A Memory Called Empire

Did You Know?

• The sequel A Desolation Called Peace was published in March 2021.
• A Desolation Called Peace also won the Hugo Award for Best Novel.
• The sequel is set a few months after the events of A Memory Called Empire.

Plot

Ambassador Mahit Dzmare travels from Lsel Station to the Teixcalaanli Empire carrying a copy of her predecessor Yskandr Aghavn's consciousness in an imago-machine implanted in her skull. Because Yskandr died before returning to Lsel, his memories are fifteen years old. On Teixcalaan, Mahit works with her liaison Three Seagrass and Three Seagrass's friend Twelve Azalea. Mahit discovers her imago has been sabotaged and loses access to Yskandr's memories.

Nineteen Adze, an advisor to Emperor Six Direction, saves Mahit from an assassination attempt. The elderly Emperor nears death, triggering a succession crisis, and the Empire announces plans to annex Lsel. Mahit retrieves an imago machine from Yskandr's corpse and learns he promised the Emperor an imago machine and was murdered by an advisor opposed to imperial immortality. She also learns of an alien invasion threat.

Mahit convinces the Emperor to cancel the annexation to address the invasion. Civil unrest kills Twelve Azalea and hundreds of others. The Emperor commits ritual suicide, and Nineteen Adze becomes regent for Six Direction's clone. Mahit requests a transfer back to Lsel.

Major themes

The novel examines the intersection of past and future selves, as well as language, grammar, and custom intertwined with conquest and culture. It discusses how institutional memory shapes society and politics, comparing the expansionist Teixcalaanli Empire with the independent Lsel Stationers. Mahit is perceived as a barbarian by the Teixcalaanli. The author, a former Byzantine historian, draws from the Byzantine Empire, Aztec Empire, and Central Asian empires.

Lsel Station's culture and history are inspired by the medieval Armenian Kingdom of Ani. Martine, who holds a Master of Studies in Classical Armenian Studies, incorporates themes of cultural resistance, hybridity, and identity from her research on Byzantine–Armenian relations, especially the annexation of Ani by Byzantium in 1044. Armenian influences appear in Stationer names like Mahit Dzmare and Yskandr Aghavn; Mahit Dzmare may evoke the Armenian words mah (death) and dzmer (winter).

The term Lsel may derive from the Armenian verb lsel (to listen), emphasizing cultural memory and oral tradition. Martine dedicated the book to anyone who has loved a culture that absorbs their own, and to Grigor III Pahlavuni and Peter I Getadardz.