Alright, this isn’t technically a fantasy book. It’s more of a space opera, but it’s stuffed with more than enough steampunk elements to satisfy even the pickiest of fantasy readers! The third (and, maybe final) book in Reynolds’ series, this is definitely high-concept: we get space-worlds spaced like spindles, pirates, people who can plug into alien skulls to communicate with people light-years away… you get the picture. It’s a romp, and a bloody enjoyable one too.

Though I’d recommend going back and starting with Revenger, this is a pure thrill ride: pirate sisters Adrana and Fura Ness are out to swindle the cosmos, alongside their crew. Expect tonnes of misadventures, some betrayals, some excellent tension and, above all, some truly inspiring worldbuilding.

Bone Silence is the third and final (for now) novel in Alastair Reynold’s Revenger sequence. I really enjoyed the previous two novels, chronicling the adventures of the infamous Ness sisters, their ship, and their motley crew, and was looking forward to seeing what happened next. And I’ll tell you right now, it was worth it. There’s a lot going on in these pages. There’s Reynold’s trademark elaborate, complex worldbuilding, each piece of the wider universe sliding into place as smoothly as a cog in an elaborate clock. There’s the Ness sisters, whose growth from naïve country bumpkins to hardened pirates, with their own code and their own quests has been a delight to watch. And that’s before exploring the complex weave of emotion and action which binds two very different siblings together. There’s mysteries still to be investigated, whose solving promises to shake the foundations of the universe. There’s politics and knives in the dark, moments of despair and abject terror. This is a story which will draw you into its pages with dazzling, high concept science fiction, then throw out an emotional gut punch. This is a story to make you end up in the metaphorical gutter, looking up at the stars.

Just to be clear, I really enjoyed this one.

I’ve talked about the world (or worlds) of this series before. But to recap: this is the Congregation. It’s a rich necklace of worlds wrapped in their own orbits around an old sun. Each of the worlds is small, ranging from meters to perhaps hundreds of miles across. And they dodge and weave around each other in a delicately elaborate dance of celestial mechanics, one which nobody entirely understands. There’s a sense of age and loss permeating the text; the Congregation is old, filled with baubles - worldlets containing artifacts of earlier, more scientifically advanced times (as well as lethal traps). There’s a melancholy to it, a sense of decline, as humanity seems to have fallen from greater heights to scrapping in the gutter. If the Congregation is a marvel, those who live in it are all too familiar, all too human. Avaricious. Vengeful. Compassionate. Loving. Traitors and fools, thieves and scholars, all of the best and worst of us on display.

Between the worlds fly ships of interstellar commerce, in a way which would be familiar to Nelson (or, perhaps more appropriately, Horatio Hornblower). Plying the deeps on solar sails, these ships are delicate, complicated things, and those who take them out into space are odd, driven, complicated people. Also, sometimes, pirates. Because shooting holes in the sails of another interplanetary craft, boarding it and stripping it of cargo is entirely possible.

This is a universe to stir the blood and call out to the soul, as tiny glistening drops traverse the endless deeps of space.

That’s before we even get to the aliens. Because humanity isn’t alone in the universe. Out there somewhere are other species. More advanced than humanity. Holding the levers of power – government, finance, policing. Quite what they want and why they want it has been one of the mysteries of the series, and if more light falls on some of those questions here, I shan’t delve into the detail. I’ll say this though: the story is one about fulfilling your curiosity, about the price and reward of doing so. As the end approaches, some of the big questions will be answered, though by the final page you may find yourself with more questions than you started with.

After focusing on each of the Ness sisters in turn in previous books, here we get to see them side-by-side. Their stories are woven together with interleaving chapters, each having their own viewpoint. It’s a testament to Reynold’s skill that both sisters feel distinct, genuine, and having vivid personalities in their own right. You won’t mistake Fura, boiling with a slowly rising rage, driven to acts of violence and compassion in equal measure, with the more collected, but equally tormented Adrana. Their voices are as different as their stories – but as those personal narratives wrap around each other, they make something greater than they are alone. The Ness sisters are a triumph of characterisation. They’re both damaged, yes. Physically and mentally struggling. Trying to make decisions for the lives in their hands, trying to serve their goals, to uncover answers to the mysteries that plague the congregation and, incidentally, to stay alive. But they’re compassionate, and willing to hold the line and die with (or for) their crew. They’re sometimes ruthless, sometimes riven with doubt, occasionally wise or compassionate, always curious. They’re heroines, shaped by circumstances which might have broken them, but have instead bound them to common purpose, and left them burning more brightly and more fiercely than the Old Sun. Their story, and that of their crew, is an absolute pleasure to read.

As for that story: as ever, I shall try for no spoilers. But it has a sense of wonder to it. As I said above, there are big questions here, about humanity’s place in the universe. About why that universe is the way it is. About the economy, about sous, about the real agenda of the aliens walking the congregation. There are new marvels unveiled, and old horrors stalking the streets. There’s antagonists so vile you can feel their presence seeping off the page, and flights of grand imagination which left me breathless. Reynolds has pulled out all the stops here, and given the Ness sisters a conclusion which you’ll remember; this is one of those stories that you won’t want to end. I was left torn between needing to know what happened next, and hoping not to turn the final page.

Which is all a long-winded way of saying this is a great story, and a cracking conclusion to the series. If you’ve come this far with the Ness sisters, you’ll want to take this voyage too. I promise, it’s worth it.

I love Alistair Reynolds and enjoyed Revenger, so was excited to get to my hands on Bone Silence and devoured it. A great story for the Ness Sisters, though it does feel sort of like the end for them.
Last-ditch attempts, and tonnes more misadventure, timed well and designed around a really compelling story.

But if you're looking for pirates in space, a bit of steampunk, a lot of fun and a lot of touching stuff, this is the perfect book for you.

I received this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

The Congregation’s Thirteen Occupation is built upon the value of quoins, currency that keeps people like the Ness sisters risking their life hunting space for alien technology and treasure. Now the quoins have lost their value, the Thirteenth Occupation is starting to decline, and Adrana and Fura Ness are fighting for their lives to uncover the truth behind the Occupations and what is the true purpose of the quoins. This is a journey that will lead them to team up with the different species of alien, traitors, and bauble crackers like them, just looking for an honest, well honest-ish, living if they want to survive.
Bone Silence picks up where Shadow Captain left off with the Ness sisters as joint captain of the Revenger. Their attempts at clearing their names are halted when by Incer Stannis, a bone reader more talented than them, attacks them on behalf of the Congregation, determined to bring Fura in dead or alive. What follows is an all-or nothing chase in space, Fura forced to use all her cunning to stay one step ahead of Stannis who is every bit as ruthless as she is.
What made this book for me, is that Adrana and Fura’s intelligence is not enough. Stannis is worse than Bosa Sennan who began the Ness sister’s misadventure in Revenger. Bone Silence is filled with sacrifice and last-ditch schemes, making this a non-stop action page turner.
This is not a book that can be read in isolation, however. While there is enough explanation of what is going on, a richer understanding comes from having read the books before which I can highly recommend. Revenger was the first Alistair Reynolds book I read and now he’s one of my favourite authors.
Bone Silence feels like the end of the Ness sisters which is a little sad. Although there are still some questions left unanswered, the ones that began the journey in Revenger have been resolved. There could be more adventures, and I would be excited to see where they go next, but if not Bone Silence is a satisfying conclusion for the sisters. I would highly recommend all three books, Revenger, Shadow Captain, and Bone Silence to any fans of sci-fi, and space opera.

AUTHOR: ALISTAIR REYNOLDS | PUBLISHER: GOLLANCZ | RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

There are two things that tend to be a solid sign of a good time when it comes to modern sci-fi: space pirates and the name Alistair Reynolds on the cover. Bone Silence is the third act in Reynolds’ Revenger Universe series, though much of the impact is lost simply due to it being the third in a series. For those unfamiliar with the books, this is far-future sci-fi with a hard edge. It’s millions of years in the future. The current galactic ruling body is called The Congregation, a haphazard coalition of thousands of worlds. Between the stars, battles rage, trade happens, and pirates profit.

One of the appeals of the series is that it’s full of neat ideas; for example, Quoins are these weird alien artefacts that have become a de-facto currency in The Congregation. They, of course, have a sinister secret, and much of the plot of Bone Silence deals with the consequences of using weird, poorly understood things as the basis for your economy. Another is the use of strange alien skulls as communications devices.

The previous books focused on one perspective; Fura in the first book and her sister Adrana in the second. Bone Silence brings the two Ness Sisters together, and we follow both these scoundrels as they try to escape the inevitable consequences of their own actions. It wouldn’t be a story about pirates without treasure of course, and in this case, it’s an ancient thing that will either fix everything or doom everyone. It’s also nice to see how the characters have matured over the series, and yet, in many ways, haven’t changed.

They are, of course, being pursued by a dogged and intrepid enforcer of the law. Because despite this being weird far-future sci-fi, it’s also a high-seas style adventure. You can practically hear the sea shanties at times. There’s plenty of cunning deception, outright violence, and twists and turns all the away along. Alistair Reynolds guarantees damned good fun, to say the least.

It isn’t entirely smooth as a read. The change in style from the previous two books is a little jarring, and though it works well as a novel in its own right, it isn’t a strong sequel to the previous two books. Trilogies should be greater than the sum of their parts, and Bone Silence lets down the over-arcing vibe of the series. But the price it pays for this is by being a really entertaining read on its own.

If you're reading this, I guess you are already familiar with Reynolds' Revenger series. This is amongst my favourites of the universes he has created - I love the slightly archaic feel, and the sense of technologies that are simultaneously far ahead and well behind our own - possibly because it's the most fun. This is the final volume, and let me reassure you, it wraps things up well. No spoilers of course, but character arcs come to satisfactory conclusions, and the ending goes up and on and out with an element of the cosmic scale that he does so well. I believe Reynolds is heading back to Revelation Space next time, but I'd be happy to see more books in this setting.

Reynolds’s re-imagination of the solar system remains a joy. I remain beguiled by Revenger‘s universe with its salty vernacular, where spacefarers must be hardy, self-sufficient individuals to survive the months of sailing the solar winds through the empty dark. At its best, Bone Silence is on crackling cinematic form (the funeral, Strambli’s transformation) and delivers tense sequences that had me chewing my nails. But at times I wanted to yell at it to just stop faffing and get to the point.

Because at over 600 pages, Bone Silence is nearly twice the length of the previous Revenger books. It gives Reynolds time to rebuild the fractured relationship between the Ness sisters and show us how much their adventures have changed them, but I can’t help but compare it unfavourably to Revenger, which delivered just as much plot and character development in a more streamlined and – for my money – more compelling narrative.

By contrast, Bone Silence suffers from uneven pacing as the sisters crawl across the system to Trevenza Reach. Yet Reynolds tries to achieve so much in the final act it feels like a TV show that got cancelled and had to tie up its plots a season early. Tying so many threads up neatly is a big ask and the result is not entirely successful. In the end, Bone Silence felt like a slightly muddled middle book, revealing ever bigger back stories and hinting at wilder, weirder futures. I’d like to be excited for what future books might hold – but Reynolds says he's done with the Ness sisters. If so, this is an unsatisfying ending – a fascinating adventure, but one which doesn’t quite do justice to its many intriguing ingredients.

Even if I didn't read the previous installments in this series I han no big issues with the plot and the characters.
It's the first book I read by this author and won't surely be the last because I truly enjoyed this story, the amazing world building, the interesting and fleshed out cast of characters.
It was an excellent read, highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine.

The final part of the Revenger trilogy (after Shadow Captain), Bone Silence returns to the universe of Captains Arafura and Adrana Ness. In this far-future solar system, the planets themselves have been dismantled, yielding the material for the construction of tens of thousands of "worlds" - habitable structures a few kilometres across, built in all shapes and sizes (discs, spheres, spindles...) This is where humanity lives now, although civilisation has waxed and waned, with thirteen distinct "Occupations" - phases when people were expanding and settling. The history of this is mysterious, with plenty of powerful artifacts to be recovered from abandoned "baubles".

In this setting the Ness sisters - two young women who ran away from home world Mazarile seeking adventure, but found piracy, fighting and death with Fura ultimately rescuing Adrana from captivity - now scour the spacelanes in their ship the sunjammer Revenger, captured from the dread pirate Bosa Sennen. Unfortunately a bounty has been set on their heads, and they're pursued by a squadron of the Congregation's most ruthless thief takers who believe they are in league with Sennen, or perhaps that they are Sennen (it's complicated).

I love the setting for these books. In Reynolds' hands, the manoeuvrings of the great sail-driven craft, the hazards of calling at unruly and fractious port world, the glory a of a fight, the the salty language, and above all the loot up there for the taking - for me all these evoke the never-was pirate-ridden world of Stevenson and Robinson Crusoe. It's an advanced world with advanced tech but all the familiar themes are there - the long pursuits, the scanning for sight of a sail, the ferocious broadsides (here, delivered with electromagnetic coil guns). And the crew members we meet wouldn't be out of place lurking in a corner of the Admiral Benbow.

If that was all these books had, they might be fun, but no more than a jeu d'esprit (albeit a good one) on Reynolds' part. But there's much, much more than that. Under the surface of this book are serious SF themes: the fate of humanity in the far future, the origins of civilisations, our relationship with alien races. And big human themes: the sisters are coming of age, finding their place in this strange universe, making friends (and enemies) and losing them. Those themes are explored rather more thoroughly in this book than in the previous ones, the Ness sisters having now found one another and constructed some form of relationship again after the traumas they suffered before.

Indeed, solving these mysteries has become more than a matter of casual curiosity. Fura and Adrana have now become convinced that it's key not only to the future of the human race but to their own more immediate survival. There's also a desperation to this book that marks it out from the others. We have had hints before that outside forces may be manipulating events but here it seems there are two sides, rival factions of aliens pursuing some conflict and bringing an even tighter sense of danger to events. It's not clear who can be trusted, or even what is to be gained from those can.

Bone Silence felt to me more focused, basically an extended chase sequence, than the earlier books, and more sober: the sisters are growing up, there's less sheer exuberance and a greater awareness of consequences (as when someone who lost money because of what Fura and Adrana did at the end of the last book plunges to his death. before their eyes). The stakes are higher now - it's not just a question of being dragged back home, and they have enemies with deep pockets and an even longer reach. There is an edge to the battles, a sense of the gloves being off.

It is, though, not all action. I enjoyed the shipboard sections when nothing much seemed to be going on, but the two sisters - and their ragged crew - were learning to trust each other. There are many, many reasons why they wouldn't, and Revenger herself holds dark memories, especially for Adrana. Shudder at what went on in the "kindness room"! Revisit the Bone Room, where the twinkling, alien skull allows communication - at a price - across great distances. In this book the process carries a more deadly edge than ever - there is the prospect of discovery for one thing, and other, darker dangers as well. (The exact origin and nature of the bones and the "twinkly" inside them is never made clear: like many aspects of the Revenger universe, that remains a dark secret, perhaps to be revealed one day, perhaps not). And Reynolds' portrayals of the crewmen and women are rounded and fully formed.

All in all great fun, though this is one trilogy you really do need to read in order.

This book is the third in the series and I would recommend that the two previous books be read first ………… setting the characters , their relationships and the worldbuilding in place , to fully enjoy this last book .

The characters in this book are not the traditional type usually found in books of this genre ( that is too , too good to be true ) I like characters who have flaws , who can rise above expectations and still be who they really are .
Fleeing from Space Pirates , sisters Arafura and Adrana provide plenty of drama with their complex relationship , whilst trying to keep all around them safe .
Can the sisters evade capture and possible death from the Hunters , determined to hang every crime around there necks - true or not …………………… even while satisfying their curiosity about the worlds around them ?
There is plenty of fast paced action , interactions with other species , including robots in various state of repair , with plenty of technological advancements to keep even the geekiest of us entertained .

If you enjoy a good space adventure with twists and turns then this book and the series are just right for you .

I was given an ARC of this book by Netgalley and the Publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Adrana and Arafura (Fura) Ness are back in this (allegedly) last book in the series. Having upset the whole Congregation of worlds with the changes in quoins and their values, they are now being hunted for a variety of crimes. They set out to acquire a means of communicating and listening in on ship to ship messages. Each sister also has their own 'shopping list' of things they want to acquire while docked.

Fura commandeers another ship for Adrana and they each set their ships towards their next target, where they will be able to satisfy their curiosity regarding certain matters relating to the cycle of the rise and fall of civilisations and other tasks they have taken upon themselves.

Meanwhile the hunters are circling and drawing near, with dirty tricks, to capture the Ness sisters. The intention is to hang every crime they can on the heads of the sisters, while setting everyone against them to ensure capture and conviction at the very least (death if necessary).

Each sister has to deal with difficulties thrown in their path, hoping that they will eventually be safely reunited and better placed than they are at the start.

I enjoyed this book, I like the world's that the sister's and their crew visit and the people they meet. They all have their different ways of speaking, for example the space farers talk like pirates, alien's have their own different ways of communicating and the robots speak depending on their level of repair. The author states that they have finished this world now, which I am disappointed about. However, the books in this series are excellent and I am glad that I have read them.

If you enjoy space or adventure stories you will most likely enjoy this book. I recommend it to you, but make sure that you read the other two first (Revenger and Shadow Captain).

Bone Silence is the third and final volume in the Revenger series, and it is a fitting and compelling conclusion to the whole saga. This epic space opera series is best read in chronological order as many of the overarching questions about how everything came to be the way it now currently is requires some knowledge of the preceding books for full enjoyment. Many of the curious questions readers were concerned about in the first and second instalments are answered in Bone Silence. Usually, books are either plot or character-driven but the two are not mutually exclusive here as both have been attended to with precision detail.

What is impressive is Mr Reynolds’s ability to create spiky and less-than-affable main characters who you actually continue to care about; granted I often prefer this type of characterisation as I find those characters a damn sight more intriguing than tedious goody-two-shoes types but still. They also have plenty of reason as to why they act the way they do further emphasising the need to read these chronologically. The writing continues to be dark and atmospheric creating a tension that hooks you into the story from the initial stages.

Despite this nothing is taken too seriously, and you are in for a fun, entertaining and truly raucous ride through this stellar, sprawling universe. Reynolds never forgets that most people read for escapism and provides us with just that. It blends his well-established hard sci-fi elements with drama-filled narrative and the complex sisterly relationship between Arafura and Adrana. Not forgetting the space pirates and some outstanding technological advancements. There were even a few earth-shattering twists in the tale and revelations I had not predicted.

In the acknowledgements at the back of the book, Reynolds states: “I am, for the time being, done with the Ness sisters. Whether they are done with me, remains to be seen.” I must say that I really am quite bereft to be leaving this world, but I look forward to whatever Reynolds has coming next with eager anticipation. Many thanks to Gollancz for an ARC.

Firstly, I’d recommend that if you haven’t yet had the pleasure of reading at least one of the previous books in this series, then don’t start with this one – put it back on the shelf and go looking for Revenger instead. While this story is still full of space battles, weird aliens fighting amongst themselves, and struggles to overcome peculiarly horrible diseases – a fair chunk of the book is taken up with resolving some of the big mysteries regarding the world and how it has come to be the way it is. If you haven’t read at least one of the previous books, not only will you find it difficult to understand what is going on – at least initially – you also won’t care as much as you should about the ongoing chaos and how to resolve it. I think Reynolds has managed to pull off a difficult balancing act – providing plenty of action and adventure with two spiky but ultimately sympathetic protagonists and yet also giving us a complicated world where the initial rules don’t actually apply. It is in this book we learn exactly what the dynamic is.

I am impressed at how much I still cared for both girls, given they aren’t particularly nice, which isn’t a surprise, given what they’ve gone through, and their own conflicted feelings about each other. There is a fair amount of sibling rivalry that causes friction and distrust, particularly at times when things are getting tricky. The characterisation is well handled throughout and I particularly liked the truly horrible antagonist Reynolds managed to produce in this book. After the horrors of Captain Bosa, I had thought that any other baddie in this series would be something of an anti-climax, but nasty Incer managed to be someone I loved to hate.

One of the outstanding aspects of this series is the dark, brooding Gothic quality of the writing which is sustained throughout all three books particularly effectively. This is a dystopian world where bad things happen to good people, however, there are enough shafts of light that it didn’t become too overwhelmingly grim, which is a tricky balance to accomplish. The ending worked, tying everything up satisfactorily, but without making it too tidy, which would have jarred in this universe. Highly recommended for fans of space opera with a bit of a difference. The ebook arc copy of Bone Silence was provided by the publisher through NetGalley in return for an honest opinion of the book.
9/10

I read all Reynolds early books though stopped as the themes/style became a bit samey for me. This is my first in some years. Am pleased to see more variety in writing, characters and plot. I hadn't read the earlier books in the series but found it easy to pick things up in the plot and direction. A good 'space opera' read, adventure with broader context.

A year ago, I reviewed Shadow Captain, the second part of this trilogy of Space Pirates stories, which made my ‘Best of’ list for 2019. With the arrival of the third book in the series, does it still hold water?

There are clearly changes afoot with this third book. Whereas the first book Revenger is told from the perspective of pirate captain Arafura Ness (aka Fura) and Shadow Captain from the perspective of her sister, Adrana, in Bone Silence the narrative is mainly third-person focused, and this means that with a wider perspective the novel can look at the bigger issues that have been hinted at in the earlier books.

We have been gradually told previously that the thousands of worlds of the Congregation have been through a series of boom and bust cycles over thousands of years. Known as Occupations, there is evidence that there had been twelve before and this has led to the baubles – secret sources of objects from previous Occupations – which the pirates spent their time finding and looting, if possible.

As the characters discovered in Shadow Captain, a number of events are happening that suggest that the Congregation may be heading towards the fall of civilisation in the Thirteenth Occupation. More importantly, it is conceivable that the Revenger crew may have even inadvertently hastened the decline. Their discovery that a mysterious object exists that might explain the origin of the Congregation, have led to the creation of the baubles and may even be something that is connected to what happened with quoins (the interplanetary currency) at the end of Shadow Captain. Much of Bone Silence is about the journey to this object.

As if this wasn’t enough to put the crew into hiding, Adrana and Arafura are now being pursued by a fleet under the leadership of psychopath Incer Stallis who are determined to hunt them down as justice for their crime. To monitor communications and stay hidden, at the beginning of Bone Silence the crew attempt to buy a new ‘Bone’, that weird Alien skull used to communicate in some sort of secret neural network, before travelling on to the mystery object.

At the same time, they have to avoid the fleet searching for them, whilst not giving away their objective. They find themselves now recognised as criminals across the planets because despite their not knowing what they did to make it happen in Shadow Captain, the crew of the Revenger find at the beginning of Bone Silence that they are being blamed for the universal devaluation of the quoins, which has caused bankruptcy and misery throughout the Congregation. It’s not going to be easy.

As the third book in a trilogy (so far, at least) Bone Silence shows how far these characters have come. Whereas Revenger was a deceptively simple ‘teenagers-on-the–run’ kind of story, Bone Silence shows us that there has always been an intriguing detail behind the main plot, and it is this that the book brings to light.

That’s not to say though that our main characters are pushed to the background. In Bone Silence much of the story is how Adrana and Fura become competent adults, able to bond with a growing set of crewmates and working together in times of peril as well as deal with the difficulties along the way. They have clearly become leaders, who have built a loyal (well – mainly loyal) team around them and are running a pirate ship as if they were born to it (even when they make mistakes.) The pirate leaders are some distance away from the teenagers we saw back in Revenger.

This is further confirmed when the two Ness sisters end up running two ships in an attempt to mislead the fleet and avoid Incer Stallis. Adrana has to take command of a ship they pirated, the Merry Mare, whilst Fura continues to run Revenger and her crew guided by Paladin, their family robot who is a relic from the Twelfth Occupation. They have to make difficult decisions and deal with life-changing choices that reflect their transition into adulting. By the end of the novel the sisters’ transformation into adults is complete and their future beyond space captaincy just beginning.

Alastair in his acknowledgements at the end of the book writes “I am, for the time being, done with the Ness sisters” and this seems the right decision to make. As much as it would be interesting to see further, there’s enough in Bone Silence for many readers to be satisfied to leave it there. I must admit that I wasn’t entirely convinced by some of the answers to the universal questions at the conclusion, but they do draw things to an end.

There is scope for other stories and other ideas to be pursued should Alastair or his publishers wish to do so, but if this is the end of our journey with Adriana and Fura, then the distance travelled by the Ness sisters over the three books, taken as a complete story, is impressive. If you’ve enjoyed the journey so far, Bone Silence should not disappoint.

This book hooked itself into me and forced me to read it over the course of a single day.

Bone Silence is the third (and final?) of a series about sisters, space and pirates. I don't advise starting with this book, though you might be able to muddle through if you're desperate.

If the last two books were more about survival, exploration and the sisters' relationships, this book is more about answering some big questions - what is wrong with the quoins (a sort of currency) and what does it mean? What's the fate of the alien they end up carrying? Is this civilisation going to last?

This is what kept me reading - I had to know! I won't go into the answers, because that's where spoilers lie, but to suffice to say I found them satisfying - if one of them a little guessable by the time I got there (nothing wrong with that, shows the groundwork was laid!).

I'll miss the Ness sisters and their crew, and though this book puts an end to their story for now, there's certainly room to open it up again if Reynolds wanted to.

“This little civilization of ours is squalid in places, unjust in others. It is constructed to a large degree upon a foundation of greed and inequality. But it is not beyond salvation, and just as crucially it is all we have. There are fine things about it, too. There are lovely worlds, more than you or I will ever see in our lifetimes. There are beautiful cities and fabulous ruins. If we are feeling adventurous, there are baubles. If we are not, there are teahouses and cakes, and I should not care to place one above the other. I wish to have both things in my life: adventure and comfort.” *

I second this statement wholeheartedly; Al Reynolds has a way to resonate with his readers, no matter the strangeness of his universes.

And even if this series is not his best work, I still liked it a lot. What’s not to like reading about unique worlds, marvelous technologies and ancient mysteries? Add to all these a bit of steampunk, space pirates, two badass sisters as captains, a crew like no other, one hell of a ship - the sunjammer Revenger - and you’ve got yourself a picture.

Despite the slow and somewhat dull start, it picks up pace in the last half and we get some of the answers which we’re craving for, along with some gape-mouthed twists and revelations.

In the acknowledgments at the end, AR says: “I am, for the time being, done with the Ness sisters. Whether they are done with me, remains to be seen.” I do hope he will return for a novella in this universe and focus on the Ghosties, which is still one of the greatest mysteries.

* Excerpt from the ARC; it may be changed in the final version.

One of my most anticipated reads for the start of 2020 was Bone Silence. While not a lot of people talk about it, the Revenger trilogy has been a highlight to my sci-fi reading life. It kind of falls into the cracks because it got written as YA (It won the locus award for best young adult book in 2017) but a lot of people see it as Adult. You all are missing out.

Bone Silence had a lot more pages than the first two installments for me. The others were around 300 if I remember correctly and the e arc edition I had was over 600 pages. That is a big increase. Even so it needed that to set up the playing field for the ending. We also get the point of view of both sisters where in the previous installments it was from just one of their point of views (Revenger was Fura, Shadow Captain was Adrana). Each of their story lines needed more space.

For a while I thought I was going to be rating this book 5 stars. However as we neared the ending and started wrapping up the story lines I did not get out of the ending what I think should have come out of the ending. It is the end of this trilogy and the author has said that for now he is done with our sisters. But there are still a lot of questions left to answer. There is nothing wrong with leaving some things open but in this case I feel that we got too little for the questions that were asked by the sisters in the previous book. Especially as it concerns the world building. I docked a whole star for this. It left me feeling unsatisfied.

Even so I did enjoy the whole of the book outside of that. It was a joy to see old favorites and having new people on board the mess that is the Ness train. Both sisters grew. Fura turned very differently because of what happened in Revenger. She became cold hearted but in this book I saw her slowly opening up again to those around her. Adrana on her end realized some of her own flaws.

All in all this is a trilogy that is well worth your time.

After a middle-volume hiatus that involved little more than our reluctant space pirates arriving on a new world and getting off it again, there's some hope that the third volume of Alastair Reynolds' Revenger series might get back to resolving some of the mysteries and intrigues that have arisen over the previous two books (Revenger, Shadow Captain). And it does, but in a book that feels considerably longer than the previous two combined, Bone Silence takes us on a slow and not always gripping journey to an outcome that at least feels appropriately grand in scale.

But first the fearsome bauble hunters turned space pirates the Ness sisters, Fura and Adrana, and their diminished crew need to find new bones: alien skulls from an ancient unknown civilisation long before the current Occupation of the system that can be used by those skilled and gifted enough to communicate across distances. They settle for Mulgracen, hoping to arrive incognito with no upsets, but there was never much chance of that being the case.

Nevertheless, after an incident with another ship, the Revenger crew have a new mission to bring an unusual cargo to Trevanza Reach, 17 million leagues away and it appears that the wanted Ness sisters are going to have a dangerous adversary on their tail for the 2 months that it will take to cross this distance.

Without giving away any spoilers, there are two main mysteries or intrigues that the reader of the previous two volumes will be looking to be answered. The first involves the nature of quoins, previously used as currency here but which now appear to have another purpose having lost their denomination and stability into the bargain, plunging the system into a kind of banking crisis. The other matter relates to a discovery of the number of Occupations in the 10 million year history of what is known as the Congregation. Could the two matters even be connected in some unimaginable way?

Well, Alastair Reynolds manages to (eventually) provide some unexpected developments in relation to those matters and for a while at least provides some mail-biting tension and explosive action along the journey to Trevanza Reach. Although it started out in Revenger as something of a YA steampunk space pirate adventure, the underlying serious tone has taken over, particularly as Fura and Adrana have now been through a lot and have grown up. We no longer have the youthful innocent perspective of ''The True and Accurate Testimony of Arafura Ness'' of the first book, which isn't necessarily for the better.

What Reynolds offers in its place however is a better balance of the camaraderie of the little people struggling to make a living but caught up in grander conspiracies and 'social experiments' that will deeply affect their lives. Along with the banking crisis that has occurred, it's not difficult to see the author has injected some contemporary real-world relevance into the storyline and it doesn't always sit comfortably. After the first fun volume and the less compelling second book, the 600 pages of Bone Silence can be hard work and it's debatable whether the outcome makes it worth persevering through to the end of this trilogy.

A brilliant conclusion to the Ness Sisters trilogy, Alastair Reynolds delivers a blend of hard sci-fi concepts and high seas adventures with his usual panache. The narrative keeps you hooked and the overarching mysteries of the series are threaded neatly so as not to distract.
Thoroughly recommended for both long time fans and new readers.