As someone who has enjoyed de Bodard’s work in the past, like Red Scholar’s Wake, I was so excited for Navigational Entanglements. At the same time, this was an ambitious project which doesn’t necessarily hit the mark all the time. Keep reading this book review of Navigational Entanglements for my full thoughts.
Summary
Using the power of Shadows generated from their own bodies’ vitality, Navigators guide space ships safely across the a realm of unreality populated by unfathomable, dangerous creatures called Tanglers. In return for their service, the navigator clans get wealth and power―but they get the blame, too. So when a Tangler escapes the Hollows and goes missing, the empire calls on the jockeying clans to take responsibility and deal with the problem.
Việt Nhi is not good with people. Or politics. Which is rather unfortunate because, as a junior apprentice in the Rooster clan, when her elders send her on a joint-clan mission to locate the first escaped Tangler in living memory, she can’t exactly say no.
Hạc Cúc of the Snake clan usually likes people. It says so on her “information gathering”―right after “poisoning” and “stabbing.” So she’s pretty sure she’s got the measure of this they’re the screw-ups, the spares; there isn’t a single sharp tool in this shed.
But when their imperial envoy is found dead by clan poison, this crew of expendable apprentices will have to learn to work together―fast―before they end up cooling their heels in a jail cell while the invisible Tangler wreaks havoc on a civilian city and the reputation of all four clans.
Review
(Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher. This has not impacted my review which is unbiased and honest.)
While I wanted to enjoy Navigational Entanglements, it just fell a little short. This novella had some impressive world building and concepts. I was totally here for it even if at the beginning I was so lost. But unfortunately, the world building didn’t get a ton clearer. I think part of that is that the scope of what de Bodard is trying to do might be better for a longer form or something which has the space needed to detail all the things I wanted to see. I wanted to know a bit more about the world to make the discoveries ring more deeply.
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Part of what makes a discovery or revelation different is the firm knowledge or illusion that it could never be. You want a revelation to resonate more when we are so convinced it could never happen. At the same time, Navigational Entanglements has a crew dynamic. And I wanted to fall into them, but I found I needed to know a bit more about them. There were some bright spots in the action and some of the character interactions. All in all, Navigational Entanglements is ambitious, but unfortunately it didn’t have enough for me to hold onto.
Find Navigational Entanglements on Goodreads, Storygraph, Amazon, Bookshop.org, & Blackwells.