Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (5/5)
Date Started: April 28, 2024
Date Finished: May 9, 2024
My Thoughts
Ruocchio knocks this book out of the park. The characters are so nuanced, that it’s easy to miss their depths at times.
Hadrian re-invents himself through repeated existential crisis’, becoming an entirely different person each time. If you look closely, and pause while reading, you can draw a parallel through your own adolescence. Arrogance, failure, denial, narcissism all leading to the world punching you in the face until you learn how the world works. Hadrian learns these lessons, acknowledges them, and then rejects them entirely time and time again.
Ruocchio brilliantly uses Tor Gibson as a mouthpiece for strong philosophical tones in the novel. Through Tor guiding Hadrian’s experience through the world we, the readers, are exposed to the injustice of a society that expects complete obedience to its values.
Hadrian is a complex character that I’m still trying to come to terms with. He seems to simultaneously deeply love those around him, while also forgetting them as soon as they are gone. This contradiction in his personality may come from the narration (1st person past tense), and that he tells the story from a great distance in years.
Because of the POV, we know what Hadrian will eventually do (It’s in the series name, for heaven’s sake!). And as he undergoes metamorphosis after metamorphosis, I was left wondering :
“Is this the man who destroyed a sun?”
“What sun does he destroy?”
What I hoped to get out of it
I was hoping for a Space Opera with strong characters and a good setting.
What I got out of it
The world that Hadrian lives in is brutal. The characters he collects on his journey are strong, passionate, and unforgettable.
Ruocchio gave us many hints to a much deeper universe that Hadrian hasn’t experienced as of the end of the first book. From the ending of book one, I think we’re going to see more of it – which is good, because I didn’t get enough of it in book one.
Recommendation
Who should read it
Anyone who enjoys Science Fiction with STRONG philosophical messages will LOVE Empire of Silence. This one is up there with Red Rising – and if you know me, you know I’m a Pierce Brown fan boy!
Book Notes
Great book, with lots of depth. Will be interested to see where we go next.
Important foreshadowing:
Not even two. “All right.” I sucked in a rattling breath, held it so it wouldn’t come out a sob. “I’ll tell you a story.” A year passed, it seemed, or a century before I chose a story for her as I had countless times. It was one she’d heard before and one I knew almost as well as Simeon’s. “Once upon a time, on an island far from Earth, upon the margins of untrammeled space, there stood a city of poets. The Empire was young in those days, and the last of the Mericanii were broken. “The city of poets had been built as a haven, as a place for men to hide from the Foundation War and compose their arts in peace. The city had only one law: that none may use force against another. So the city flourished and was made beautiful by all the artists who dwelt behind its walls and prospered by their fellowship.” “Except for Kharn.” “Kharn had not chosen the city for his home but had been born to it, the child of a great poet. And as the children of great warriors are often not warriors themselves, so he was no poet. He dreamed of being a soldier, a hero like those in the epics his people composed. His people would hear none of it. ‘We have no need for soldiers here, nor the burden of arms,’ the poets said, ‘for we are far from Earth, and the walls of the city are strong.’ “‘Those who will not live by the sword will die by one,’ Kharn insisted, for so the poems said. But the poets did not believe their own words, believing stories to be dead trifles under their command. Yet truth is neither opinion nor its slave, and the day came when the sky was darkened by sails. The Extrasolarians had arrived. Men like monsters in the Dark, the children of the Mericanii in their black-masted ships. And they burned the city and the poets in it.” “Except for Kharn.” Here I paused to brush the hair from Cat’s face and to mop her brow. That accomplished, I continued, “Kharn fought them, and the Exalted—who are kings among the Extrasolarians—recognize only strength. So they spared him even as they cut the hearts from his people and set their bodies to crew their vile ships. They spared him. And Kharn lived among them for many years and with them pillaged other cities, other worlds.” I do not know how long I spoke or how long I held her hand. I told the whole story. How all the while Kharn Sagara harbored vengeance in his heart. How he turned the Exalted against one another, slaying their captain and taking command of their ship for himself. How he set a course for their home: the frigid Vorgossos and its dead star. I told her how he took their planet for himself, how he made himself king of that dark and frozen world. It was the story from the book Gibson had given me, The King with Ten Thousand Eyes. It was not a happy story, nor was it a short one.
Characters
Hadrian Anaxander Marlowe
- Main character
- “During the war, I was Hadrian Halfmortal and Hadrian the Deathless. After the war, I was the Sun Eater. To the poor people of Borosevo, I was a myrmidon called Had. To the Jaddians, I was Al Neroblis. To the Cielcin, I was Oimn Belu and worse things besides. I have been many things: soldier and servant, captain and captive, sorcerer and scholar and little more than a slave.” Location 204
Lord Alistair Diomedes Friedrich Marlowe
- Archon of Meidua
- Hadrian’s Father
- But Father never wanted a child. He wanted an heir, someone to inherit his slice of Empire and to carry on our family legacy.Location 200
- When I make a decree, I make it. Personally. No proxies, no fallbacks. The old systems of democracy and parliament only allowed the cowards to hide. Our power depends not on the consent of the people but on their belief in us.” Location 1492
Lady Liliana Kephalos-Marlow
- Hadrian’s Mother
- a celebrated librettist and filmmaker and notorious womanizer, youngest daughter of the vicereine-duchess. Frequently away from Devil’s Rest, preferring her own family’s summer palace at Haspida.
Crispin Marlowe
- Hadrian’s younger brother
- Heir to Alistair Marlowe
- I was four when Crispin was born, and at once my little brother began to prove himself the ideal heir, which is to say that he obeyed my father, if no one else. Location 227
- I already hated him, but hatred is something pure, like a fire in the belly. Resentment, though, sat in me like a cancer. I did not want what was his. Rather, I resented that he had taken something that I had implicitly understood was mine. Location 986
- For a moment I realized that being the younger brother, he had expected to come into nothing. Just as I had thought Devil’s Rest had always been Crispin’s, he had believed it mine. He had toiled in my shadow, and I in his, neither of us knowing the shadow was really just that of our Father, drowning us both.Location 2572
Tor Gibson
- Hadrian and Crispin’s tutor
- Tor Gibson who made me the man I am, he who taught me my first lesson. Location 236
Sir Felix Martyn
- Lord Marlowe’s castellan and commander of his house guard.
- My father’s castellan, Sir Felix Martyn, taught me to fight with sword, shield-belt, and handgun.Location 230
Demetri Arello
- Captain of the starship Euryasir
- Hired by Hadrian’s mother to smuggle him out of his father’s reach. Abandoned Hadrian on the streets to die.
Lord Balian Mataro
- Count of Emesh
- Married to Lord Luthor Astin-Shin-Mataro
- Father of Dorian Mataro and Anais Mataro
- Schemed to marry Hadrian to Anais to better his bloodline.
Ligeia Vas
- Gran Prior of the Holy Chantry on Emesh
- Her son, Gilliam Vas – a bastard, genetically mutated intus. Killed by Hadrian.
Valka Onderra Vhad Edda
- Xenologist, researching the Umandh and the “Quiet” ruins
Cat
- Poor street girl who was Hadrian’s lover until she died of the plauge.
Sepha
- Old woman who runs a clinic. Saved Hadrian after he was abandoned for dead on the streets
William of Danu (Switch)
- Myrmidon
- Hadrian’s best friend
- Formerly a chartered catamite
Pallino
- Myrmidon
- One eyed veteran of the imperial legion
Dame Raine Smythe
- Tribune who allows Hadrian to go on his expedition
Basander Lin
- LT of Dame Raine Smythe
Utsebimn Aranta Otiolo
- Aeta of the cecilin
Casantora Tanaran Iakato
- Baetan priest-historian
Itana Uvanari Ayatomn
- ichakta captain
- killed by Hadrian