Arkady Martine

Martine's first novel, A Memory Called Empire, published in 2019, is the beginning of her Teixcalaan series.[1] It is set in a future where the Teixcalaanli empire governs most of human space, and is about to absorb Lsel, an independent mining station. Lsel ambassador Mahit Dzmare is sent to the imperial capital to prevent this, and finds herself embroiled in the empire's succession crisis. Martine said that the book was in many respects a fictional version of her postdoctoral research on Byzantine imperialism on the frontier to Armenia in the 11th century, particularly the annexation of the Kingdom of Ani.[2]

In The Verge, Andrew Liptak praised the novel as a "brilliant blend of cyberpunk, space opera, and political thriller", highlighting Martine's characterization and worldbuilding.[6] In Locus, Russell Letson appreciated the novel's "absorbing and sometimes challenging blend of intrigue and anthropological imagination", as well as its sense of humor.[7] Publishers Weekly and Kirkus Reviews both gave the novel a starred review, noting the facility with which Martine brought the worlds of her "gorgeously crafted diplomatic space opera" to life,[8] and comparing Martine's novel to the works of Ann Leckie and Yoon Ha Lee.[9]

The second installment of the Teixcalaan series, A Desolation Called Peace was first published in 2021. It picks up several months after the events of Empire. Mahit is back on Lsel station, Three Seagrass is promoted-but-bored on Teixcalaan, and the new emperor is on the throne. Mahit is trying to process all of the events of the previous book when she is quickly thrown into a series of political intrigues that forces her to leave the station with Three Seagrass, who shows up on Lsel Station to take Mahit to an outlying area of space to try to communicate with a species of incomprehensible aliens and avert a war of total destruction. Back on Teixcalaan, political schemes are brewing, and the very young heir to the throne is in the middle of them.[10]

1. A Memory Called Empire, Tor Books (2019), ISBN 9781250186430
2. A Desolation Called Peace, Tor Books (2021), ISBN 9781250186461

• Rose/House, Subterranean Press (2023), ISBN 9781645240341

• "Lace Downstairs" (2012)
• "Nothing Must Be Wasted" (2014)
• "Adjuva" (2015)
• "City of Salt" (2015)
• "When the Fall Is All That's Left" (2015)
• "How the God Auzh-Aravik Brought Order to the World Outside the World" (2016)
• "'Contra Gravitatem (Vita Genevievis)'" (2016)
• "All the Colors You Thought Were Kings" (2016)
• "Ekphrasis" (2016)
• "Ruin Marble" (2017)
• "The Hydraulic Emperor" (2018)
• "Object-Oriented" (2018)
• "Just a Fire" (as by A. Martine) (2018)
• "Faux Ami" (as by A. Martine) (2019)
• "Labbatu Takes Command of the Flagship Heaven Dwells Within" (2019)
• "Life and a Day" (as by A. Martine) (2019)
• "A Desolation Called Peace" (excerpt) (2020)
• "A Being Together Amongst Strangers" (2020)

• "Cloud Wall" (2014)
• "Abandon Normal Instruments" (2016)

• "Everyone's World Is Ending All the Time: Notes on Becoming a Climate Resilience Planner at the Edge of the Anthropocene" (2019)

• "Testament by Hal Duncan" (2015)
• "Report from Planet Midnight by Nalo Hopkinson" (2016)
• "The Djinn Falls in Love & Other Stories by Mahvesh Murad and Jared Shurin" (2017)
• "The Only Harmless Great Thing by Brooke Bolander" (2018)