The Hands of the Emperor

Edit: whoops, pressed enter too early. I really enjoyed this book! Of course I‘m a sucker for a competence fantasy, as someone who is always flailing around missing appointments and forgetting birthdays. Ah, just writing that I realised another birthday I forgot. I will never be you, Cliopher Mdang!

This has a decent amount in common with my favourite competence fantasy (which still retains the title I think, though this is an extremely strong contender), including that the effectiveness of the main character is very rooted in his passionately held, deeply idealistic but also deeply considered philosophical and political beliefs. This is a book very thoughtful about what that kind of effectiveness can take out of you, and what can begin to heal that. It also thinks highly but I think believably of community and culture, which is something I enjoy in a book. A few really good characters in here, most interestingly expressed through differing styles of communication. The evocation of other arts - music, dance, clothing design, architecture, a little carpentry - was loving and lovely, and another thing that made this very pleasant to read. Some nice jokes too.

A strong recommendation! There were a few style things that fell flat for me, and it gets a bit repetitive toward the end in ways that don’t always land for me, but this has a lot of heart and skill.

Alright! Spoilers below here.

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I do really like that it explores the cost with his family that Cliopher has paid, in detail and a little messily. This is definitely meant as a feel-good thing, so it makes sense that that series of confrontations and reveals are much, much more sweet than bitter. It isn‘t that rare for a true misunderstanding to cause deep, years-long hurt in relationships, so maybe it‘s unfair to say it feels a like a cop-out that it can all be resolved through a long series of very satisfying testaments to Cliopher‘s accomplishments and a couple of righteous speeches, and practically no unsatisfying indignity.

The speeches also… it didn‘t pull me out entirely, but I can‘t really imagine these earnest speeches, usually coming in a very non-speech kind of setting, not being ridiculous. And he makes a fair number! I don‘t know if it‘s how they are written that doesn‘t work for me or if it‘s just the concept of spontaneously starting orating about your authority etc., and the fact that in the narrative they mostly feel designed as Righteous Satisfying Takedowns, so I am predisposed to suspect them. They had a lot of interesting stuff in them and parts of them were great, just, yeah.

I‘ve focused so much on the things I didn‘t like. I loved reading this book and kept being late to things because I didn‘t want to put it down at the end of a chapter! It made me feel inspired, happy, determined, open to wonder and beauty. Irritatingly it does feel well wrapped up, this was a real thorough Cliopher Mdang character study - irritating because I would like more but can‘t bring myself to earnestly wish for it! Luckily I think there‘s more books set in the same world - I‘d definitely like to see more of, um, the ex-Emperor and see what his thoughts are like. It also again reminded me that I should seek out more fantasy that isn‘t centred on white Europe (as this is not).

Oh, also, my favourite joke is how Cliopher keeps bringing up a pedantic flaw in his political rival Prince Rufus‘s insults of him - the octopus not generally sucking the life out of things thing - and then at some point he says (at this point clearly beside the point of the conversation) „That‘s not what octopi do, but I haven‘t belaboured the point.“ Delightful. Establishes his rivalry as genuinely two-sided, and also conjures up exactly how Kip might have been frustratingly know-it-all-y to his friends and relatives in the Vangavaye-ve before he set out.

This series might be my reading for the next few months :) yay!