As a lifelong lover of science fiction and the darker flavours of dystopia, I’m always on the lookout for stories that blend star-spanning stakes with intimate human (and non-human) entanglements. Aliette de Bodard’s The Red Scholar’s Wake, published on 24 November 2022 and which I picked up in 2023, does exactly that. It’s an imaginative mix of political intrigue and a near-magical sensibility, set in a universe where sentient ships and human hearts are equally capable of tenderness and treachery.
Aliette de Bodard’s The Red Scholar’s Wake: intrigue, magic
De Bodard returns to her Xuya universe with a tale that feels at once sweeping and intimately focused. The novel follows Xích Si, a brilliant scavenger and captive engineer, and Rice Fish, a sentient mindship who is also the widow of the formidable Red Scholar. Their alliance—part survival pact, part slow-blooming romance—unfurls against the ever-shifting loyalties of pirate courts and trade leagues, where every favour has a cost and every secret a buyer.
What makes the book sing is its fusion of political gamesmanship with textures that read as magical realism: ancestral altars tended in microgravity, coded incense and ritual shaping negotiations, and mindships whose avatars shimmer with memory and mood. None of it is “magic” in the spell-flinging sense; rather, it’s a world where belief, culture and technology braid together so tightly they feel enchanted. That soft glow gives the intrigue its emotional ballast, so that manoeuvres in council chambers land with the same force as glances exchanged in shadowed corridors.
De Bodard’s prose is elegant and restrained, favouring sensory detail over exposition. You taste the broth, feel the hum of bots and bulkheads, and sense the tidal pull of obligation that defines Xuya’s kinship networks. The effect is mesmerising: a political thriller that never forgets the people inside the plot, and a love story that never loses sight of the galaxy pressing in from every angle.
Review: The Red Scholar’s Wake by Aliette de Bodard 🍵🍵🍵🍵
As a reader drawn to dystopian currents, I appreciated how this novel keeps its bleakness grounded in systems—empires and syndicates, contracts and customs—rather than in gratuitous cruelty. Xích Si’s perspective, cautious and razor-sharp, anchors the story; Rice Fish’s voice, at once ancient and vulnerable, complicates it in lovely ways. Their dynamic has a patient, tensile quality that rewards readers who enjoy romance threaded through strategy.
The plotting is deft: feints and counter-feints, councils and clandestine meetings, betrayals that feel both shocking and inevitable in hindsight. If the middle third slackens slightly as the board is reset, the final movement tightens with satisfying clarity. Worldbuilding remains a standout—rich without ever becoming obtuse—and the sense of community, obligation and chosen kin elevates the stakes beyond mere survival.
I’m settling on four teacups out of five: 🍵🍵🍵🍵. The book is gorgeously crafted, emotionally astute and politically knotty, with prose that lingers like incense. A few pacing hiccups and a desire for one or two antagonists to be sketched with more nuance keep it shy of perfection, but the whole is a triumph—romantic space opera with the shimmer of the mythical at its edges.
The Red Scholar’s Wake is that rare novel which balances heart and hard choices, delivering a story as intimate as it is expansive. Published on 24 November 2022 and devoured by me in 2023, it’s an imaginative blend of political intrigue and a gently luminous, almost-magical atmosphere—ideal for readers who crave character-first space opera with teeth. My verdict: a warm, fragrant four teacups out of five, and a wholehearted recommendation to make this your next interstellar escape.