A Thousand Words for Stranger by Julie E. Czerneda

Either way, it’s still a good introduction to Czerneda. When I first read this, though, I was so taken with the novelty of the concept that I didn’t mind it, finding it more intriguing than frustrating. The end is rushed as well, and there’re quite a few threads left dangling. The book starts very well, but bogs down in its last third, rushing frenetically by one idea after another without making much progress. That squandered a lot of what she had so carefully built up, and it’s tough to patch over what should have been a smooth bridge, even as relatives of some key characters turn up. It is, sadly, undermined by Czernada’s fumble of a transition between the Stratification trilogy (via an unsatisfying epilogue novelette in the last book) and this Trade Pact trilogy.

However, in some ways, this book really works better as a sequel, and I’m glad I decided to re-read the full saga in this order. I don’t know whether Czerneda had it all planned out, or just faithfully followed her own trail. I was surprised to find just how much of the M’hiray mythology is set out or hinted at in this first book.

It’s still quite a good book, though, and I’ve not been sorry that it started me following Czerneda’s career. It has a lot of strengths, but its flaws are now more clear, and I’m spotting it part of a star for its initial impact. It’s disappointing but perhaps not surprising that the converse is somewhat true for this first book. Re-reading them now in chronological order, I’ve been very pleased to find I liked the prequel trilogy more than I recalled. As with many, this is the book through which I first encountered Julie Czerneda’s writing, and now the start of the middle act of her trilogy of trilogies.

A Thousand Words for Stranger by Julie E. Czerneda