I am looking for a book with a lot of intrigue and faction interplay. It could be science fiction or fantasy or anything in between. I really, really enjoy political games and tests being played between characters, like the scene in Game of Thrones where Tywin tests everyone coming to a meeting beforehand by sitting at the front of a table and having all the seats on one side to see how closely they would sit to power and why. That being said, I also really like fictional mechanics of other universes that make sense. I have recently really enjoyed the book Lies of Loch Lomora and also finished The Traitor Baru Cormorant and I have been watching The Expanse…so I'm really really digging complex but compelling political conflicts. I also am a long time dungeon master that really loves it when a group of players/characters come across something important and get pursued hellaciously and courted by many different groups and interests. I don't know how to explain it, but for me, factions and their impact upon their world at large is some of the most immersive aspects of a world and story to me. I don't know if there are books out there that really reflect that. Can anybody help me?
by plastic_beach_arcade
4 Comments
The Gods Are Bastards by D. D. Webb fits this. First book’s on Kindle and the rest are on Royal Road.
*The Jakarta method* by Vincent Bevins
The Terra Ignota series, by Ada Palmer, is an absolute hoot along these lines. It’s a sci-fi series set in a future where the world is politically divided into seven non-geographic ”Hives” and the main character is a sort of universal slave who belongs to no nation and is only allowed to work for food. The Hives are the Masons, the Humanists (formerly the Olympic Committee), The Europeans, Mitsubishi (which recently absorbed Greenpeace, the 8th Hive), the Cousins, the Brillists, and the Utopians.
In comics, I really love East Of West, which is a sci-fi alternate history (history diverges during the US Civil War but the series is set around 2150) where the continental United States is divided into seven nations: The Union, the Confederacy, the Kingdom of New Orleans, The Republic of Texas, The People’s Republic Of America, the Endless Nation, and “Armistice” (population 1).
LE Modesitt Jr The Grand Illusion series, first book Isolate.
Frank Herbert Dune and its sequels
Isaac Asimov Foundation and its sequels
Neal Stephenson Snow Crash, Zodiac, The Baroque Cycle, first book Quicksilver
Jim Butcher Dresden Files, first book Storm Front. The intrigue between factions and different supernatural entities shows up in each book but to see the overall picture you’ll need to get a few books in. And it’s ongoing,mine if the few really long series I’ve read that keeps working.
David Brin Uplift series, first book Sundiver
Jean Johnson The First Salik War series first book The Terrans and Theirs Not to Reason Why series first book A Soldier’s Duty, set in the same universe but a few hundred years apart