• Questions: When a mother breaks her daughter’s love, how can she repair it? How understandable is it for the injured to injure others? Is there a point at which people aren’t worth sacrificing to save? Do human sins have an ethical effect beyond the human race itself?
• Themes: Prejudice, cruelty, hubris, love, sacrifice.
• Genre: Less walks a line between fantasy and science fiction as cuts a new path of its own, a poignant and thoughtful genre-blender.
• Author: Nora K. Jemisin writes with grace, vividness, fluidity, and sensitivity evoking the highest compliment I know–she reminds me of Ursula K. LeGuin.
• Audience: Definite adult content, although I don’t discourage interested 14+ year olds from giving it a try. Aimed at lovers of the Human Story in an imaginative, if grim, other Earth.
• Books: The Fifth Season, The Obelisk Gate, The Stone Sky, all equally good, form a coherent narrative. Best read in order.

Conclusion: If you like your mind and heart stretched in equal measure, try it.

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