Author: CJ Cherryh Score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️ Completed: January 1, 2025 Last edited time: February 17, 2026 3:39 PM Status: Reviewed Type: Book
Diplomacy, in spaaaaaaace
Diplomatic crises have been resolved planet-side, so there’s nowhere to go but up.
Precursor shifts the setting but not the governing concern. Cherryh remains focused on diplomacy as process rather than event, this time filtered through a claustrophobic space faring human civilization and its political consequences. She has some views on the engineering and mechanics involved, but mostly leaves them unexplored. (too bad)
The real attention goes to the quirks of an inbred society that has developed in relative isolation for centuries. Cherryh is good at tracing how long-standing assumptions harden into custom, and how negotiation becomes a permanent state rather than a crisis response.
Like many entries in the series, very little happens. The plot inches forward, I’m here for it. Still, it lacks the depth of character work that made Inheritor stronger.
Eighteen books ahead in the series. One must pace one’s self.