Boy, did it ever!
To summarise... the story is set on Embassytown, a distant planet colonised by humans. Communication between the humans and the native aliens, the Ariekei (or Hosts) is incredibly difficult - only specially bred and trained Ambassadors, working in pairs, are able to speak the language - but they live in relative peace. This all changes when a new Ambassador arrives from another human colony, and The Hosts begin to react strangely to the newcomer's speech.
To say more would probably give away too much, though what I've said here really doesn't do justice to the complexity of the world Mieville has created. I was actually a little sceptical, especially after realising this was a sci-fi novel (I'm more a fantasy/horror kind of girl). For the first quarter of the novel I was a little lost and not 100% sure I was enjoying it. Then, one lunchtime, as I looked at my watch and realised that I was going to have to put the book away, I realised that I really REALLY didn't want to stop reading. It took me a little by surprise how involved in the story I had suddenly become, but it was a good feeling. The kind of feeling you get when you know you're onto a winner.
The story is told in the first person, and the narrator is Avice Benner Cho, who has recently returned to her childhood home and becomes deeply involved in dealing with the problems the new Ambassador creates. She's a fun character, with a bit of an edge, and even though there is an other-worldly quality to her as well (not surprising, since she was born and raised on this strange planet) it is easy to identify with her as she watches her childhood home begin to collapse around her. The secondary characters, including the mysterious Hosts, are equally well-written and the story just gets better and better. I genuinely did not know how it was all going to end, and was pleasantly surprised by the developments in the final chapters.
I was actually quite glad that I read Kraken first, because it gave me a chance to get used to Mieville's writing style, which alternates between long, flowing description and quick, punchy dialogue. Sometimes his way of saying things comes off as odd, but it was easy enough to get used to in Kraken and I was prepared for it in Embassytown, where, coupled with the insane amount of detail, it might have put me off. That would be my only criticism of Embassytown... the book requires a lot of set-up, so that the reader understands the world, the characters and how they live. It was probably the huge amount of detail required that made me so uncertain about the book to begin with, and it will possibly put off some readers. But it paid off in the end. Now, having reached the end, I'm determined to go back and re-read the first section, to try and properly digest all the little tidbits I might have missed.
A hightly recommended read. I look forward to reading many other China Meiville novels in the future.
