The Risen Empire

I had been reading Heroic and Epic Fantasy for years, and I’d purposely avoided reading Sci-Fi, convinced that it would influence my burgeoning plot development. I wanted to maintain my plot integrity and not be subconsciously led by other authors in the genre (but of course I couldn’t avoid the influence of the SF I watched on TV). Of course, I was missing out on some great writing. I was enthralled by this story—it combined an undead trope with space opera, as the ‘risen empire’ maintains its territory while facing an external threat from the technologically hybrid Rix. There’s a… show more.

The Succession duology (The Risen Empire and The Killing of Worlds) is one of the best sci-fi series that few people seem to have heard about. Westerfeld does a masterful job of portraying high-tech, futuristic military combat both on the ground and out in space. It felt so realistic, and I learned so much about spaceship combat that I had never even imagined before. The stories in these books stuck in my head for years, and I find I keep returning to read them again every so often, which only happens with the very best books.