lb_lee (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
lb_lee) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
pluralstories2022-07-26 04:01 pm
lb_lee) wrote in pluralstories2022-07-26 04:01 pm
This Alien Shore, by C. S. Friedman (sci-fi prose, 1998)
“God save us from an Earth in which all men are the same. God save us from a colony where that is the goal, or a culture which assumes that for its norm. Give me a thousand people speaking different tongues, worshiping different gods, and dreaming different dreams, and I will make of them a greater nation than you can make with ten thousand of your gengineered duplicates. For mine will have the spark of greatness in them, while yours will live for conformity, worship mediocrity, and take their carefully modulated delight in predigested dreams.”
Blurb: Multiple fleeing for her/their life in space amidst a space opera backdrop that includes a society built around being as disability- and weird-friendly as possible (while still being just as full of intrigue and bad behavior as anywhere else). Quoth Wiki: "An explosion in her habitat sends young Jamisia Shido scrambling through the corridors to an escape capsule. Intercepted by an interstellar passenger ship, she sets out for the stars pursued by [...] terran and galactic pursuers. Demons hide in the depths of jump-space as well, much as killer whales pursue seals diving from one ice-floe to the next."
Why is it worth your time? Honestly, I enjoyed the worldbuilding and cultures more than I did the multiple themself, but it is a good space opera, and the world is worth the price of admission all by itself. I would happily read more books taking place in this setting.
Plural Tags: sci-fi multiplicity, inner children (minor role), abuse low-focus
Content Warnings: In comments below; contains spoilers.
Accessibility Notes: This book is LONG (500 pages or so). Available as ebook, audiobook, and paper.
Blurb: Multiple fleeing for her/their life in space amidst a space opera backdrop that includes a society built around being as disability- and weird-friendly as possible (while still being just as full of intrigue and bad behavior as anywhere else). Quoth Wiki: "An explosion in her habitat sends young Jamisia Shido scrambling through the corridors to an escape capsule. Intercepted by an interstellar passenger ship, she sets out for the stars pursued by [...] terran and galactic pursuers. Demons hide in the depths of jump-space as well, much as killer whales pursue seals diving from one ice-floe to the next."
Why is it worth your time? Honestly, I enjoyed the worldbuilding and cultures more than I did the multiple themself, but it is a good space opera, and the world is worth the price of admission all by itself. I would happily read more books taking place in this setting.
Plural Tags: sci-fi multiplicity, inner children (minor role), abuse low-focus
Content Warnings: In comments below; contains spoilers.
Accessibility Notes: This book is LONG (500 pages or so). Available as ebook, audiobook, and paper.
Content warnings
This is a space opera with intrigue, so some people do die. A major plot point is that major space travel involves being pursued by terrifying otherdimensional monsters that are beyond human conception. Also, the multiple protagonist rarely gets agency, and her most effective headmate solves problems by sleeping with them, which can be uncomfortable to read.
Trauma is not a big part of this book, but it IS a plot point that Jamisia's plurality was induced by a mindbreaking corporation for moneymaking reasons. (Which, in the context of the book, comes to make total sense.)