tremendous book, fascinating, moving. I loved the characters and could hardly wait for the sequel!!! ( )

What if death could be conquered and eternal life could be achieved. At the base level, this is the question that Risen Empire tries to answer. Spiraling out from this permise other complicated questions arise; honesty, loyalty, religion, economy, inteligence and self-awareness.

The book does manage with many of its attempted goals. The culture and system of the empire itself is fairly well thought-out and it works well as a playground for the events that take place. In some ways the story hinges itself slightly too much on the much sought after answer to the Question - the Emperors Secret - but other than that, there is a good interplay between the different parts and things move forward in a good way. The non-linear flashbacks, if they can be called that, work fairly well as a device. Told in cronological order they would probably have felt slightly tedious but instead they give you relevant background information.

Characters don't have an extreme dept and can sometimes feel a bit under-developed or shallow but function within the set framework. Though archetypical they do their intended work. Some of them even do more than that.

In conclusion; the major strenghts of the book is by far the ideas that are presented, the broad strokes of the envisioned empire and its culture, the new ways at which it looks at near-singularity societies and their inner workings. These are the reasons, and they are very compelling, to read this work. ( )

Amazing. I cannot really explain it. It seems to move incredibly slowly, the whole book leading up to the end, but I hardly noticed. I was enthralled by it all.
Brilliant technology, complicated politics, deadly wars, forbidden love? It has it all and blends it together wonderfully. It does go into extremely specific detail, which includes injuries, so it might make you squirm, but still a great book. ( )

Summary: In the Risen Empire, immortality is a matter of course for the wealthy and powerful. Sixteen hundred years ago, the Emperor invented a form of life-after-death, and has since ruled the eighty worlds of his empire, along with a caste of similarly immortal nobles and military elites. However, the borders of his empire are threatened by the Rix cult, a group of fanatics who worship compound minds: AI developed from the computing power of entire planets. When the Rix take the sister of the Emperor hostage, in order to plant a compound mind on her planet, the situation becomes critical. Laurent Zai, the captain of a small Imperial frigate, is tasked with rescuing the hostages - a mission which, if he fails, will result in an Error of Blood and his own ritual suicide. Back on the Emperor's homeworld, Senator Nara Oxham must do her best to keep the situation from escalating into full-blown war. But neither of them can know the secret plans of the Rix - nor the secret that Emperor will risk anything to protect.

Review: Although I generally prefer fantasy when it comes to my speculative fiction, I'm not opposed to sci-fi. Far from it, in fact: Ray Bradbury was (is) one of my favorite authors, and don't even get me started on how much I love Battlestar Galactica. However, taking a critical eye to the situation, the sci-fi I love all has one thing in common: it's less about the science and more about the fiction. Humans are more interesting than technology, characters over plot, again and again.

And Westerfeld's book does have some very interesting human moments; there are several scenes that were genuinely and unexpectedly moving. Unfortunately, his characters tend to get swamped out by an overwhelming preponderance of technobabble. It's imaginative, consistent, and plausible technobabble, but there's only so much talk of AI and nanomachines and synesthetic viewscreens that I can deal with in one sitting. It's a shame, too, because Westerfeld clearly knows his stuff, and has shown in other books that he knows how to balance technology and character: I really enjoyed the Uglies series, and Peeps is one of the best blendings of science and story that I've ever read. I find it interesting, though, that in a story whose main theme seems to be the interplay of technology and humanity - how much machine can you put into a human before they stop being human, how much humanity do you have to give a machine before it stops being a machine - that the human element loses out to the technology in the storytelling. 3 out of 5 stars.

Recommendation: I'll be reading the sequel, The Killing of Worlds, since The Risen Empire ends without resolving anything and with a MAJOR cliffhanger. (Apparently this is one of those cases where the series was written as a single book but split into two by the publisher.) Still, I think this book would be best for those who enjoy technological/military sci-fi; those of us who prefer the focus on the characters might want to look elsewhere - or else be good at skimming through the tech talk. ( )

The premise: The Risen Emperor has ruled his empire of 80 human worlds for nearly sixteen hundred years. He's found a way to conquer death--which requires dying FIRST in order to live forever--and even bestows that privilege on a select few. The first to received that privilege, once upon a time ago, was his sister, now known as the Child Empress, and now, the Child Empress's life is at stake: humanity's worst enemy, the Rix, have taken her hostage in order to waken the compound mind--the mind of a planet. The Emperor will do anything to keep that from happening, but there's a secret he'll protect even more than his very own sister, no matter how many lives it costs.

My Rating

Wish I'd Borrowed It: it's just not for me. I can see how some masculine readers might love this book to pieces, as it's certainly brain-candy in terms of world-building and details. But I've heard from other reviews that of Westerfeld's adult SF, it's not the strongest, so I'll wait to pass judgment on whether or not his YA is superior. However, I'm in the YA camp for now. I won't be reading the sequel (or the continuation) of this book, nor any that might possibly come in the future, a future that isn't soon coming, if you take a look at Westerfeld's faq. Can't blame the guy. I look forward to reading more of his YA, and will give his adult SF another shot should I happen upon a different title at a later date. As far as recommendations, I suspect masculine fans of space opera will probably eat this up, provided their primary love in SF is world-building and details rather than meaty plots or characterization. Not that the characterization is BAD in this book, there's just too many characters to follow, some you only get a chapter on, and frankly, the pages could've been better used, IMHO.

One note of warning: if you're reading this and are liking/loving it enough to want the sequel: get it ASAP. The Risen Empire ends on a major cliff-hanger due to the fact Tor split the manuscript into two books. So yeah, have your sequel on hand if you're liking it. :)

The full review, which does contain spoilers (well, more nit-picks than spoilers, maybe), may be found in my journal. As always, comments and discussion are most welcome.

REVIEW: Scott Westerfeld's THE RISEN EMPIRE

Happy Reading! :) ( )