near Sun. There's roughly 200 pages of slogging filler, dribbles of slice-of-life which seem to mostly be about an idiotic propaganda show called Channel Idol, and then the Phene empire mounts an impossibly bold attack. There's another 200 pages of serviceable action with land and space battles, though again it is so incredibly generic that it could come from literally any science fiction written since 1960, and Sun wins. Hooray.
Space opera is full of military geniuses. Ender Wiggin, Miles Vorkosigan, and Honor Harrington spring to mind. But I believe their genius because the story tells us the rules of warfare and how they break them. And even when they win crushing victories, it hurts on a personal level. Neither is true here, and it absolutely robs the military action of any tension or drama. The other major flaw is personal. All these characters feel like American kids, not militaristic noble scions. The "fun" part of fiction is that the fate of worlds is in the hands of hormonal erratic kids barely old enough to legally drink, as opposed to decrepit and senile gerontocrats. Sun's Companions and the nobles of Lee House are a wasted group of stock characters who mostly stand around to say "wow Princess Sun, looking good." I firmly believe that the stories of chivalric societies are so full of things like courtly love and undying loyalty because the actually reality was lots of adultery and betrayal, which are much more interesting subjects for a book. Again, Red Rising and theNew Moon series handle larger than life emotions and coming of age in a much more engaging way.
There are decent moments in this book, which serve to highlight how dismal most of it is. An actually sparking confrontation between two Yele admirals who disagree about how to contain Chaonia. An escape from massive sea monsters on boats. The Riders, the Janus-faced hivemind that holds the Phene Empire together with psychic FTL communication. And while Princess Sun is a lesbian, or at least female favoring bi, it barely comes up. Chaonia has Asian influences in names and cuisine, but it's P.F. Chang Americanized orientalism with nothing below the surface. Yoon Ha Lee, Aliette de Bodard, and the whole contemporary Chinese SF movement are actually writing non-Western scifi and a lot of it is quite good. While I'm all for more diversity in fiction, it feels so ham-handed here.
And ultimately, this book is just too long at 500+ pages. Even if you want to read pap, there's better pap. Serves me right for taking book recommendations off Twitter.
esmithumland's review against another edition
2.75
1. By the end of the book I still have all the questions I had at the beginning, so I'm not understanding what the purpose of the book was.
2. Really? Persephone just....shrugged and forgave Solomon after he admitted to being blackmailed into spying on her and tracking her location? Is she stupid?
3. Having a literal m'lady character and a Ryan Gosling as Ken in Barbie character wasn't fleshed out enough so instead of being funny or ironic (which I'm not even sure was the goal) it was just kind of cringe and weird and out of place.
4. The whole romance plot was utterly unexplained. One moment they kind of have a crush on each other, the next thing I know they're kissing? No lead up, no exploration of feelings, no scenes of them slowly developing something. Utter disappointment and poor writing. Just don't have it at that point.
5. The deaths of some central characters at the beginning felt so pointless. They were framed as possibly being important, but we didn't get any actual time with them, so instead of feeling sad they were killed, I just felt like I'd been getting interested in that character for nothing. The other secondary and tertiary characters not being attended to in even a sliver of a degree that the two dead characters were made me even more annoyed at having to be forced to invest in characters that were promptly killed off, and the fact that I was left with ones that apparently I didn't really need to know or care about at all. The lack of significant character deaths during the entire rest of the books, during way more high stake battles, just made it completely unbalanced, and made the initial deaths seem like shock value, and not actually for the plot. It was cheap.
6. And where was the romance between Sun and her lover? It was mentioned....and then they barely interacted at all. For like the millionth time what was the point?
2. Really? Persephone just....shrugged and forgave Solomon after he admitted to being blackmailed into spying on her and tracking her location? Is she stupid?
3. Having a literal m'lady character and a Ryan Gosling as Ken in Barbie character wasn't fleshed out enough so instead of being funny or ironic (which I'm not even sure was the goal) it was just kind of cringe and weird and out of place.
4. The whole romance plot was utterly unexplained. One moment they kind of have a crush on each other, the next thing I know they're kissing? No lead up, no exploration of feelings, no scenes of them slowly developing something. Utter disappointment and poor writing. Just don't have it at that point.
5. The deaths of some central characters at the beginning felt so pointless. They were framed as possibly being important, but we didn't get any actual time with them, so instead of feeling sad they were killed, I just felt like I'd been getting interested in that character for nothing. The other secondary and tertiary characters not being attended to in even a sliver of a degree that the two dead characters were made me even more annoyed at having to be forced to invest in characters that were promptly killed off, and the fact that I was left with ones that apparently I didn't really need to know or care about at all. The lack of significant character deaths during the entire rest of the books, during way more high stake battles, just made it completely unbalanced, and made the initial deaths seem like shock value, and not actually for the plot. It was cheap.
6. And where was the romance between Sun and her lover? It was mentioned....and then they barely interacted at all. For like the millionth time what was the point?
snokat's review against another edition
adventurous
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
Really fantastic world building and cast of characters. It took me a little bit to get into it, but once I was I couldn’t stop reading.
autumncarroll's review against another edition
adventurous
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
4.0