Empire of Bones

[sawyl]

Instead of concentrating on my studies, I spent a fair amount of today reading Liz Williams' Empire of Bones.

The year is 2030, the place is Varanasi, and Jaya is dying of premature old age. Unfortunately, Jaya is the Receiver, the only person on Earth able to communicate with the ancient colony ship responsible for originally establishing life, and her emergence has triggered an evaluation of the planet by the original colonisers to determine whether Earth should be assimilated or whether it should be pruned. Trouble is, the two alien bureaucrats sent out to assess the situation have their own agendas and their own caste related issues to sort out, so things could go either way...

Empire is an elegant blend of the political and the speculative, firmly rooted in the traditions of Aldous Huxley and Ursula Le Guin: definitely a novel for anyone who liked Left Hand of Darkness.