RRP: £9.99 Details

Save: £2.65 (27%)

£3.75 delivery Thursday, 22 June. Details

Or fastest delivery Wednesday, 21 June. Details

In stock

[{"displayPrice":"£7.34","priceAmount":7.34,"currencySymbol":"£","integerValue":"7","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"34","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"yzVOveUKxCm1h5%2BfHKI9qJ1w4Jv%2F32rHqlHAD3yJOnbEP7C4J3Zl2Myom51AQjh1ZHnFHZSrZdXLEtE6wSOhwQaXPpDSOXjPrZX88ji8SakBDDzswVX5Kc5NFYy9kixcfIftzhvLo%2FWZsScJF9ZaLMilYsvWQUAoo8Mg1oJltbT1dg%2FwIqU43A%3D%3D","locale":"en-GB","buyingOptionType":"NEW","aapiBuyingOptionIndex":0},{"displayPrice":"£2.19","priceAmount":2.19,"currencySymbol":"£","integerValue":"2","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"19","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"yzVOveUKxCm1h5%2BfHKI9qJ1w4Jv%2F32rH8RbSL18UK8%2FQjLDD4HBAW%2BuO1L7SxK5nVa3ouUqfLXyiv%2B0QZXxVEO4qMTbdTwjLclXgZqDnN5Fr7ls2Y5LR%2F5iGu0DByJTc8SNUGBWFm8ioJHP3z3A7JRLdkrPPt4%2FYLZORtnETJ8MPpYpy7dF6JA%3D%3D","locale":"en-GB","buyingOptionType":"USED","aapiBuyingOptionIndex":0}]

££7.34 () Includes selected options. Includes initial monthly payment and selected options. Details

Payment

Secure transaction

Dispatches from

Amazon

Sold by

ACE_BOOKS

Returns

Returnable within 30 days of receipt

Details

Payment

Secure transaction

We work hard to protect your security and privacy. Our payment security system encrypts your information during transmission. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. Learn more

Dispatches from

Amazon

Sold by

ACE_BOOKS

Returns

Returnable within 30 days of receipt

Item can be returned in its original condition for a full refund or replacement within 30 days of receipt

Read full return policy

Add gift options

£3.30 delivery 20 - 23 June. Details

Deliver to Germany

Used: Very Good | Details

Sold by World of Books Ltd

Have one to sell?

Sell on Amazon

Flip to back Flip to front

Listen Playing... Paused You're listening to a sample of the Audible audio edition.
Learn more

See all 3 images

Follow the author

Ann Leckie

Ancillary Justice: THE HUGO, NEBULA AND ARTHUR C. CLARKE AWARD WINNER: 1 (Imperial Radch) Paperback – 1 Oct. 2013

by Ann Leckie (Author)

4.2 17,698 ratings

Book 1 of 3: Imperial Radch

See all formats and editions

Amazon Price

New from

Used from

Kindle Edition

"Please retry"

£4.99

—

Audible Audiobooks, Unabridged

"Please retry"

£0.00

Free with your Audible trial

Hardcover, Special Edition

"Please retry"

£32.12

—

Paperback

"Please retry"

£7.34

£6.07

£1.16

Audio CD, Audiobook, Unabridged

"Please retry"

—

£50.82

—

Save 5% on any 4 qualifying items | Terms

Purchase options and add-ons

The record-breaking debut novel that won every major science fiction award in 2014, Ancillary Justice is the story of a warship trapped in a human body and her search for revenge.
Ann Leckie is the first author to win the Arthur C. Clarke, the Nebula and the Hugo Award for Best Novel in the same year.

They made me kill thousands, but I only have one target now.

The Radch are conquerors to be feared - resist and they'll turn you into a 'corpse soldier' - one of an army of dead prisoners animated by a warship's AI mind. Whole planets are conquered by their own people.
The colossal warship called The Justice of Toren has been destroyed - but one ship-possessed soldier has escaped the devastation. Used to controlling thousands of hands, thousands of mouths, The Justice now has only two hands, and one mouth with which to tell her tale.
But one fragile, human body might just be enough to take revenge against those who destroyed her.

'ENGAGING AND PROVOCATIVE'
SFX Magazine

'UNEXPECTED, COMPELLING AND VERY COOL'
John Scalzi

'HIGHLY RECOMMENDED'
Independent on Sunday

'MIND-BLOWING'
io9.com

'THRILLING, MOVING AND AWE-INSPIRING'
Guardian

'UTTER PERFECTION, 10/10'
The Book Smugglers

'ASTOUNDINGLY ASSURED AND GRACEFUL'
Strange Horizons

'ESTABLISHES LECKIE AS AN HEIR TO BANKS'
Elizabeth Bear

The Imperial Radch trilogy begins with Ancillary Justice, continues in Ancillary Swordand concludes with Ancillary Mercy.
Also available now: Provenance is a stunning standalone adventure set in the same world as Ancillary Justice. NPR calls it 'A fitting addition to the Ancillary world'.

Book 1 of 3

Imperial Radch
Print length

432 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Orbit
Publication date

1 Oct. 2013
Dimensions

12.6 x 3.2 x 19.8 cm
ISBN-10

0356502406
ISBN-13

978-0356502403
See all details

Bought Together

Frequently bought together

Ancillary Justice: THE HUGO, NEBULA AND ARTHUR C. CLARKE AWARD WINNER: 1 (Imperial Radch)

£7.34

Get it as soon as Thursday, Jun 22

In stock.

Sold by ACE_BOOKS and sent from Amazon Fulfillment.

+

Ancillary Sword: SEQUEL TO THE HUGO, NEBULA AND ARTHUR C. CLARKE AWARD-WINNING ANCILLARY JUSTICE (Imperial Radch)

£7.34

Get it as soon as Thursday, Jun 22

Only 13 left in stock.

Sold by ACE_BOOKS and sent from Amazon Fulfillment.

+

Ancillary Mercy: The conclusion to the trilogy that began with ANCILLARY JUSTICE (Imperial Radch)

£8.35

Get it as soon as Thursday, Jun 22

In stock.

Sold by ACE_BOOKS and sent from Amazon Fulfillment.

Total price:

To see our price, add these items to your basket.

Try again!

Details

Added to Basket

Some of these items are dispatched sooner than the others.

Show details Hide details

Choose items to buy together.

Arkady Martine
10,310
Paperback
Editors' pickHand selected reads
£7.64
£3.82 delivery
Ann Leckie
10,144
Paperback
£7.34
Get it as soon as Thursday, Jun 22
£3.75 delivery
Only 13 left in stock.
Ann Leckie
10,578
Paperback
£8.35
Get it as soon as Thursday, Jun 22
£3.74 delivery
Ann Leckie
18
Paperback
£19.49
Get it as soon as Thursday, Jun 22
£4.28 delivery
Only 5 left in stock.
Martha Wells
38,885
Paperback
£10.70
£3.67 delivery
N. K. Jemisin
33,750
Paperback
£8.99
£3.83 delivery

Special offers and product promotions

Save 5% on any 4 qualifying items. Discount by Amazon. Shop items

Product description

Review

The record-breaking debut novel that won every major science fiction award, Ancillary Justice is the story of a warship trapped in a human body and her search for revenge. --Book Description

The record-breaking debut novel that won every major science fiction award in 2014, Ancillary Justice is the story of a warship trapped in a human body and her search for revenge. Ann Leckie is the first author to win the Arthur C. Clarke, the Nebula and the Hugo Award for Best Novel in the same year. They made me kill thousands, but I only have one target now. The Radch are conquerors to be feared - resist and they'll turn you into a 'corpse soldier' - one of an army of dead prisoners animated by a warship's AI mind. Whole planets are conquered by their own people. The colossal warship called The Justice of Toren has been destroyed - but one ship-possessed soldier has escaped the devastation. Used to controlling thousands of hands, thousands of mouths, The Justice now has only two hands, and one mouth with which to tell her tale. But one fragile, human body might just be enough to take revenge against those who destroyed her. --From the Inside Flap

Winner of the Hugo Award
Winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award
Winner of the Nebula Award
Winner of the Locus Award
Winner of the British Science Fiction Association Award

On a remote, icy planet, the soldier known as Breq is drawing closer to completing her quest.
Breq is both more than she seems and less than she was. Years ago, she was the Justice of Toren - a colossal starship and an artificial intelligence controlling thousands of soldiers in the service of the Radch, the empire that conquered the galaxy.
An act of treachery has ripped it all away, leaving her with only one fragile human body. But that might just be enough to take revenge against those who destroyed her.
Inventive and intelligent space opera, Ancillary Justice marks the debut of a bold new voice in science fiction.

'THRILLING, MOVING AND AWE-INSPIRING'
Guardian

'MIND-BLOWING'
io9.com

'ENGAGING AND PROVOCATIVE'
SFX Magazine

'HIGHLY RECOMMENDED'
Independent on Sunday

'ASTOUNDINGLY ASSURED AND GRACEFUL'
Strange Horizons

'ESTABLISHES LECKIE AS AN HEIR TO BANKS'
Elizabeth Bear

--From the Back Cover

Book Description

The record-breaking debut novel that won every major science fiction award, Ancillary Justice is the story of a warship trapped in a human body and her search for revenge.

From the Inside Flap

The record-breaking debut novel that won every major science fiction award in 2014, Ancillary Justice is the story of a warship trapped in a human body and her search for revenge. Ann Leckie is the first author to win the Arthur C. Clarke, the Nebula and the Hugo Award for Best Novel in the same year.

They made me kill thousands, but I only have one target now.

The Radch are conquerors to be feared - resist and they'll turn you into a 'corpse soldier' - one of an army of dead prisoners animated by a warship's AI mind. Whole planets are conquered by their own people.

The colossal warship called The Justice of Toren has been destroyed - but one ship-possessed soldier has escaped the devastation. Used to controlling thousands of hands, thousands of mouths, The Justice now has only two hands, and one mouth with which to tell her tale.

But one fragile, human body might just be enough to take revenge against those who destroyed her.

From the Back Cover

Winner of the Hugo Award
Winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award
Winner of the Nebula Award
Winner of the Locus Award
Winner of the British Science Fiction Association Award

On a remote, icy planet, the soldier known as Breq is drawing closer to completing her quest.
Breq is both more than she seems and less than she was. Years ago, she was the Justice of Toren - a colossal starship and an artificial intelligence controlling thousands of soldiers in the service of the Radch, the empire that conquered the galaxy.
An act of treachery has ripped it all away, leaving her with only one fragile human body. But that might just be enough to take revenge against those who destroyed her.
Inventive and intelligent space opera, Ancillary Justice marks the debut of a bold new voice in science fiction.

'THRILLING, MOVING AND AWE-INSPIRING'
Guardian

'MIND-BLOWING'
io9.com

'ENGAGING AND PROVOCATIVE'
SFX Magazine

'HIGHLY RECOMMENDED'
Independent on Sunday

'ASTOUNDINGLY ASSURED AND GRACEFUL'
Strange Horizons

'ESTABLISHES LECKIE AS AN HEIR TO BANKS'
Elizabeth Bear

About the Author

The record-breaking winner of the Hugo, Nebula, Arthur C. Clarke and British Science Fiction Association Awards for her debut novel, Ann Leckie lives in St Louis, Missouri, with her husband, children and cats. You can find her website at www.annleckie.com or chat to her on Twitter at @Ann_Leckie.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Orbit; 1st edition (1 Oct. 2013)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 432 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0356502406
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0356502403
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 12.6 x 3.2 x 19.8 cm

Best Sellers Rank: 24,044 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- 193 in Hard Science Fiction (Books)
- 195 in High Tech Science Fiction
- 262 in Colonisation

Customer reviews:
4.2 17,698 ratings

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.

Ann Leckie

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

The record-breaking winner of the Hugo, Nebula, Arthur C. Clarke and British Science Fiction Association Awards for her debut novel, Ann Leckie lives in St Louis, Missouri, with her husband, children and cats. You can find her website at www.annleckie.com or chat to her on Twitter at @Ann_Leckie.

Customer reviews

4.2 out of 5

17,698 global ratings

5 star		45%
4 star		36%
3 star		14%
2 star		4%
1 star		2%

How customer reviews and ratings work

Top reviews from United Kingdom

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

dfg

worth persevering

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 5 June 2023

Verified Purchase

This is a genre I instinctively like. This book is more confusing than most. However, it is worth while reading to the end, by which time you will find that your understanding has grown and you are beginning to care about what happens next. The point of gender seems very heavy handed , but maybe it will become apparent later why this is so. For now I found it intrusive. Try it.

Helpful

Andrew Mazibrada

A very, very good book, that just falls short of brilliant

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 1 February 2015

Verified Purchase

Some Spoilers, so please be aware.

Perhaps this will disappoint, but Ancillary Justice frustrated me. It’s a very, very good book, and definitely one of the best science-fiction books of 2014. No question of that – I very much enjoyed it. The themes which run though it are starkly human – vengeance, love, redemption, recovery – drive many great books. The concepts which underpin the setting are fresh, imaginative, clever and richly themed. The setting itself, intricate and powerful, hints at huge scope and an operatic scale for the stories to be told within, and at times the level of detail is enthralling (most often in the context of the military’s structure). The lead character, Breq (or Justice of Toren One Esk 19 as she is much later on), is an ancillary which, in itself, is an intriguing take on POV (although not necessarily completely original). Ancillaries themselves are a stark, ingenious way to characterise the Radch, and to underpin the way in which the story develops. The attempt at a single gender pronoun, at least in part to add colour to the way in which the Radch culture differs so much from our own, was both brave and clever. Reports suggest Leckie refused to change that when asked.

Yet, to me, Ancillary Justice fails to deliver on the promise of a truly great novel. The setting, which that detail hints at, is never fully rendered. There are times when I found it difficult to visualise the places her story unfolded in – they were so often sketched, skirted over, rather than colourfully painted (perhaps Breq for obvious reasons just doesn’t appreciate the details). The story seemed to take a seat behind Leckie’s literary style, and sometimes the pace flagged, especially in the early stages.

Breq as a lead character was always going to be tricky and I was never convinced by the reasons for her driving desire to take on the Lord of the Radch. Moving from her POV as Justice of Toren, and then as the various ancillaries which are commanded by Justice of Toren, is actually seamless. I never experienced a difficulty in picking that up and the concept is something special. Yet, from a pure ‘character/desire’ perspective, I found her relationship with the character who is the catalyst for the driving force of the story itself not deep enough to spark that desire. We know only that the character concerned was one of her ‘favourites’. That character herself, the reason Breq takes on the mission she does, does not exhibit the sort of emotional attachment to the place she is stationed that we would expect, given how events unfold later (and the way the Radchaai are as a society). The way Breq sees it, tapped into the emotions of that character as she is, the character is almost detached and apathetic towards the whole place.

The gender pronoun issue, trumpeted as one of the really insightful aspects of the novel, with comparisons made to Ursula Le Guin, frequently had the effect of dropping me out of the story. Some characters are clearly male, some clearly female, but we are not told about all of them. Why are we told about any of them? If gender is removed as a focal point for characterisation, thus collapsing our assumptions and giving us a clean slate for desires and driving forces, why tell us about any at all? It leaves us wanting to search out the prose to see if we’ve missing key point based on gender. If one character has a physical relationship with another, fine. We still don’t need to know gender.

Story, yes, the most important part – this is the first book in a trilogy, so the story is set to unfold, but it the fulcrum of Breq’s self-imposed mission feels like it is missing so much. There’s a twenty-year gap between the events on Ors and the events which take place with Seivarden. We have the vaguest hints at what Breq does in those years, but not enough to justify her drive over that time and set it out. Also, I found it hard to identify with Breq – although she displays very human desires (perhaps her old self re-asserting itself in her subconscious), her internalised thoughts are often quite bland – I found myself fighting to root for her. I don’t agree with some reviews suggestive of deus ex machina, but I do feel a mite confused by Seivarden – that his (yes, it’s a he) place in the book seems a little convenient. In some ways, it’s a classic B-story which arcs around behind the A-story and intersects at the critical moment, but Seivarden has so little to do that it doesn’t even really fulfil the category of B-story. It’s almost as if he was there to (a) explain the gender pronoun thing a little better, and (b) for Breq to “save the cat” and give us something to root for. Seivarden seems too ambiguous and empty a character to justify Breq’s actions later on.

Pace is slow the begin with – far too slow and there is too much insightful dialogue in relation to the action which actually moves the plot forward. This is what I mean by Leckie’s literary style. There were palpable lapses in tension in the early stages of the book, although plenty of what could be said to be, still underplayed, conflict (between Awn and the various factions on Ors, as well as between the factions themselves).

All this said, Ancillary Justice demonstrates an author who is likely to write something truly great, with a prodigious imagination, and is well-worth reading – there are certainly few books released in 2014 which stand up to the scope, imagination and operatic scale of Ancillary Justice.

6 people found this helpful

Helpful

The Culture crossed with the Roman Empire

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 20 July 2014

Verified Purchase

Ancilliary Justice starts with its central character, who goes by the alias of Breq, on a wintery planet in search of a weapon with which she hopes to revenge events from 20 years previously. The story of those events is told in alternate chapters where we learn about a universe which is home to the imperial Radch, whose artificially intelligent starships control networks of telepathic soldiers, created from the bodies of those unfortunate enough to have been conquered and killed by these interstellar Romans.

Breq, it turns out, is one such avatar, One Esk Nineteen, last survivor of the troop carrier Justice of Toren. That sentence is indicative of two of the key features of author Ann Leckie's book. Firstly, that the ships control multiple avatars, all of whom are aware of what each other is/are thinking and seeing. Leckie handles the description of multiple viewpoints and rapidly changing perspective really skilfully. Secondly, this is very much a story of confused identity, as One Esk struggles to understand who and what she is. Crucially for the plot she and her like are not the only multiple entities in the book...... While the confusion created is intentional, it does occasionally step a little too far as, early on, Leckie rapidly introduces races, nations, factions characters, and interchangeable avatars at a pace which left this reader at least, somewhat disorientated.

As well as effectively describing the experiences of the multiple entities, Leckie gives the isolated One Esk a convincing, dispassionate voice, viewing the worlds around her in an unemotional, detached manner. While reading the book, one term which didn't enter my head was 'zombie', but in retrospect, that would be one way of looking at it. If all zombie stories are really about something else, Ancilliary Justice is a zombie story about identity and about what it really means to be human. Here it is One Esk, who, despite her origins, turns out to be the most human character.

In using SF to consider issues of humanity, Leckie joins a long tradition in which, of course, Philip K Dick is the dominant figure. He is not her only speculative literary antecedent. Early on, with its dominant society and intelligent spaceships, it felt a bit like reading about the Culture's dark, imperialist cousin, but by the end, with a seemingly impregnable empire, weakened by internal corruption, and faced with mysterious and faintly sinister aliens, it is closer to Stephen Donaldson's Gap series.

One interesting feature, which echoes both Iain M Banks and Ursula K Le Guin, is the ambiguous and shifting sexuality of the characters. This is society where language is subtly nuanced to express gender but where actual sexual identity seems difficult to determine. The default pronoun is female, but individuals are referred to as both him and her depending on circumstances. This usage gives the impression of a universe dominated by women, which asks questions of the extent to which language echoes, and/or reinforces the balance of power in society. If Leckie is saying anything about the effect of the dominant gender on society, it seems to be that it is of little impact. This is a society every bit as violent and competitive as a male-dominated one.

Finally, I loved the end. I didn't enter into this book in the knowledge that it is intended to be the first in a series, but it is, and that results in a culmination which is like a door being slammed in one's face, and a feeling of "Wow, what next".

In terms of sub genre this is closest to military SF, but it is definitely towards the intelligent end of the spectrum, a long way from ultra-violent, video game inspired, shoot-em-ups, and run of the mill Napoleonic-navy-in-space stories which seem to predominate these days.

This is not a piece of planet-shatteringly original writing, its influences are too obvious for that, but it is a step above the average, and as such, well worth reading.

44 people found this helpful

Helpful

Amazon Music Stream millions of songs	AbeBooks Books, art & collectables	ACX Audiobook Publishing Made Easy	Amazon Web Services Scalable Cloud Computing Services

Audible Download Audiobooks	Book Depository Books With Free Delivery Worldwide	DPReview Digital Photography	Goodreads Book reviews & recommendations

Amazon Home Services Experienced pros Happiness Guarantee	IMDb Movies, TV & Celebrities	Kindle Direct Publishing Indie Digital & Print Publishing Made Easy	Shopbop Designer Fashion Brands

Amazon Warehouse Deep Discounts Open-Box Products	Amazon Business Service for business customers	Whole Foods Market We Believe in Real Food

Select Your Cookie Preferences

Follow the author