By China Miéville, Embassytown is:

• two novels juxtaposed — the first a revelation about language and awakening, the second a conventional saved-in-the-nick-of-time galactic war-and-politics potboiler
• a science-fictional hall of mirrors — reflections of the best among Samuel R Delany (cf. Babel-17), Roger Zelazny (cf. Lord of Light), Robert Anton Wilson, Liz Williams, Neal Stephenson, A E Van Vogt, Cordwainer Smith, ...
• an extended joke — a riff on the hyperliteral Drax the Destroyer of Guardians of the Galaxy
• a mind and a map and a metaphor of itself — and as per Daniel Dennett, "... metaphors are not 'just' metaphors; metaphors are the tools of thought ..."
• brilliant sprinkles of poetry — decorations on the frosting of a store-bought cake
• a gray idea — without character, and lacking characters that one might come to care about

Embassytown — it is, and could have been, much more ...

^z - 2018-01-23