Behind the Throne (The Indranan War, #1) in SpecFic Buddy Reads

Oct 07, 2016 Bradley rated it it was ok

Shelves: sci-fi, 2016-shelf, worldbuilding-sf

I wanted to think this might have been a vast empire-building SF epic, with spaceships galore and an underdog rise from the dregs, but no. Even the SF portions feel kinda tacked on, focusing more on taking a bit of world-building along the cultural lines and making a matrilineal succession the focus, instead, with an almost obligatory strong female cast to "round" it out.

In actuality, this is not really an SF except in the fact that it has cut and paste SF space-operatic featured over a very old ...more

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Oct 24, 2016 Philip rated it it was ok

Shelves: 2016-releases, sci-fi, space-opera

2.5ish stars.

A fast-paced, highly readable action novel that professes to be space opera but, as far as I can tell, only incidentally happens to take place in space.

Approximately 85% of the novel, told from the POV of former gunrunner Hail, transpires as follows in slight variations:

Thinking about my former lover/gunrunning partner, Portis (from my days as a gunrunner), brought all the universes crashing down upon me in a space-explosion that sucked the air from my lungs like a space-Dyson. I st 2.5ish stars.

A fast-paced, highly readable action novel that professes to be space opera but, as far as I can tell, only incidentally happens to take place in space.

Approximately 85% of the novel, told from the POV of former gunrunner Hail, transpires as follows in slight variations:

Thinking about my former lover/gunrunning partner, Portis (from my days as a gunrunner), brought all the universes crashing down upon me in a space-explosion that sucked the air from my lungs like a space-Dyson. I struggled to breathe and fought to keep the tears from gushing out of my eyes. "Get it together, Hail!" I said to myself. "A princess doesn't let anyone see her cry! Once a gunrunner always a gunrunner!"

It took every ounce of self-control I could muster to restrain myself from ramming my fist down my cousin's throat and ripping her liver out. Good thing I learned self-control as a gunrunner.

"Bugger me," I muttered then forced a Han-Solo-esque half-grin and made a witty retort to my ekam, Emmory, in typical gunrunner style. He didn't blink an eye, just slightly raised an eyebrow at me. He gets me.

All the while I was screaming inside my head, "You can't do this! You're not a princess, YOU'RE A GUNRUNNER! BUGGER ME!"

Plenty of melodrama.

The worldbuilding is pretty slipshod- insert Indian cultural influences, slap on some political strife, and ooh! Let's make it a matriarchal empire just to throw in some flavor! The characters were enjoyable in a basic, stock kind of way. Despite her dramatic nature, Hail is pretty BA. I enjoyed the anxious, tense atmosphere that came from not being able to trust anybody. Anyone, even a member of her own guard could be a traitor!

Once you manage to stop rolling your eyes, it's actually a lot of fun. The storyline is very simple and doesn't provide too much in the way of novelty but its streamlined nature allows it to move quickly and there's always something going on. I liked it a lot more than I expected to. I guess in this case the whole is greater than the sum of its parts?

So, yeah, my first foray into space opera didn't actually hold a single spaceship battle. All of the action, aside from the first 10 pages or so, takes place on Hail's home planet. The end of the novel seems to set up some opportunities for some space fighting. Maybe in the next book we'll get a little more intergalactic intrigue? ...more

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May 20, 2017 Chris Haught rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: specfic-group-reads, review-copy-net-galley, fof-reads

I received a copy of this ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

4.5 stars, and I'm going to round it up. Why? Because even after I worked all week and had a lot of things to do around the house last night, I stayed up until 3 am to finish this book. I could barely walk to get to the bed after I finished, but I did it. And really enjoyed the whole experience.

This wasn't as detail-rich or epic scope as most of the top ratings I give, but when a book hooks you ...more

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Oct 03, 2016 Lindsay rated it liked it

The Indranan Empire is an interstellar civilization under a hereditary matrilineal monarchy. It's also under attack with nearly every immediate member of the Empress's family assassinated in a short time. The only one left other than the Empress is the black sheep of the family, princess-turned-gunrunner Hailimi Bristol. With the Empress ailing from a dementia-like illness, Hail is dragged back to the Empire very much against her wishes.

Once returned, and as the new imperial heir, Hail finds her The Indranan Empire is an interstellar civilization under a hereditary matrilineal monarchy. It's also under attack with nearly every immediate member of the Empress's family assassinated in a short time. The only one left other than the Empress is the black sheep of the family, princess-turned-gunrunner Hailimi Bristol. With the Empress ailing from a dementia-like illness, Hail is dragged back to the Empire very much against her wishes.

Once returned, and as the new imperial heir, Hail finds herself mired in court politics and assassination attempts, and she urgently wants to find out who killed her sisters. The Empire is vulnerable to internal struggle and a long-term peace treaty with the nearby Saxon Empire looks to be failing as well.

For me this had a really clumsy start, with just about everything prior to Hail returning to the Empire feeling like it needed at least another editing pass. However, once into the Indranan society the book takes a sudden turn for the better. The Indranan society is a multicultural one with primarily Indian-based cultural norms and dress, but organized as a matriarchy with matrilineal families and inheritance. There's strong religious influences, primarily Hindu, but with churches that feel Christian. There's unrest around the role of men in society and a supposed caste system, but neither of these have much impact in this book where most of the action is within the palace itself. There's some eyebrows raised when the new heir has male bodyguards, and most of the positions of power are held by women, but other than that, we don't see a great deal of discrimination.

Hail herself is also quite interesting, with considerable guilt regarding leaving her sisters and disaffection towards her mother. Her return to the Empire is initially about finding her sister's killers, but as the book proceeds she takes on much more of the responsibility of the heir.

This one is a bit hard to review in some ways. There's a really solid story here, with a well-constructed world with interesting issues and characters and lots of challenges to overcome and a solid plot. However, the execution is a bit lacking, with a lot of tell rather than show and too much repetition and particularly repetition of some clunky terms. There are parts of the book where "gunrunner" feels like it's used on every page. I'm fairly sure even actual gunrunners don't use that term. Likewise "space madness". On the tell rather than show, we never get what Hail's gunrunning actually involves, and while we hear that men are repressed in Indranan culture and that there's an oppressive class system, we really don't see much of either.

I would give this a 3.5 star rating marked down for execution. ...more

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Oct 05, 2016 Justine rated it liked it

Shelves: 2016-read

3.5 stars

This book definitely improves in its second half, enough so that I'm interested in reading the next book and seeing where the story goes from here. ...more

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Feb 11, 2017 Lata rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: x2017-read, auth-f, bipoc-actor

Totally escapist, political intrigue-heavy fantasy about an empire on the brink of war, a gunrunner/princess dragged back home to said empire in the wake of the murders of three members of her family and the ailing head of her family, her mother the empress. Lots of action with an interesting premise, that the planet on which most of the action takes place was settled by people from India, and after many years, became a matriarchy. Hail Bristol, gunrunner/princess, is unhappy being back home and ...more

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Oct 26, 2016 Veronique rated it liked it

Shelves: read2016

Behind the Throne is an easy and entertaining read.

The idea of a rogue princess is not a new one but it works. Hail has left her planet for a particular reason, living as a gunrunner for the last 20 years and making a 'reputation' for herself. However, with the Empress ill and her sisters and niece recently murdered, Hail is brought back to fulfill her role as heir.

The blurb is misleading since this story is nothing like Star Wars, nor are there any space battles. Really, did they read the sto ...more

9 likes · Like · see review