ARC Review: The Stars Undying

I don’t know about you, but I’m loving this growing trend of taking classics and/or events from history, making them gay, and setting them in space. (I say trend, but really so far it’s this book and Suzan Palumbo’s upcoming Countess.) If that sounds good to you—which it should—then let me urge you now to get your preorders in for The Stars Undying (US, UK, int’l) because trust me. You won’t regret it.

Before we start with the review though, don’t forget you can follow Emery on twitter too.

A spectacular space opera debut perfect for readers of Ann Leckie’s Ancillary Justice and Arkady Martine’s A Memory Called Empire, inspired by the lives and loves of Cleopatra and Julius Caesar.

Princess Altagracia has lost everything. After a bloody civil war, her twin sister has claimed not just the crown of their planet Szayet but the Pearl of its prophecy, a computer that contains the immortal soul of Szayet’s god. Stripped of her birthright, Gracia flees the planet—just as Matheus Ceirran, Commander of the interstellar Empire of Ceiao, arrives in deadly pursuit with his volatile lieutenant, Anita. When Gracia and Ceirran’s paths collide, Gracia sees an opportunity to win back her planet, her god, and her throne…if she can win the Commander and his right-hand officer over first.

But talking her way into Ceirran’s good graces, and his bed, is only the beginning. Dealing with the most powerful man in the galaxy is almost as dangerous as war, and Gracia is quickly torn between an alliance that fast becomes more than political and the wishes of the god—or machine—that whispers in her ear. For Szayet’s sake, and her own, Gracia will need to become more than a princess with a silver tongue. She will have to become a queen as history has never seen before—even if it breaks an empire.

The Stars Undying

Emery Robin

Goodreads

Rep: bi mcs, lesbian side character, nonbinary side character, gay side character
Release: 8th November 2022

Five Reasons to Read This Book

One. Butch lesbian Mark Antony. This alone should be reason enough to read. Those four words, the first and most important reason you need to pick this book up. Must I add more to this point? Surely not.

Two. If you enjoy books filled with political twisting and turning, then this is the book for you. In fact, the politics are central to it all, really. I mean, as you might expect if you know anything about history when it comes to Caesar, Cleopatra and Antony. You might suspect some of what’s to come, but this is a book where that doesn’t matter—you’ll enjoy it just as much if you have some idea of what’s going to happen as if you have no clue. (Although, you might appreciate some of the foreshadowing more.)

Three. This is more a retelling of history than the play, Antony and Cleopatra, but I still think it’s one that stays true to the themes of the play (and, I suppose, history, if you can call those “themes”). I mean, it’s a retelling that really gets its hands dirty when it comes to delving into the history and understanding the why of what happens, and that shows in the book too.

Four. This is a book where you finish it, and then you sit for a moment, and you think oh shit that’s what that meant. It’s a book with layers, that you only realise when you go back and think on it. You can read it reasonably quickly, sure, but you need at least five working days to process everything, and even then you’ve probably missed something. It’s one you’ll want to reread once you’re done, if only to see how everything looks now you have the knowledge of the end.

Five. Who doesn’t love a good unreliable narrator? No one? Excellent! Because this delivers. And yeah, you know these narrators are unreliable from the start—they even tell you so themselves, after all—but still somehow you get sucked into the story and the next time they say “so that was a lie”, you find yourself a bit surprised anyway.

So, have we convinced you that you want to read this book?