This is such a lush sci-fi with an AWESOME premise!

Let’s begin with my favorite part: The Culture! Martine did an AMAZING job with embodying the culture and politics into this scifi world and it is just wonderful. It’s the best part of this book. Everything is described so beautifully, and you really get to appreciate it. From the clothing to the different places the characters travel to. It’s all just wonderful. The world building is fantastic! Okay, let's set up the plot which is basically a whodunit murder mystery... IN SPACE. We're following Ambassador Mahit Dzmare as she sets off for Teixcalaan and when she arrives, she gets the very unfortunate news that a fellow Ambassador has been murdered within her station and NOBODY wants to believe it's an accident so she makes it her mission to find out what "really" happened.

The writing was absolutely wonderful, the story flowed perfectly, the settings were really vivid & creative, the romance totally worked, and the characters were all well developed & realistic. I loved how complex the main character was. Even characters who weren't in a ton of the story were really strong!

I was just so thrilled to see a well-rounded story that had a full plot arc on its own, yet still set up the sequels perfectly. Soooo when can I have book 2 please?

I love that we now apparently exist in the golden age of SFF and therefore can expect sci-fi to provide us with beautiful and complex offerings like A Memory Called Empire. At it’s heart this was a murder mystery story but the intricacy of the world building, the deep characterisation and the beautiful prose made it so much more. I wasn’t sure about Mahit to start with but I was surprised by how invested I quickly became in her viewpoint. This was such a cleverly done and intelligent novel. Highly recommend.