Perhaps the Stars

I'm not really sure what to make of this last entry in the Terra Ignota quartet. Some parts were absolutely brilliant – the way that war spirals out into tiny fractal battles with the motivation behind each becoming increasingly personal and complex. I loved the way that Palmer as a historian thinks about not just technological changes but how government, family structure and social mores will change in 500 years. As she reminds us, the American Experiment is not yet 500 years old and there's no reason to believe that 500 years in the future people will continue to idealize democracy and free speech, as dear as that is to us today.

I loved the tension between: do we do everything we can to dream of a better world, or do we work incrementally on this one? I thought that ultimately, after The Will To Battle being overly sympathetic to the Masonic Empire, Palmer in this book shows more of the nuance between these sides and ultimately the arc for the original Saneer-Weeksbooth bash and for Carlyle Foster are pretty satisfying.

But there's just too much in this book. There are three pieces that just don't really fit and I feel bad because I think they're really Palmer's favorite parts: The Homeric references, JEDD Mason and Mycroft. Each is central, but ultimately distracting. Perhaps the least clear complaint is Mycroft – part of what made Terra Ignota stand out is a literally criminally insane, unreliable narrator, whose scandalous secret past is definitely scandalous. But by the third book, Mycroft's deification of JEDD Mason and commitment to the monarchy of the Masonic Empire was starting to really dilute the richness of the setting. Palmer's responded to this criticism by saying that it's just the lens of reading via Mycroft and that readers can read past him. But she had a rich opportunity to provide a foil for his narrative with 9A, and instead 9A too became a JEDD cultist. I think this is simply a theory of mind failure – as the reader, I cannot completely see past an unreliable narrator to pick up clues from a highly complex setting from only seeing first person narration from said highly unreliable narrator. Also, Mycroft's schtick is that he really is an unforgiveable person and I think Palmer got wrapped up in her own creation and ultimately found him sympathetic in a way that I did not find deserved.

So complex world-building + interesting philosophy + futuristic homeric retelling + morally complex unreliable narrator + exploration of novel divinity = too many things to fit into a quartet

Let's do this then, shall we?

Terra Ignota is a full meal, a book series that excites the senses of every reader who is passionate about the Craft of Writing, History, Philosophy, Poetry, and everything in between.

Watch as Mycroft, our Richard III, charms the reader with his soliloquies under the guide of future hatred. They warn us, beloved reader, that any empathy we may feel for this object of our affection will soon fade as the reality of his actions reveal itself in gore and anger. This same Shakespearean protagonist that will confide in us his insecurities and their life of servitude. Watch him as he plays with God, as he lifts the curtain on a most curious conspiracy that would delight all and any who distrust the powers that be, whichever epoque they may inhabit.

Watch Voltaire exulted and Dumas avenged. Send us Aramis and make her dance into our home, afraid. Watch the marble-infused Masons and the mothers of the world, regardless of gender. Watch the cyborgs. Are they cyborgs? Watch the lust of the clerics and the androgyny of beauty. Watch Diderot paint and Rousseau negotiate a treaty, and show us how the land starved devour all.

Watch as we witness the corruption of Utopia, as we are lead to support murder for the sake of the common good. Watch as we are complicit on torture, and blood, and cannibalism. And watch as marvel at the foundations of Olympia, cemented in corruption and sex, and political games too gruesome to conceptualise without being present. Watch us witness this second Enlightenment, on the shoulders of the original, the great Renaissance, where our Giants transform and adapt to the realities of the Future.

And then Watch it all fall apart.

Watch Mycroft, our Odysseus, reenact the stage and map of this new Iliad and this new Odyssey. Watch Bester's influence in a World War that reminds us there is no glory in nations, only in Men, and only just. Watch us fail Mankind, and the Stars. See us at Mankind's best and worst. Here is a Weapon of Mass Destruction! Watch us hate with sufficient vigour to demand its use, annihilate all who oppose us.

Oh, wait, we were wrong.

War. War never changes.
It hasn't changed since Sun Tsu.
It hasn't changed since Hobbes (oh, Hi Monster of Malmesbury!)

And meet God.

Fucking Hell.
This is awesome.

I am so mad at this.

I don't know if it's because I didn't do the full required reading of Homer, Hobbes and ancient Greek mythology, but this book seemed overly long. There are moments of brilliance that made me keep going, but I still lost track of all the characters and their motivations frequently enough to make me consider aborting. All that said, it was a clever and many-layered book (or rather, series of books), just not one that I find easy to recommend.

These books are so goddamned weird and I love them for it. Having said that, I don't know if this final entry quite sticks the landing. I'd have given the first half of this an easy five stars, but the second half (starting from around the point the Alexander is introduced) drags it down a bit, I think.

Things I liked:

- It was interesting to have so much more of the story told from a non-Mycroft perspective.
- The expansion of scope to include the actions of so many non-focal characters to show the wider impact of the war.
- The rapid fire betrayals, side swaps, clarifications, and re-allying of so many factions really brought home the idea of a war of many factions with no fixed geographic territory.
- The weaving in of the Homeric elements.

Things I didn't:

- The first three books played a lot with ambiguity and Mycroft's unreliable perception to make it unclear whether the supernatural elements of the plot might actually be more mundane, but this last one seems to take a much firmer stance, especially toward the end, and I think it loses something for that.
- Petty, sure, but more or less every viewpoint character seems to be, to some extent, a partisan of the faction in the real underlying war that I disagree with.
- The constant (lampshaded, even!) deus ex machinas. With a few exceptions, pretty much the only way for a focal character to “die” seems to be getting Bridgered into someone else.
- The last fifth or so of the book is basically just people standing on a stage making announcements.