Like a band riffing on all the songs you love, and doing it well.
5 stars
The Suneater books by Christopher Roucchio are probably the series I most look forward to new releases of. It’s a little bit thematically similar to Red Rising (but not as YA) in the sense that both series are
1) Narrated in the first person by a Great Man (in the Theory of History) sense who is really just a confused and wounded boy swept up in the tide of history.
2) Both feature space empires openly inspired by Imperial Rome.
3) Both of said space empires are ruled by a genetically modified ruling caste.
4) Graphic violence and cheapness of human life are central themes.
5) Both authors are prone to poetic prose and waxing philosophically about the human condition.
All that is to say, if you liked one you’ll probably like the other, but something else to keep in mind about Suneater is that the whole series is a …
The Suneater books by Christopher Roucchio are probably the series I most look forward to new releases of. It’s a little bit thematically similar to Red Rising (but not as YA) in the sense that both series are
1) Narrated in the first person by a Great Man (in the Theory of History) sense who is really just a confused and wounded boy swept up in the tide of history.
2) Both feature space empires openly inspired by Imperial Rome.
3) Both of said space empires are ruled by a genetically modified ruling caste.
4) Graphic violence and cheapness of human life are central themes.
5) Both authors are prone to poetic prose and waxing philosophically about the human condition.
All that is to say, if you liked one you’ll probably like the other, but something else to keep in mind about Suneater is that the whole series is a homage to Science Fiction and a bunch of other stuff. No, really, one of coolest parts of the first book is inspired by an obscure J Pop song by Maya Sakamoto and makes reference to the lyrics throughout in various different ways. Roucchio even admits as much. Everything is inspired by something, to the point that at the very beginning it feels obnoxiously derivative of Dune and Star Wars (push through this, it’s common for people to get frustrated in the first couple chapters of the first book). It’s not a rip off if you manage to make it a tribute and I feel like Roucchio ultimately succeeds at this.
