#and really both mianaais killed awn

[rotationalsymmetry]

I can't stop seeing Anaandar Mianaai's multiple bodies and split selfhood as representing the concept of a government, a body that is composed of multiple individuals and competing factions and yet has to act as one and yet often does in fact act against itself. And yet also, at the same time, often doesn't act against itself as much as the people under the government need it to. Breq is never confused about the reform Mianaai bring on her side. She knows that's not how things work.

And she has no "ok but I need to support..." because Awn is dead and nothing else matters.

[g4rchomp]

I finished "Ancillary Justice" and I need to talk about it (spoilers down below + very, very long post sorry) This post is mostly a repository for my thoughts so it's messy but anyone is welcome to read and reply ofc, it's always fun to share :^)

First, I really loved the book. I loved the concept, I loved universe, I loved the characters, I loved the story. I was warned the pacing would be slow but I was on the edge on my seat most of the time, it just clicked for me.

I think you can never go wrong with exploring what it means to be human. To explore what consciousness, grief, love, hope, revenge means. Ann Leckie does this really well in this book and Breq has been on my mind ever since I read more than 10 pages of the book.

what it means to be an AI, what it means to make choices

Since it's a central part of the book, I was a little bit disappointed that Breq and other ship consciousnesses were simply explained as being "AIs", which little elaboration. I would have loved to have a little more substance around that. That being said, I think it's mostly because conversations around AI flourished in the past 2-5 years, the Radch chronicles were written in 2013 so just saying "AI" didn't have the same implications as it does today.

One thing I loved was the exploration of what making choices meant for both ancillary and human characters. It is both central to Awn and Breq's characters. Awn feels helpless during the Tanmind riots and thinks she has "no choice" which is then questioned by Skaaiat. Breq understands that in a way, but it really resonates with her when she's confronted with orders to kill Awn later on. to me that's a moment where Breq's (One Esk at that point) humanity starts to truly shine through. What does it mean to have a choice? What does it mean to make choices? What's the difference between the two? Under the Radch rule, choices are constrained and consequences are heavy, but it doesn't mean the choices you make can't have a long lasting impact, one way or another.

speaking of empires...

who doesn't love an evil empire? I'll never get mad a "empires are evil" tropes in sci-fi because it simply is true and that message is still very much needed. In Ancillary Justice, I just wish the bureaucratic works that underpins the stability of such huge empires was more insisted on. what do you mean it only takes a few days to receive a visa to enter the Radch????? it's easier to enter the Imperial Radch than it is Canada lol. the ships, the palace, the thousand of Anaander Mianaai, all of it is part of an administrative structure that, at the same time, is integral to the survival and reach of the Empire and also a major source of breaches that make it impossible for an Empire to truly see and control everything.

in a way, we see that through Anaander's split, an empire that stretches so far out it falls into pieces and cannibalizes itself. I thought that was great. however, I feel like the Empire is a little too centered on Anaander Mianaai as a person, it's personalized in her which I think is reductive. empires aren't bad because their leaders are bad, they're bad because they're empires. I hope this will be touched on during the next two books!

on another note, I love that the two parts of Anaander Mianaai aren't in complete opposition. one part is expansionist and openly violent but the other part doesn't want to abolish the Radch, she's reformist, she's liberal. nowwww an empire that transforms into a version of itself that still holds immense power but through a "democratic" facade where have we seen that before I wondeerrrr. it's a strong point of the book and I hope Breq continues to distrust Anaander Mianaai forever. also when it's reveal that Breq's last name is Mianaai now. eye roll of the century. when Anaander thanks Breq for being confrontational with her "no one else does this hihi" yes because you kill them. great vilain. an empire that absorbs everything like a black hole even it's strongest detractors. I hope this gets even more expanded on later in the series.

on returning to previous states

another thing I hope the next two books address is Breq's new position as a ship commandant. the destruction of the Justice of Toren marks such a big shift in Breq's character it just feels weird to see her in a position of power, on a ship, with at best mixed feelings about the situation. it feels almost a bit out of character to see her lead after the last 20 years of her life. it's like she went back to a previous state, which is not something I like to see in fiction. I'm looking forward to see how things develop but my impression was that Breq was longing for something else now, a revenge that did not imply playing by the same rules she did before.

also, Breq's goal in the first book was to shoot (not kill) Anaander Mianaai, which she did. so what's her goal now? I feel like it's not clearly stated and her post-shooting attitude lacks exploration. she just goes with the flow and see where it takes her next but for some reason it didn't feel satisfactory to me. it's what I thought was the biggest weakness in the book.

I love Strigan

that's it I love her, I loved her relationship with Breq. in a way she is to Breq what Skaaiat has been for Awn: a turning point. she pushes her to recognize her own agency, think deeply about the choices that are afforded to her and the consequences of making or not making those choices. I hope she makes a comeback.

ofc I love Seivarden too, there seems to be much about her we don't know bc Breq simply doesn't care but I like her and I want to see what's next for her.

I didn't get the bridge scene

I feel like I missed something. why would Seivarden fall? what was the significance of this scene? so Seivarden could be grateful for Breq? but she already had a reason (Breq saved her in the snow). or so Breq could be grateful to Seivarden for saving her? but it's already established Breq has a weird attachement to Sievarden, it didn't need more. was it to show Breq's superhuman abilities? we already knew that (in both timelines) was it to force Breq into a vulnerable position? but then why do that through a 3km fall? I would love to know what everyone's interpretation of this scene was. it felt significant but I can't say why, it bugs me lol

"pronouns are gimmicky" blablabla

ik the series is well known partly for the use of she/her pronouns throughout the text, telling the story through a radchaai language perspective. people noted that Breq speaks multiple languages and isn't human anyways so she wouldn't struggle with discriminating gender. first of all, I don't care. second of all, it was seamless and well executed. everyone who says it's gimmicky is wrong in my eyes and I'm not willing to elaborate. I loved it, it was fun and it was a fresh perspective. also I read the book in french, which uses masculine pronouns as a "neutral" form so it felt even better.

(voice of a guy who has only ever read Dune):

which gets me to my next point. the series has been compared to Ursula LeGuin's work and I can see why (I love LeGuin, I haven't read all of her work yet but she's a staple in my heart and mind). buuuuut I thought a lot of elements were very Dune-esque which I personally loved. the obsessive attention to minor physical changes to indicate emotions, the subtle but meaningful hand gestures, the grand houses competing for power, the divided emperor god, the space poems (Gurney Halleck am I right) the sentient/ almost human made-to-serve clone (Duncan Idaho am I right) and the list goes on.

so yeah I feel like we compare women sci-fi author for their inclusion of feminist perspectives in their work without giving a lot of consideration to the other themes they explore and how they do so. the comparison with LeGuin (or Martha Well) is interesting but to me the merits of Ancillary go beyond the issues of gender. (and by that I don't mean that LeGuin or Well's work is only good bc of their perspectives on gender I hope that's clear I love both their work for many, many reasons INCLUDING but going beyond this one does that make sense?)

Anyways that's ittt! pitch me tomatoes or nod sagely or tell me what you thought abt that bridge scene I'd love to hear it! onto Ancillary Sword now

[theskyexists]

Ancillary justice

Fascinating. This ship AI controlling the corpses of colonised people in service to the murderous empire creates small spaces for the slightest acts of autonomy, and it uses that autonomy to intervene - to stop a soldier from abusing a grief-stricken casualty of war, to have the slightest petty victory over those who can command her. Amazing character work. She does experience it as slavery.

I like how Seivarden is brought in as the Empire's arrogant awful shitstain nepo baby murder soldier that we can all disdain. Seems like AI mc really liked Lieutenant Awn bc she's a good man. The opposite to Seivarden.

Ah there is a distinction made between One Esk and Justice of Toren.

Ah. Funny that these creatures of empire still believe in the 'civilised' rules of that empire and corruption of those rules ( justifications) as an outlier.

Every single thing indicates that the highest person in the land has intervened: the guns, the segment dead, the girl dead anyway, the device which can block radch communications, the dismissal of Awn and the deliberate provocation, the understanding the tanmind thought they had, the cleaning up of people who knew of the understanding. But the question STILL is why.

I do very much like the trick of this narration which calls everyone she.

Oh Kay....how did strigan suddenly realise....Oh. she knows because we're going into the flashback in which Seivarden tells them. When was that

The segment was killed in order to make Awn vulnerable to murder. (No)

Awn comforting the new segment.... Hmmm. Sounds like the people that are ancillary are still alive in there..

Hmm now its saying that Esk is the singers and Justice of Toren not....

Ok the book has lost the plot now. The mc has just spent twenty years to get this damn gun. And her plan is to shoot ONE INSTANCE of the great ruler - which doesnt actually require the gun at all.

But after all, this is but one segment, and we've already discussed both memory loss and the strange baseless attachment to Seivarden multiple times...

Ah, it almost seems like the Justice of Toren was meddled with before. By a Mianaai. What do we know? The Mianaais are clones....organic. they do seem to be able to interact with their other selves - but a hint has already been dropped that this can be cut off or does not operate the same as AI. The only thing that makes sense is that Mianaai is NOT a Hive mind constant consensus with itself. Oh damn, i predicted this a few paragraphs before the text stated it.

So this is the pro-racist-classist-slavery-expansionist Mianaai faction probing Seivarden. That fall from the bridge really made her reevaluate

Ah - i hadnt thought of Mianaai recognising her as not what shes saying she is. But at least the author notes this lapse in plot logic before i can notice it. And is making a big point of it. I think we're back into pawn in larger game territory

Now they go to the opposite faction.

Mianaai really already knew it was Justice of Toren... But all of her too curious to eliminate it...why WOULD Justice have done this, if there had been an option to speak to the right Mianaai in private...

Thing is, for most of this segment the writing did not make sufficiently clear to me that the problem isnt not that there is another Mianaai (the other is dead) but that the conflict was spoken of to them before they were fragmented by device. And that memory is stored and will be sent out soon. But these memories are stored electronically and in the segments that are still there. There do seem to be more here.

Why wouldnt they make the simple expense of armouring all the Supreme leaders....

Im so touched by the good feeling the Orsians still have towards Awn...

What i dont understand is why there are so many Mianaais here. I thought it was one ruler per Palace but it works more like an AI than i thought.

The thing is - what i am most surprised by still in retrospect is that the harvest they do of thousands for ancillaries FROM annexed planets wasnt more of an issue on Ors.

Hmm. The concept of fragmented Mianaai (one fascist one utilitarian) is very interesting BUT i do not quite understand how she could have denied to herself that she's fighting herself if they share THOUGHTS. Justice of Toren shot Awn and One Var shot Awn and One Esk might never have done that, but they all had access to the same information. Every time Mianaai cut off communications greater Mianaai should have made a reconstruction of the blind spots. Having the conflict stated out loud - i dont see how it would have changed anything. All the Mianaai SHOULD have known that they were in conflict with themselves. That couldnt probably have been hidden from themselves? I guess greater Mianaai was simply balancing things? The entrance of a segmenting device - its origins and its strategic implications - it must have come from the Presger.

I liked reading the opposite side to one of my favourite stories: devotion. Breq quite unaware of what it has inspired in Seivarden. Unaware even of the fondness it feels for Seivarden...

I thought the coincidence of Seivarden's survival and involvement with the genocide plus Esk's uncertain memory might lead somewhere but it didnt... (Yet?). I guess i wasnt fully convinced somehow of Esk's commitment to as total revenge as possible as the singular reason for its suicidal plans. (i also think the narrative put too much focus on the gun's armour piercing qualities when Esk wanted it for its selfcloaking. For that matter another loose thread: why would any Mianaai that cannot trust itself go around unarmoured?? A sign of trust, pact, dare or bluff? Losing bodies IS a great inconvenience when one can be segmented). I guess i would have liked the statement on the great impact of small interventions repeated/fully realised in this decision of suicide bombing for seemingly little impact. Nor was i convinced how Esk would have made these choices from being muddled and grief stricken. I would have been more convinced if all along Esk had understood that the way to do the most damage was to bait Mianaai into exposing her full self to the truth of her internal conflict before it in fact apparently accidentally did that - and this was why it acted so obviously - instead of suddenly realising it would definitely be recognised, implying their cognitive patterns are under influence of a (third?) higher power - which was never confirmed.

[number63liveblogs]

Ancillary Mercy, chapter 14

Did Lieutenant Tisarwat just purposefully trigger a panic attack as a part of her plan? Wow, that really takes a lot of guts and self control, considering that she had to babble about things that aren’t the ones that are actually making her that anxious.

She really is extremely valuable to Breq, which is both a good and a bad thing from a storytelling perspective. On one hand, all of this is Anaander Mianaai being screwed over by her own plan of spying on Breq. If she hadn’t uploaded herself on Lieutenant Tisarwat, they couldn’t use her access codes against her.

But on the other hand, the original Tisarwat for all intents and purposes died for this. You could actually think that she should have been just an unremarkable desk worker instead of a key player in a rebellion against Anaander Mianaai. But then, if Anaander hadn’t killed Lieutenant Awn, Breq wouldn’t be a key player, and if she’d never taken control of the Radch space, Sphene would have nothing against her, if she wasn’t a threat towards the station inhabitants, the station AI wouldn’t go against her every chance she gets. For Lieutenant Tisarwat it just feels more unfair, maybe because it isn’t the person who was wronged against, but someone else inhabiting her body.