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The Stone Sky
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The Stone Sky
The Stone Sky is a 2017 science fantasy novel by American writer N. K. Jemisin. It was awarded the Hugo Award for Best Novel, the Nebula Award for Best Novel, and the Locus Award for Best Fantasy Novel in 2018. Reviews of the book upon its release were highly positive. It is the third volume in the Broken Earth series, following The Fifth Season and The Obelisk Gate, both of which also won the Hugo Award.
As with the other books in the Broken Earth series, The Stone Sky is mostly set in a single supercontinent referred to as the Stillness by its inhabitants. Most of humanity lives in city-states referred to as "comms," and are segregated into social castes based on their usefulness to society.
The Stillness is constantly wracked by geological cataclysms, and every few hundred years an event is severe enough to touch off a global volcanic winter, referred to as a Fifth Season. Some characters, referred to as orogenes, have the ability to manipulate geological energies on a large scale, as well as magic on a smaller scale. They are a persecuted and feared minority, though it is largely due to their efforts humanity has survived the Seasons at all.
The former inhabitants of Castrima-under move north after damage by rival comm Rennanis compromised the geode's mechanisms, rendering it uninhabitable. The comatose Essun, nursed back to health, finds she has only a short time to return the Moon to a normal orbit and end the Fifth Seasons forever.
Essun's daughter Nassun is recovering from the shock of killing her father. Despondent and angry, she resolves to destroy both the Moon and Earth. Schaffa, her Guardian, agrees to help her reach the only city on the other side of the planet, Corepoint; from there, the Obelisk Gate can be activated without the need for the central control obelisk that Essun used.
The comm reaches Rennanis after a costly desert crossing, where Essun learns that Nassun plans to open the Gate as Essun did, which would almost certainly kill her. She takes a small company to Corepoint to intercept Nassun. Just prior to leaving, she learns she is pregnant by Lerna, the former healer from her old comm Tirimo, with whom she has started a relationship. Hoa, the stone eater who has been following her since she left Tirimo, transports them directly through the Earth; however, a rival faction of stone eaters attacks and Lerna is killed.
Nassun and Schaffa reach the ruins of a city in the Antarctic region from which Schaffa believes transportation is available to Corepoint. The ruins contain a functional transportation system linking to Corepoint directly through the center of the planet. During their transit through the core, the Earth is a living consciousness furious with humanity's attempts to control it and with the loss of Earth's moon, which Earth blames humanity for. The core is rich with the magical energy that forms the Earth's consciousness, and Nassun realizes this directly fuels the Guardians' abilities and longevity through an iron shard embedded in their brains.
Flashbacks reveal Hoa's story: at its ancient peak, human technology created the Obelisk Gate, a network of nodes that tapped Earth's magical essence for an inexhaustible energy source. To accomplish this, scientists used the DNA of a subjugated race to create "tuners," humans with exquisite sensitivity to magic, to control the Gate by tapping the magic from Earth's core. However, the night before the Gate was to be activated, tuners discovered that the people their genetic code was based on were in continual torment, lobotomized and used as batteries to charge the obelisks with magical energy. The lead tuner, Hoa, decided to destroy the city of Syl Anagist using the Gate's energies rather than perpetuate this injustice. As the tuners attempted this, the Earth took control of the obelisks, trying to sterilize itself of almost all life. The tuners managed to avert this by preventing some of the obelisks from activating, but the massive energies involved flung the moon into a high elliptical orbit and tuners transformed into the first stone eaters. Nevertheless, enough obelisks were activated to cause worldwide devastation and cause "The Shattering," humanity's dark age wracked by the Fifth Seasons. From a distance, Hoa observed a single tuner survive and become the progenitor of the Orogenes.
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The Stone Sky
The Stone Sky is a 2017 science fantasy novel by American writer N. K. Jemisin. It was awarded the Hugo Award for Best Novel, the Nebula Award for Best Novel, and the Locus Award for Best Fantasy Novel in 2018. Reviews of the book upon its release were highly positive. It is the third volume in the Broken Earth series, following The Fifth Season and The Obelisk Gate, both of which also won the Hugo Award.
As with the other books in the Broken Earth series, The Stone Sky is mostly set in a single supercontinent referred to as the Stillness by its inhabitants. Most of humanity lives in city-states referred to as "comms," and are segregated into social castes based on their usefulness to society.
The Stillness is constantly wracked by geological cataclysms, and every few hundred years an event is severe enough to touch off a global volcanic winter, referred to as a Fifth Season. Some characters, referred to as orogenes, have the ability to manipulate geological energies on a large scale, as well as magic on a smaller scale. They are a persecuted and feared minority, though it is largely due to their efforts humanity has survived the Seasons at all.
The former inhabitants of Castrima-under move north after damage by rival comm Rennanis compromised the geode's mechanisms, rendering it uninhabitable. The comatose Essun, nursed back to health, finds she has only a short time to return the Moon to a normal orbit and end the Fifth Seasons forever.
Essun's daughter Nassun is recovering from the shock of killing her father. Despondent and angry, she resolves to destroy both the Moon and Earth. Schaffa, her Guardian, agrees to help her reach the only city on the other side of the planet, Corepoint; from there, the Obelisk Gate can be activated without the need for the central control obelisk that Essun used.
The comm reaches Rennanis after a costly desert crossing, where Essun learns that Nassun plans to open the Gate as Essun did, which would almost certainly kill her. She takes a small company to Corepoint to intercept Nassun. Just prior to leaving, she learns she is pregnant by Lerna, the former healer from her old comm Tirimo, with whom she has started a relationship. Hoa, the stone eater who has been following her since she left Tirimo, transports them directly through the Earth; however, a rival faction of stone eaters attacks and Lerna is killed.
Nassun and Schaffa reach the ruins of a city in the Antarctic region from which Schaffa believes transportation is available to Corepoint. The ruins contain a functional transportation system linking to Corepoint directly through the center of the planet. During their transit through the core, the Earth is a living consciousness furious with humanity's attempts to control it and with the loss of Earth's moon, which Earth blames humanity for. The core is rich with the magical energy that forms the Earth's consciousness, and Nassun realizes this directly fuels the Guardians' abilities and longevity through an iron shard embedded in their brains.
Flashbacks reveal Hoa's story: at its ancient peak, human technology created the Obelisk Gate, a network of nodes that tapped Earth's magical essence for an inexhaustible energy source. To accomplish this, scientists used the DNA of a subjugated race to create "tuners," humans with exquisite sensitivity to magic, to control the Gate by tapping the magic from Earth's core. However, the night before the Gate was to be activated, tuners discovered that the people their genetic code was based on were in continual torment, lobotomized and used as batteries to charge the obelisks with magical energy. The lead tuner, Hoa, decided to destroy the city of Syl Anagist using the Gate's energies rather than perpetuate this injustice. As the tuners attempted this, the Earth took control of the obelisks, trying to sterilize itself of almost all life. The tuners managed to avert this by preventing some of the obelisks from activating, but the massive energies involved flung the moon into a high elliptical orbit and tuners transformed into the first stone eaters. Nevertheless, enough obelisks were activated to cause worldwide devastation and cause "The Shattering," humanity's dark age wracked by the Fifth Seasons. From a distance, Hoa observed a single tuner survive and become the progenitor of the Orogenes.