A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine

Won the 2020 Hugo for Best Novel.
Ambassador Mahit Dzmare is posted far from her mining station home, to the Empire's glorious capital. Yet when she arrives, she discovers her predecessor was murdered. But no-one will admit his death wasn't accidental - and she might be next.
Mahit must navigate the capital's deadly halls of power, while hunting the killer. She must also somehow stop the Empire from annexing her fiercely independent colony. As she sinks deeper into this seductive yet unfamiliar culture, Mahit engages in intrigues of her own. For she's hiding an extraordinary technological secret, one which might destroy her station and its way of life.Or it might save them all from annihilation.

Loved the story. Really enjoyed learning about the two cultures; though I wish we'd gotten more ... well, political scenes and less running around in danger. I enjoy witty repartee and seeing characters use their keen observational (and conversational) skills to get ahead of their enemies.

This was a fantastic foray into sci-fi that deals with political intrigue. The two cultures that we experience were different enough thst they truly did feel alien to each despite being human. I loom forward to the next book.

This book recently got the nod in the Hugo awards, and based on that I bumped it to the top of my tbr. I have no regrets for doing this - it is one of the most impressive books I have read this year.

Teixcalaan is a galaxy spanning empire, with a rich political history. We follow the new ambassador for a small independent ‘state' on the edge of the Teixcalaan empire, summoned to the Teixcalaan court and immersed into this complex political structure. Arkady Martine slowly introduces us to elemnts of this court through a combination of murder mystery (what happened to the previous ambassador?) and political maneuverings of the various political factions in court. Somehow politics through poetry seems to work, as that is the way Teixcalaan seems to be ruled. The world building is on a scale I have rarely encountered. This is truly epic.

Away from the politicking that underlies the main story there are some deeply philosophical themes running through the story as well, especially around the concept of ‘self'. One of the key technologies here is an ‘imago' - a device that record the memories and personality of the previous holder of the job, which is embedded in the new person. This person is the integrated with the new job holder, gradually meshing into one, with the old personality being subsumed by the new, but leaving the knowledge and experience of the first. A clever concept and it leads to some interesting subtext around how we view our selves and how our own personality evolves.

If I did not know that this was a debut novel, I would never guess. This is a deep, philosophical and political epic space opera/murder mystery. It is deeply impressive. A Memory Called Empire has to rank as one of the best books I have read this summer. It is definitely the cleverest.