Review – A Memory Called Empire (Teixcalaan, Book 1) by Arkady Martine (4.5/5 stars)

Reading Level: Adult
Genre: Science Fiction/Space Opera
Length: 472 pages
Publisher:‎ Tor Books
Release Date: March 26, 2019
ASIN: B07C7BCB88
Stand Alone or Series: 1st book in Teixcalaan Duology
Source: Borrowed ebook from Library
Rating: 4.5/5 stars

“Ambassador Mahit Dzmare arrives in the center of the multi-system Teixcalaanli Empire only to discover that her predecessor, the previous ambassador from their small but fiercely independent mining Station, has died. But no one will admit that his death wasn’t an accident—or that Mahit might be next to die, during a time of political instability in the highest echelons of the imperial court.

Now, Mahit must discover who is behind the murder, rescue herself, and save her Station from Teixcalaan’s unceasing expansion—all while navigating an alien culture that is all too seductive, engaging in intrigues of her own, and hiding a deadly technological secret—one that might spell the end of her Station and her way of life—or rescue it from annihilation.”

Series Info/Source: This is the first book in the Teixcalaan series, which looks like it will be a duology. I borrowed this on ebook from my library.

Thoughts: This was a very well done science fiction/space opera type of read. The world created here is immense and the characters are intriguing. Most of the story revolves around the mysterious death of an ambassador.

Ambassador Mahit has been sent to the center of the Teixcalaani empire to replace her predecessor after his mysterious death. Initially his death seems to be an accident but Mahit quickly finds out that it was not an accident and that her predecessor was deeper into empire politics than she could have imagined. Mahit must save her station from being annexed by Teixcalaan, help Teixcalaan avoid civil war, and warn the empire of a possible alien invasion creeping in from the outer reaches of space.

This was not an easy read. The prologue is incredibly long and in general this does suffer some from the info dump issue that a lot of sci-fi has. The reader is plunged into an incredibly vast and confusing world and left to struggle their way to the surface of it. However, in the end I believe it was worth the effort. The characters are incredibly complex and engaging, the world-building is magnificent, and the plots are complex, full of twists and turns and intriguing.

I really loved the concept of Mahit’s people carrying around the memories of their predecessors in their brains. This was fascinating and really added a lot to the story. I also loved the lush descriptions and complex Teixcalaani culture.

This does start fairly slow and I struggled to stay engaged for parts of the first half of the book. The chapters are very, very long and it’s hard to commit to starting another 30 min chapter after finishing one. I occasionally found myself skimming through long paragraphs of descriptions, that while beautiful, didn’t add a lot of meat to the story. However, things picked up pace exponentially in the second half of the book. As I got to the last 25% or so of this book, I found it impossible to put down.

I ended up so intrigued by the events at the end of the this book and so fascinated by something that could potentially take on the Teixcalaan Empire that I feel like I absolutely need to read the second book in this series…after a bit of a break. As I said, this was not an easy read. You need to focus and stay focused, there is a lot to keep track of and it can be a bit exhausting to follow.

My Summary (4.5/5): Overall I really enjoyed this. I was impressed by the complex world-building, intricate politics, and engaging and complex characters. The story starts out slow and is a bit difficult to stay engaged in, but it was worth it to stick it out. I loved the end of this and am excited to see how things continue. This is beautifully written and incredibly complex and does take a fair bit of effort to get through. However, I thought the effort was worth it in the end. I would recommend if you enjoy complex politically driven science fiction stories about vast space empires.