Daughter of Elysium by Joan Slonczewski

~The Quick Take~

Daughter of Elysium follows in A Door Into Ocean's footsteps when it comes to depth of character, world, and science, but the style of story is markedly different. Whereas A Door Into Ocean drives towards a dramatic problem/conclusion, Daughter of Elysium is much more interested in the incidental, the intellectual, and other asides that string together to build a nuanced narrative. If you like to read for the joy of the world/characters/ideas, no brainer, this is a great book. If you prefer to feel an element of tension and compulsion running through a novel, Daughter of Elysium might not match your expectations.

~The Real Review~

Centuries upon centuries after the events of A Door Into Ocean, the Sharers remain much the same. Shora is quite a bit different, though. Floating cities dot the ocean moon, filled with millions of people from a long-dead world. These Elysians have (mostly) conquered aging and lead indulgent lives confined only by their rigid social norms.

Blackbear Windclan, his "goddess" Raincloud, and their two young children have no stake with the Sharers or the Elysians. They leave their matriarchal, volcanic home planet of Bronze Sky for their jobs: Raincloud as an interpreter of an uncommon language and Blackbear as a doctor researching why "immortality" and infertility are linked. Daughter of Elysium is mostly their story.

It's a somewhat thin premise. We watch the Windclans meet colleagues and peers, adjust to high-tech life, and get settled into their new lives. Both Blackbear and Raincloud's jobs are a driving factor of the novel, but there's no real "hook" there.

Regardless, it makes a promise to the reader: Daughter of Elysium is an opportunity to get to know the Windclans and experience their immersion in new cultures and ideas.

This combination of a lack of solid hook and an open-ended promise affords Slonczewski incredible freedom in where she takes the book. We're not following along on a traditional three-act plot. There's no obvious hardship to overcome. The intrigue and joy of Daughter of Elysium come from the subtler things: the budding friendship of two very different characters, the relationship between Blackbear and his family, a slight yet profound change in the world. 

Perhaps the novel's most concrete "point" is ecology on a galactic scale and the intersection of cultural ideals from the four prominent worlds:

• the anarchistic, communal Sharers

• the egalitarian, aloof Elysians

• the "salt of the earth," family-oriented Bronze Skyans

• the violent yet surprisingly nuanced Urulites

This creates a rich and complicated galaxy full of seeming incongruities. It's one of those rare books where there is no "enemy," there are only creatures doing what makes the most sense to them given the realities of their day-to-day lives. It's lovely and also frustrating. More than once, I wanted both sides to "win."

This aspect of Daughter of Elysium is markedly different from a Door Into Ocean, where the Valedon colonizers murder non-violent Sharers for corporate interests. And with this difference comes a substantial change in the reading experience.

While the opening chapters of A Door Into Ocean still contains Slonczewski's trademark depth and characterization, it has a clear hook: how will Valedon's disagreement with Shora end? And as we explore this question and watch the increasing stakes, discovering the answer becomes a tense compulsion.

I had to know if the Sharer's non-violent techniques would work. I had to know if the characters I grew attached to would survive, or do the right thing, or develop into the people they could have been all along. Don't get me wrong, I loved the characters and the world, but more than that was the compulsion to see how each strand of the story wove together to answer the hook of "will Shora be able to withstand Valedon?"

Conversely, I read Daughter of Elysium because I loved the characters, the world, the philosophies, and the arguments that made me stop and question my own ideas. I didn't "need" to read another chapter even though it was far past my regular bedtime; I wanted to.

Well, for most of the book, anyway.

The last 60 pages take a turn. The incidental storytelling becomes incremental with clear stakes on a significant scale. 

I won't spoil it; this is too good of a book to blow open like that, but I will say the ending was the weakest point. It's not that Slonczewski sprung it on us; the puzzle pieces are all there. I can't even fault its suddenness; if every POV character is shocked, we should be too. And yet, it did feel rushed. I think it's because while, intellectually, everything checks out, emotionally, this section was flat. As the rest of the novel is intellectually and emotionally nuanced, the emotional component's loss was palpable. It's like the book lost a dimension.

This is a shame because the ending isn't a throwaway existing only for the tension; it seems undeniable that the next book will build on these ideas, and I'd love to return to them with the same fondness with which I returned to the Sharers.

Thankfully, this isn't a damning problem. I had no expectations for the end of Daughter of Elysium. It could have ended with the Windclans eating dinner some ordinary evening, and I'd have been happy. As mentioned, the book's promise was getting to explore ideas, places, and characters through the experiences of the Windclans; we get that aplenty. Slonczewski fulfilled her promise.

And the last 60 pages, rushed though they felt, didn't—couldn't—detract from that because they didn't undermine the promise.

I've barely mentioned the Sharers here, but rest assured they play a prominent role in the novel. While Daughter of Elysium isn't a direct sequel to A Door Into Ocean, it's not entirely standalone, either. I loved this tangential connection. Sometimes, when a sequel follows too close on its predecessor's heels, it can cheapen the first book. Daughter of Elysium reverently references the past and builds on top of it but doesn't exploit it for easy emotional wins while still giving us access to the Sharers that we've grown to love. I wish more series followed this approach.

Daughter of Elysium is a delight, and I'm so glad a reader recommended this series to me.

Cover art by Tim Jacobus: