“… That could have gone much worse,” said Three Sea-grass, when she could. She straightened up. Wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. And didn’t try to get away from Mahit’s touch, not at all. “Look, Mahit-nobody died, not even slightly.”

Well that’s a fascinating change of pace.

In A Memory Called Empire, we pretty much stayed in the heart of Teixcalaan. A single planet, mostly a single City. We had all sorts of politics and worldbuilding and hints of what else was out there, but for the moment, it felt like a fairly contained story within that larger world.

And then in A Desolution Called Peace, Mahit Dzmare is back on her Station, that war she used to solve her problems in the first book is coming, and Three Seagrass has decided to be the one to respond to a call for Information. And there’s Eight Antidote, who’s 90% the previous Emperor and trying to learn to be his own person. Oh, and for good measure there are actually more than just hints of romance this time around.

It’s a much bigger book in scope, ranging through a few different locations and deals even more what it means to be a person–and just how broad can you define ‘you’ anyways?

A solid sequel with an impressively different feel. There’s not a third (yet), but if/when there is, I’ll be sure to give it a try!

Onward!