Book Review: The Stars are Legion by Kameron Hurley

The Stars are Legion by Kameron Hurley

Hardcover, 380 pages

Published February 2017 by Saga Press

The Stars are Legion is a space fantasy novel that is high on concept from the first to the last page. Kameron Hurley is an award winning author and this is my second time reading her work. The first novel of hers that I read I remember thinking was good but honestly can't remember the title right now which is not the best sign. None the less I liked it enough to come back and read this.

The story takes place in a region of space called the Legion. Is this our future? Is it a totally different new civilization? Not sure. The legion seems to be a couple worlds and habitats in space. We are introduced to a woman named Zan. She is our hero and it becomes clear that she has no memory of the life she lived but remembers enough to be a badass warrior. We understand quickly that this has happened to Zan before. There is a woman Jayd who might be able to help her but it is possible Jayd is the reason Zan is in this spot in the first place. She is given a mission to board a space station/ world ship called Mokshi with the mission to liberate it. Her entry to the world requires a giant battle and only succeeds in getting Zan stranded deep in the bowels of the ship.

It about 100 pages I realized that this culture is devoid of men folk...more on that later.

In this novel the women of this universe don't talk about dying but being recycled, which on Mokshi means being ejected into the deep down below levels. Thus begins Zan's quest to climb the levels. Fighting monsters and the weird ship based ecology. Each chapter begins with quotes from The legions historical and or religious texts. These are not throw away motifs. They are important to the story and give clues of the direction the story is heading.

I read that Hurley is normally thin on plot but heavy on details, these chapter headers may have have been added later but as a fan of intensely plotted books I loved that detail. There are clues even in the first couple pages that pay off, I had to go back and re-read. I got a laugh when I listened to Luke Barrage on the Science Fiction book review podcast said he did the same thing. The second half of the book is pretty much a heroes quest, with moments of political intrigue. If you paid close attention in those early pages the second half is a bit more powerful.

Now I get why Hurley was making jokes about this book being lesbians in space. She was just kidding so don't get the wrong idea. This world is not soft gentle feminist utopia or nerd fantasy. This book depeicts a brutal society that worships war lords. It was not the book I would have expected if I had known that it was Matriarchal space opera. It is not that I needed the novel to constantly be exploring gender issues, it is probably better than just naturally exists as a feminine culture. Some of the most interesting moments revolve around body control and issues of reproduction. I am not sure Hurley was trying to express here, reproduction in this future comes almost randomly and is always painful.

I am sure this is not the first entirely matriarchal space opera, but it is the first I can remember reading, I know it has happened before and in a moment of zeitgiest I know Stephen Kozeniewski's new sci-fi horror novel THE HEMATOPHAGES is free of dudes too. I think this a neat part of the novel but I would not entirely define it as such.

The end of the novel is classic space opera and in some ways reminded me of sword and sorcery classics. It all comes together for a super entertaining read. This is not light reading sci-fi, the appeal would not be as board as say Old Man's War. This is not mainstream or for a beginning sci-fi reader. This book will lose some readers, but if you stick it with it pays off.