A Fire Born of Exile by Aliette de Bodard
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A Fire Born of Exile by Aliette de Bodard is the second standalone romance novel set in a galactic universe of Vietnamese inspiration. Billed as a “sapphic Count of Monte Cristo/Nirvana in Fire in space,” it is a rich story with incredible technology, bold characters, sentient spaceships, and the hallmark world-building of a Bodard novel. Everything she writes is decadent, with vivid descriptions, imaginative locations, and characters that hook readers.
This space opera delves into the corrupt ruling class of the Scattered Pearls Belt, and the innocents left behind in the wake of a civil war that now makes them cower in fear of being noticed by the militia.
Quynh introduces herself as the Alchemist of Streams and Hills. She’s new to the Belt, and she sweeps across the page like a raging fire: interrupting a kidnapping and stepping in to help a frightened technologist – both seemingly inconsequential encounters that have the power to distract Quynh from her plans of revenge.
Minh is the daughter of the ruling prefect of the Belt, and both she and her friend The Fruit of Heart’s Sorrows have “grown up in a rarefied circle of the wealthy and influential.”She is captivated by Quynh even before the Alchemist saves her from kidnappers. Saving Minh gives Quynh access to the grateful parents, which is exactly what she needs. Fifteen years of rage are close to being fruitful.
Hoà is a lowly technologist whose older sister was murdered for defending a student. Her other sister is deathly ill, and Hoà doesn’t have the skills to fulfill their current contract on her own. She meets Quynh at her older sister’s grave, and receives the help she needs to save her business and her sick sister. As Bodard eloquently puts it, “they were each other’s salvation. One needing to be useful, the other needing help.”
With names like The General Who Pacified the Dragon’s Tail, The Princess Who Drowned the Sword, and Ten Thousand Flags Uprising, mindships named The Fruit of Heart’s Sorrow, Flowers at the Gates of the Lords, and The Moon in Teacups, Bodard’s stylistic grandeur is evident. Lines such as “Quynh was a ghost risen from her grave, eager to feast on the entrails of the living” are powerful as well as beautiful.
Bodard has a way of captivating readers, and I love everything she writes. She’s especially skilled in sapphic romances, where just a look can make the reader swoon. Everything about a character’s attraction is delicate and fragile, the first flickers of fire that will explode into a bonfire.
Bodard spins a sapphic romance like no other, with a story that will hook space opera fans as well as those who enjoy beautiful words. A Fire Born of Exile is an absolute treat, and I hope to see it in audiobook format soon.
You can learn more about Bodard’s Xuya universe, including the cultural inspirations and a list of all the stories and books she’s written in this universe, on the author’s website.
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Visit the author’s website and follow her on Twitter.
A Fire Born of Exile US cover design credit: Ravven
A Fire Born of Exile UK cover design credit: Alyssa Winans
Advance Reading Copy provided by Independent Publishers Group via NetGalley at my request.
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Check out my review of Bodard’s other books:
worldsofmayhem.com 