Countess

July 8, 2024
This swashbuckling, planet-hopping riff on The Count of Monte Cristo from Palumbo (Skin Thief) follows Virika Sameroo, who, having emigrated as a child from the Exterran Antilles to Invicta, the capital planet of the Æerbot Empire, is determined to break through the poverty and prejudice that centuries of colonization have inflicted on her people. She becomes the first Exterran Antillean commissioned to an Æerbot spaceship, the Oestra—but as a woman and an Exterran, Virika is not trusted by her crew, and one officer in particular, Lieutenant Lyric, despises her for refusing his sexual advances. When Oestra’s captain falls ill and puts Virika in command, she brings the ship home to visit her mother and her lover. Their reunion is cut short when the captain dies—and Virika is arrested for his murder. Wrongfully sentenced to life in prison, she plots revenge against the empire. After escaping, briefly joining a band of pirates, and taking on the sobriquet the Countess, she leads the Antilleans into a rebellion against Invicta. Palumbo’s post-colonial space opera take on Dumas’s novel moves at a whiplash-inducing pace. Evocative descriptions, especially of food, add texture, though a late twist disappoints. It’s not perfect, but fans of speculative revamps of classics will find plenty to enjoy.

August 1, 2024
Virika Sameroo has been the perfect soldier. After her parents won the immigration lottery and secured passage to capital planet Invicta from Orinoco, a colonized planet of indentured servants forced to mine for resources, Virika has devoted her life to the �erbot Empire. When the captain of her cargo vessel falls ill, Virika is promoted and becomes the first Exterran Antellean to hold such a position. What first appears to be the opportunity of a lifetime quickly turns lethal when Virika is charged with murder, sedition, and treason and sentenced to The Pit, an underground military prison located on a resource-depleted dwarf planet. With five lifetime sentences ahead of her, Virika's only focus is seeking revenge against those who framed her. Alluding to the Haitian Revolution, Palumbo's debut is a queer, anticolonialist space opera that revitalizes The Count of Monte Cristo. The pacing feels rushed at times, lacking the thorough storytelling of its inspiration. Nevertheless, readers of Rebecca Roanhorse and Becky Chambers will be invested in this Afrofuturist novella.

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August 16, 2024

Palumbo places The Count of Monte Cristo in space, where an empire thrives on the labor of refugees it claims to have rescued. Virika Sameroo is descended from Caribbean people relocated to resource-rich worlds, where they toil for the empire's profit. Her family emigrates, eventually giving Virika the opportunity to rise in the military ranks. Just as she feels she's made it, the racism she's learned to ignore rises up, and she is falsely convicted of murder. She is sentenced to die deep in a prison planet, losing her mother, her girlfriend, and her career all at once. In her cell, she learns despair and rage before gaining the chance for revenge. Though Palumbo's book is novella-length, she covers many of Monte Cristo's details while exploring revolution, workers' rights, and racism. The brevity of the novella is aided by the story's familiar foundation, coupled with passages of exposition. While this doesn't leave as much space for deep characterization, readers can easily fill in the gaps themselves. VERDICT Palumbo's debut novella, following the story collection Skin Thief, is a satisfying story of revenge and revolution that stokes the fire in readers.--Matthew Galloway

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