Kalpa Imperial

A collection of connected short stories set in a fictional [possibly post-apocolyptic] empire about its many rulers and cities and across many years. The stories are short and leave you wanting to know more about the people in them.

The writing is tight with just enough description to convince you they're being told by an oral storyteller, but it's not flowery and at times you wish you could hear a little bit more description.

However, one failing is how the stories connect. Other than the oral storyteller and the empire they pertain to, one is left wondering what connects them together. What are the relationships between all the emperors and empresses? Unfortunately, I suspect that would require a fictional history lesson and a long kings list, which would most certainly distract from the stories themselves.

Storyteller stories of intrigue and sweeping history, large and small. The strongest were in the middle, "Concerning the Unchecked Growth of Cities" and "Portrait of the Empress".

This was a very interesting book. It's set up as a series of loosely connected stories, and told in a sort of Arabian Nights style. It does give the feeling that there is a whole history, basically an endless history of the empire, and these stories are just these little fragments peeking through. But they're very rich fragments.