Broken Earth
by N. K. Jemisin · first published 2017
69% recommend23% neutral8% critical
Why HN recommends it
Gripping, original, epic-scale fantasy/sci-fi trilogy set on an unstable, catastrophe-prone world, with a largely non-white cast handled naturally; praised as a triple Hugo winner and a mind-blowing read for genre fans.
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…the next Game of Thrones book I picked up a few new series that I really enjoyed! I hope to get a few new suggestions out of this list. The Expanse - James Corey Revelation Space - Alastair Reynolds Broken Earth - NK Jemisin Three Body Problem - Liu Cixin (translated: Ken Liu)
on “Ask HN: Books you read in 2018?” ↗For pretty _amazing_ sci fi that I just stumbled on, NK Jemisin is amazing. Her Broken Earth series is not only tremendously gripping, original, and epic in scope, but it also does a fantastic job of portraying a world with predominantly non-white characters without being on the nose or ham-handed…
on “Summer Reading List” ↗Here’s some I’ve really enjoyed recently: - Octavia Butler (Everything) - Becky Chambers (Wayfarers) - Martha Wells (Murderbot) - Liu Cixin (3 body problem/ dark forest) - N.K. Jemisin (Broken Earth & and cities we became) - Dennis E. Taylor (Bobiverse)
on “Neal Stephenson reacts to Facebook name change” ↗…Earth's Past (series) https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780765382030 - Machineries of Empire (series) https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Ninefox-Gambit/Yoon-H... * Will Mess With Your Heart - The Broken Earth (series) https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/n-k-jemisin/the-fif... - Station Eleven https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/239452/station-elev... - This Is How You Lose the Time War https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/This-Is-How-You-Lose-...…
on “The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Books of the Past Decade” ↗I'm going to stick to recent stuff that was like no sci-fi I'd ever read before: Ninefox Gambit - Yoon Ha Lee A Long Way to a Small Angry Planet - Becky Chambers The Broken Earth series - N.K. Jemisin
on “Ask HN: What are the best Sci-Fi books you've ever read?” ↗The Fifth Season by N K Jemisin (and then the rest of the Broken Earth series) great dystopian sci-fi
on “Ask HN: Read any good books lately?” ↗…Representation in sci-fi is tricky, because once you start getting too far away from the current time period, you start to lose out a lot of the cultural experiences that people can relate to. N.K. Jemisin's "The Broken Earth" series does a decent job of capturing the experiences of non-white people living in the U.S. in a deep and thoughtful way, while maintaining an abstract fantasy/sci-fi setting.
on “Parable of the Butler: A science-fiction pioneer finds posthumous fame” ↗…Jemisin wrote a triple Hugo winning trilogy[1] about what could happen to humanity with a sliiightly less stable crust, if you want some more unnerving ;) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N._K._Jemisin#Broken_Earth_ser...
on “What keeps earth from collapsing in on itself? (2010)” ↗…then had to take it back to the library and never finished it. I need to pick this series back up. But it's worth saying, N.K. Jemisin deserved those wins. I've read a lot of sci-fi and fantasy and Broken Earth blew my mind when I read it the first time. I had to stop reading sci-fi/fantasy for a while afterwards because nothing could hold a candle to it. It was a master class in craft, with an incredibly…
on “Ask HN: Which book would you pick to re-read for the rest of your life?” ↗Omelas is fantastic. If you enjoy it, I'd recommend NK Jemisin's broken earth if you've somehow avoided it. And yeah Booker and Pulitzers are hit or miss, I choose carefully and don't try to do the entire shortlist.
on “Lex Fridman's Reading Plan in Numbers” ↗…always love the Hugo (or Nebula) winner, because I think people who only read SF tend to value SF concepts over prose and narrative and that's sometimes reflected in the winners, but holy hell I loved both Broken Earth and Inheritance. The Great Cities twofer is mighty fine, too. Not for nothing, but Jemisin is also a MacArthur fellow.
on “The 2023 Hugo nomination statistics have been released and we have questions” ↗Broken Earth is absolutely awesome. I don't like everything Jemisin wrote, but her hugo win was 100% deserved.
on “Science fiction authors were excluded from awards for fear of offending China” ↗Children of Time (Adrian Tchaikovsky), The Expanse (James S. A. Corey), Broken Earth (N. K. Jemisin), Locked Tomb (Tamsyn Muir), A Memory Called Empire (Arkady Martine), Murderbot (Martha Wells), The Light Brigade (Kameron Hurley), The Wayfarers series (Becky Chambers), and The Calculating…
on “Nobody Wants to Buy the Future: Why Science Fiction Literature Is Vanishing” ↗If you liked this, you should read the Broken Earth series: https://www.goodreads.com/series/112296-the-broken-earth
on ““The moon blew up without warning and for no apparent reason”” ↗I liked Broken Earth, maybe it wasn't very consistent and somewhat too long, but overall it was good. I also recommend Ancillary series by Ann Leckie.
on “N. K. Jemisin’s Dream Worlds” ↗