Empire of the Feast

This unrelenting queer erotic sci-fi novella from Barrett (Fate of the Storm Gods) falls just short of achieving its grand ambitions. The story opens with the awakening of Feast-Emperor Riverson, the most recent reanimation (and the first male) in a line of Feast-Empresses, and follows alongside the disoriented ruler as he is taught essential facts about his world. While this is a convenient way to ensure that the reader is not lost in the extensive worldbuilding details, there remains a sense of confusion, made more intense by the rapid pace of the novella form. It’s a bit of a shame, because the world is fascinating (the empire uses sex magic to appease a dangerous being trapped within the sun), but there is no time to appreciate or even fully understand the machinations of the magic or politics at play, as the empire is almost immediately attacked and the stakes are continuously heightened. There is an exciting story here, but it isn’t done justice by the brief page count. (Oct.)