Alliance Rising by CJ Cherryh

In this 2019 novel, CJ Cherryh achieves much of what I look for in fiction: relatable tension, interesting questions being pondered, human psychology, a wider world being affected by and affecting the characters. And she achieves what keeps me coming back to science fiction: meaningful technology changing the way cultures work on a fundamental level, the necessity of wrapping my head around the different priorities and minds of others, contemplating potential human futures. I read this book in two days. I look forward to reading it again. This novel details the rise of the merchanters’ Alliance, and cliffhangs the breakout of Sol system into the rest of the FTL-enabled galaxy of human settlements. It appears a sequel is coming.

To get them out of the way, two potential problems spring to mind. First, Cherryh has a tendency to intro-info-dump. Here, she certainly does front-load the long first chapter with exposition. But instead of some dry, wikipedia-esque, unrelated information pushed at a reader who hasn’t been given a chance to care yet, this felt more interconnected, more building of tension, more part of the first chapter instead of an intro. Into this springs the surprising and unknown entry of a large ship from FTL, and the immediate fallout of this is fascinating to watch in that first chapter, as we are introduced to two of the main characters. So, not the best opening to a book I’ve read, but a good one that sets the tone for the novel to come, and rises above the usual pitfalls of the intro-info-dump.

Second, does this novel stand on its own? Always a question with works in a series. Should it? Where Regenesis certainly would not stand alone, I feel like this one stands alone better. The characters are largely new, the ships and families may be known, and some of the technology, but the characters, time period, and situations are new. Cherryh’s tightly focused, third person narrative fits well if she is trying to make this novel stand alone: by denying the reader a lot of information that other authors would spend chapters explaining, Cherryh uses her voice to get the action on-page and start building from there. She focuses on what the characters need to know to move along, not on what the reader could know about the universe. Strong.

And those are the only two nit-pickings I can find in what has fast become one of my favorite Cherryh novels⁠—and that’s saying something because she has written some great novels. This book isn’t for somebody who isn’t heavily interested in intricate, psychological, political drama. Indicative of a lot of Cherryh’s work, this relies on bedroom and boardroom diplomacy and less on adventure tale. To me, that tendency is a positive. I’ve read a ton of space-chases, and this rigid focus on what’s happening and known in and directly around Alpha station allows Cherryh to extrapolate the context of the drama to a rarely seen depth.

And that’s the key to this novel’s success: I feel the thick tension. She spends a couple of hundred pages building up the threat of the blue-coated ECE, then ignores them for forty pages. Talk about building the tension! The family hosts a meeting and decides to risk their lives. They check out of their hotel, they walk to the mast their spaceship is docked on, they check the coordinates in a private office at the bottom⁠—Captain, and all three Nav seats getting a peek. They agree to the job. They crack some nervous jokes. They shake hands with the station chief they leave behind. They say goodbyes. They ride the lift. They enter the airlock. They enter their ship’s airlock. They enter their ship. They sit down and start the undock. BAM! The guns come out. How much more could you build the tension? She takes the present, onscreen threateners and then puts them off-screen for forty pages. I was sweating and dreading every page turn. And the payoff does. CJ Cherryh knows how to structure a story. She doesn’t pull the antagonists back off the page right off the bat, or halfway through; but by three-quarters of the way through the novel, I understand they’re the baddies and their sudden lack of presence communicated, “they’re up to something”. Masterful. The tension throughout this novel, from the first page⁠—"Three hours and counting, and still no update"⁠—entrances. Instead of always telling readers, “tension here”, or pulling a gun out on every page to try and ramp up the tension, the tension dawns on the reader as situations and characters develop, until the ending is just a breathless rush of crazy action and politicking.

“We’re all fools, men and women. Or capable of being. You don’t get more callous with the years and the ports: the anger and angst go, but the feelings come on, with all the experiences heaped high. Good thing for us all that wisdom generally comes with them, and you can lead our Fallan just so far, but he’s the prankster and hard to catch."

Of course, CJ Cherryh writes wonderfully as well. She uses sparse language throughout, clipping sentences and words to help give the mood and tone of the place. But her mix of narration and dialogue tend to benefit her books⁠—when the dialogue starts you know you’re in for something you thought you knew changing, speeding up. It’s quite unlike Asimov’s tendency to ask his readers to sit back and relax and watch the expository dialogue pass. This is better writing, in every way. If you appreciate good writing in speculative fiction, read CJ Cherryh. It’s that simple. She’s one of the best writers of speculative fiction alive, consistently. Her tight, third person, internal narrative is brilliant and fresh and exciting.

The themes here are based on the premise that outsiders giving orders from afar⁠—in both distance and time⁠—simply doesn’t work: America during the war of independence, other colonies of European powers, and even Spokane/Eastern Washington, where the author lives, and Seattle/Western Washington, where the government resides. The resentment and good faith applied to the outsiders’ orders show the character of the people in the novel, but fundamentally the situation will not change without Sol giving up their overbearing nature, without Sol understanding what the stars are like. In other words, Washington Drysiders helped Washington Wetsiders pay for Seattle’s monorail in the 60’s, but they’re still salty about it⁠—they helped, and that shouldn’t be overlooked, but they also understand that it was a burden on them with little hope of direct benefit. The way characters respond to outsiders giving useless and damaging orders from afar helps define them as people. All-in? Lackey. All-out? Romantic. This premise of outsiders giving orders from afar underlies the three themes.

First, the on-page, obvious theme of sovereignty. The book is an extended battle, political and physical, for control of Alpha Strip, the docking area and spacer-serving bars and restaurants on Alpha Station. Alpha station’s civil authorities had control of it and want it back, the Earth Company Enforcers take control of it, and the Spacers/Merchanters are their own side in the fight: all want different things from the Strip, and they all take steps to ensure that the Strip includes their priorities. This plays out in bloody fistfights, tense standoffs, trickery, and backroom dealing. When dealing with space travel, sovereignty doesn’t tend to apply as easily as it has to a land-based border. And the merchant ships themselves, which operate autonomously between the stars, their attempt to gain their sovereignty gives the novel its name. It’s, in a way, a partial decolonization narrative.

Second, a discussion of doughnut and edge cities as applied to space colonization. In urban planning, a doughnut city is the state of a downtown core growing too expensive, forcing residents to the suburbs, amenities follow, then jobs, then a belt road, and pretty soon the downtown core is depleted of economic vitality, as all the action is happening around it, not in it. Edge cities follow a similar pattern⁠—see Bellevue, Redmond, Kirkland, and the other Eastside towns in Western Washington around Seattle. She applies this to early space colonization in our future. Namely, as people move farther and farther away from Earth due to having more opportunities farther out, and an easier time finding jobs, the same thing will happen with Earth⁠—it will become a forgotten, powerless aspect of the human experience in space. The new settlements will develop technologies that further outpace Earth and contribute to the alienation of the “downtown core” of Earth in this system of human settlements. This critique strikes a chord with me.

Third, the death of small towns. As mechanization takes hold of more jobs, the stations that were established first are superseded by later stations with more advantages, farther away from Earth. These first stations then undergo a shrinking, some getting mothballed, while farther out Pell and Cyteen expand rapidly. In some ways, this reads like the novel version of BH Fairchild’s poems. It’s a present worry in America, and it’s portrayed here brilliantly.

In terms of an applicable, human theme, Cherryh explores the idea that humans don’t really change. Despite their priorities changing⁠—between Sol, Alpha, Pell, Cyteen, the EC, the forming Alliance⁠—the ways that people pursue those priorities are human ways. EC priority is control, so Hewitt and Cruz attempt to control as much as they can immediately. They do this through strongarm tactics, hiring station residents’ unemployed teenagers and giving them purpose, dismissing considerations outside of their short-term goal of getting Rights flying as soon as possible. These are human techniques, some good, some bad. Alpha’s priority is survival, so Abrezio spends time planning current actions in light of future potentials. He even lies to Hewitt to ensure the safety of the strip, the merchants that keep his station supplied, and the residents that he is executive over. Abrezio too, both moral and immoral actions. JR might be the most morally consistent character, but by stepping into a situation on Alpha that he doesn’t know, he smashes toes and scares people to action in ways he doesn’t anticipate. The Alliance’s priority is sovereignty, so JR does every little thing he can to further that goal immediately, without betraying his morals⁠—which would damage his goal in the long-term. But even though accidental, he ends up screwing up a few times. Abrezio, Ross, and JR, the three main characters, tend to come off as both good and bad, depending on their understanding of the situation. And this is a strong writing tactic⁠—characters with wrinkles who are not perfect specimens of competent men. But her overall point is that humans don’t fundamentally change. Context shifts their priorities, so their actions to specific inputs do change⁠—things that would have merited an over-reaction before no longer matter much, so little response is needed. However, their tactics will remain the same, even when their priorities shift where those tactics will play out.

In short, this is one of my favorite Cherryh works, and it helps further solidify her as one of my favorite authors. It’s a spectacular novel. It touches on so many aspects of humanity, culture, and potential futures that I found it fascinating. But despite being filled with interesting ideas, it is a well written, well constructed, good story, and what more could you ask for in a book?