Loki's Ring

Persephone Station

by Stina Leicht

Gita Chithra embarks on a mission through space to save the robot she loves as a daughter—or risk losing her in the depths of Loki’s Ring—in this intergalactic space adventure from beloved author Stina Leicht.

Gita Chithra, the captain of the intergalactic ship The Tempest , is used to leading her crew on simple retrieval and assistance missions. But when she receives a frantic distress call from Ri, the AI she trained from inception—making her like a daughter to Gita—she knows she’s in for something much more dangerous.

Ri is trapped in the depths of Loki’s Ring, an artificial alien-made solar system, and says everyone in the vicinity has been infected and killed by a mysterious contagion. Gita and her team investigate, only to discover horrors at every turn, and are soon stranded themselves, leaving them vulnerable to infection and attack.

Forced to call on an old friend to help them out of this mess, Gita must succeed or risk losing everyone she’s ever loved.

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Queer, Fantasy, Adult, Space Opera, Space

512 pages, Paperback

First published March 28, 2023

Reviews

[Richard Derus · Rating 5 out of 5]

Real Rating: 4.75* of five

More to come, but this story, set in the same story-verse as PERSEPHONE STATION, is propulsive, exciting, and deeply cool.

What you need to know, going in, is that Author Stina is of the present moment. This means that there are female and non-binary leads, there are straight, gay, polyamorous relationship configurations, there are artificial people called AGIs and not one thing is ever made about any of it.

As it should be. Unless the relationship is the point of the plot, or subplot, these are the details that enrich the story. That's all. I'm delighted with this. I'm excited that Author Stina is telling an old fashioned adventure and chase story with some first-contact elements and a healthy side of anti-capitalist messaging with all these characters following their varying bliss paths... and it's published by a major house with a real marketing push behind it. The happy, it will not stop.

Except there's more: this story is set in the already rich and enticing story-verse that my doted-on PERSEPHONE STATION was set in! (Go read my almost-5* review of that one.)

I know a perfect rating is always the hope of every reader, but the multiple viewpoints used in the story kept me from feeling quite as connected to the characters as a perfect rating would require. This technique is totally demanded by this particular story, but the desire to get to know just that little bit more about the AGIs, for example, left the tiniest niggle of "more, please" in this reader.

[Evelina | AvalinahsBooks · Rating 5 out of 5]

How I read this: Free ebook copy received through NetGalley

Since my days of writing cohesive reviews are behind me, I've decided on a bullet-point format. TL; DR: really good book! Stina Leicht is becoming an auto-read for me. See book = must read!

- all cast are women or non-binary characters, and the book is very diverse in other aspects as well
- they're not all young either, there are a lot of 40-50 year olds kicking some real ass; mature women are often underrepresented in scifi, which I found very refreshing
- there is a good amount of action (although the setup does take a while at first)
- a lot of characters, but when you get used to it and remember who's who, you get attached to them and their distinct personalities and quirks
- a cat on a spaceship! And he curses at everyone with his smart collar! If that's not spice on a story, I don't know what is
- there are some very interesting alien life forms and concepts
- artificial life forms, sentient AI and anything you might want to know about them - the world building is very deep when it comes to this topic
- this is set in the same universe as Persephone Station! I was very excited about that, because I adore it when authors take the time and effort to build entire worlds of their own.
- there is contagion involved, and in a post-covid world, you relate weirdly and the situations read a lot more tensely than I would imagine they would have some 5 years ago. In my opinion, this added strongly to the story
- it's something very minor to a scifi plot, and you might not even notice it, but the people in this universe seem to ONLY eat vegetarian meals. I don't think I've ever seen that in any other book. It's very interesting as a stylistic choice, and I love what the author's is (probably) trying to say by doing this.
- this is not story related, but it's hilarious how much I enjoyed it. In the acknowledgements, the author explains how a book is written and gets on your shelf. Really, a lot more authors should do this, cause before becoming a book blogger, honestly? I also never knew.

Pick this up! I definitely loved it.

I thank the publisher for giving me a free copy of the ebook in exchange to my honest review. This has not affected my opinion.

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[Sherwood Smith]

The Ring is a solar system-sized ringworld built by unknown ancient architects. Different mega-corps are out grabbing real estate on this ring as well as everywhere else. These enterprises include a faction that views AI persons as machine enemies. When the corps try to strip-mine the ring for saleable tech they loose a terrible virus, threatening both humans and AI persons. In the midst of all the grabbing, jockeying, and fighting, a rescue mission winnows its way in...

I really enjoyed the author's previous Persephone Station and so I looked forward to this. Another exciting space opera with mostly women and various other types of persons driving the action. The pacing is fast, and I really liked Gita, our main protag. If I had a complaint, it would be that this space opera might have worked better with an omniscient narrator, as we kept having to jump chapter by chapter to various POVs. But that's a small thing.

This was a fun, exciting read, and I look forward to the author's next.

[Mogsy · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 of 5 stars at The BiblioSanctum https://bibliosanctum.com/2023/03/27/...

So happy to finally read a book by Stina Leicht, though I have to say, Loki’s Ring was not at all what I expected. The publisher description oversells the action and thrills somewhat, when the reality is a more subdued and meandering space drama, but I still enjoyed the concept very much.

The story follows Gita Chithra, the captain of the intergalactic search and rescue ship The Tempest. Things kick off with a distress signal received from Ri, the AI who is like a daughter to Gita, since in the world of this far-flung future, artificial intelligences are developed inside the minds of actual humans. Needless to say, Ri has a very close relationship with Gita, and now she needs help from The Tempest. Ri has become trapped in Loki’s Ring, an alien constructed solar system that has been infected with a contagion.

Dropping everything, Gita rushes to the rescue, only to find the situation is a lot worse than she imagined. Everything around Loki’s Ring is a dead zone, killed by the mysterious infection. The starship Ri had sent her distress call from is now a floating coffin in space full of the corpses of its former crew, and now Gita and The Tempest are trapped and headed for the same predicament unless they can find a way out of this mess.

Leicht wastes no time diving right in, and in a way that is a double-edged sword. While I appreciated that we got into the story with little preamble, some leadup would have given readers a chance to get to know Gita a bit better before the action got started. There is also the interesting premise of how AI is developed, though the relationship between Gita and Ri is somewhat glossed over and not explored to its full potential. Gita’s motherly affections are clear from the way she rushes off without a second thought to Ri’s aid, but what does having an AI daughter, fostered in such a way, truly mean? We’ve been presented with some truly innovative ideas, but now I just want to know what sets this unique parent-child dynamic apart and what makes it special?

Something about the pacing also felt…off. Despite things getting off to a running start, the rest of the book had many stops and stalls. Even with the disaster going on, the story went nowhere fast, and I believe too many character POVs played a part in this. At times the writing felt bogged down with overly long conversations that added little to the story, and transitions between the different perspectives didn’t always happen smoothly. The result was a disjointed narrative that sometimes seemed a bit out of control.

All told, I can’t say Loki’s Ring was the action-packed space opera that I thought I’d signed up for, but that said, it had its moments. Fans of more cerebral sci-fi may find many of the novel’s futuristic elements appealing, especially its themes related to the inception of AI and those delving the meaning of individuality or what it means to be human. It’s not going to be everyone’s cup of tea, and if I’m to be honest, I don’t know that it’s mine either. However, I enjoyed contemplating the novel’s deeper questions and the big picture of its overall story.

[Stewart Tame · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fair warning: I won a free ARC of this book in a Goodreads giveaway.

As the description says, Gita Chithra is the captain of The Tempest. She receives a distress call from Ri, an AI that she raised. Since Ri is like a daughter to her, she naturally rushes to the rescue, which takes her to Loki's Ring, an artificial alien-created world …

I really liked this book! Stina Leicht has created a wonderful cast of characters here, and the interplay between Gita and her friends and family is a delight to experience. I also found the depiction of AI personalities and the way they fit into this future society fascinating. I would love to read further stories set within this universe.

I also liked what was done with Loki's Ring itself. As Leicht points out in her Acknowledgements, it was her agent's suggestion of setting a book on a ringworld that set everything in motion. I love the result, which suggests a purpose for a ringworld beyond the usual "more room for the population."

Speaking of the Acknowledgements, if you're the sort of reader who normally skips such things, don't. It's all kinds of fun. I promise.

Ultimately, the book was a blast, and I definitely plan to look for more books by Stina Leicht. Highly recommended!

[Evan Ladouceur · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stina Leicht knows how to write strong dialogue, good characterization, gripping narrative. I enjoyed her prior novel, Persephone Station, and in some ways enjoyed Loki’s Ring more. I was very intrigued with the idea of humans carrying and raising AI “children.” I thought Leicht did a wonderful job of conveying this and particularly liked the idea of the developmentally challenged AI “child” who still has amazing talent and promise. Why not 5 stars? A long middle, too many POV characters, and a sense that the setting wasn’t - and could never be -real. The “sector” with Loki’s Ring felt as big as a city block; the grandeur and, well, “space” of space were lost in the casual real time communication across vast distances and crowds is space ships around the ring. I liked the book, like the writing and recommend it, but feel that Leicht’s best is to come.

[Lexie · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5/5

I'm a bit of a newb to sci-fi, so please forgive any obvious ignorance to the genre that may appear in my review below. I promise I'm trying my hardest lol.

Loki's Ring follows Gita, captain of a salvage ship and mother to two AI daughters. The novel begins with her receiving a distress call from her eldest daughter, Ri, coming from a restricted area of space known as L-39. L-39, also known as Loki's Ring, is a literal "ring" planet of artificial origins. Nobody knows who exactly created it, but it's mysterious and dangerous enough that no human government has tried to lay claim to it. What exactly Ri is doing there, Gita isn't sure, but she's willing to do whatever it takes to save her daughter.

I liked a lot of the bare bones plot and ideas that are explored in this book, I just found myself wanting more. Gita is mother to two AI children, but what does that relationship really look like? We know she's particularly empathetic to AI people, and obviously she's willing to go into unsanctioned space to save Ri, but we don't get to see her interact very much with her children on the page. I was super interested in how exactly a person becomes a parent to an AI personality, and it's touched on here and there, but I guess I just wanted to explore that relationship a little deeper. We're told Gita is super empathetic and compassionate, but the book is so plot-driven that we don't get to see it very much.

There's also several different POVs explored in this book, which was a little jarring to me because I expected to focus more on Gita. I love a multi-POV story when done well, but this one just felt a bit scattered to me. We didn't get to know any one character too deeply because the author had to focus on covering the breadth of the plot by juggling several characters at once.

That said, I do think the plot was actually quite interesting. It was much more political than I expected, and that was a nice surprise. Once the action got going, it was a fun ride, and it was really satisfying to see certain elements fall into place as connections were revealed. Loki's Ring itself was an appropriate mix of terrifying and awe-inspiring, and I wish we had gotten to spend more time there. We briefly touch on some fascinating environmental/cosmic horror elements that I would have loved to see explored more, but ultimately this novel moved too fast to linger too long on parts that I thought could have been expanded into some really juicy scenes.

I will also say, I don't think Loki's Ring is a particularly great choice if you're just dipping your toes into sci-fi. There were a lot of acronyms being thrown around, technologies brought up with little-to-no context or explanation, and the first couple of chapters were especially hard for me to follow. It became much more enjoyable once I got my bearings, but I think it has the potential to turn some readers off if they aren't familiar with certain genre conventions.

Overall, however, I think this book does have a lot of interesting things to say, even if I wish we had gotten to delve more deeply into those topics. I think especially in this day and age of rapidly advancing technology and artificial intelligence making waves in several fields, personhood and expendability of these entities is an interesting thing to consider. Ultimately, I wanted more out of this book, but I feel like I'll still be thinking about it for some time.


Thank you to NetGalley and Gallery / Saga Press for an eARC in exchange for an honest review!

[Sana]

'The lead of a crisis team of middle-aged women—who is also the estranged daughter of a bio-tech hazmat CEO—is stranded on a quarantined planet, fighting a biological contaminant while trying to uncover a wider conspiracy'

Found another by the author, aaaahh! Basically, more older women protagonists always

[Macknificent Reads · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is a review for an eARC I received through NetGalley. Full disclosure, I DNFd at 75%.

It is rare that I read books led by a diverse cast if the writer doesn’t belong to at least one of the marginalized groups represented in the story. This book reminded me why that is. Since I found this book so underwhelming, I’ll do the charitable thing and start with the good bit(s).

Loki’s Ring focuses on a group of daring, accomplished, middle-aged women existing within the prime of their lives. Centering a political space opera within the interpersonal struggles of a bunch of aunties kept the story grounded and relatable, this is where the story shines. The character relationships are filled with so much humor and genuine caring, I wanted to be part of the ship crew.

In the same vein, there are barely any men in the story. I think I recall 3, total. How refreshing!

Now for the doo doo stuff. This book was in need of some serious editing. The chapters are entirely too long, my kindle predicted the shortest of them at 30 minutes to complete. Constant drawn-out chapters are exhausting for a reader and impact the pacing of the story, which already had issues. Leicht throws awkward character descriptions in during what should be tension filled moments, effectively grinding the action to a halt. I understand the desire to share this world and characters, I just wish she had been more honest about what was necessary to tell this story.

Pacing issues aside, it was the way diversity was handled that really made me DNF at 75%. I think it is wonderful that Leicht wanted to create a world where non-binary people and BIPOC are represented in numbers that seem true to reality. The thing is, it didn’t feel authentic. Leicht goes on and on with descriptions of brown people, in an almost worshipful way. She makes certain to let us know when characters are trans/nb and when their romantic relationships aren’t heteronormative. It’s like she’s trying to shine a spotlight on how she made the characters sooo diverse.

Then there’s Karter, who I would argue is our main protagonist. We learn very little about how she looks or her sexuality. My assumption, since so much detail was given about marginalized characters, is that she is a white, cis, straight woman. And that’s a problem. That lack of description means Leicht is still making white people the default. In the future. Where we birth AIs and interact with non-terrestrial beings. *sigh*

The inclusivity of this book and the ideas behind it are exactly what draw me to a story. Regardless of her intentions, Leicht isn’t ready to explore them without a more robust team of editors/sensitivity readers.

[tracie reads · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a dense, plot-filled sci-fi story set in outer space. You are dropped right into the action and have to figure out what’s going on. I’m not actually sure I ever figured out what was happening or what the author was trying to do with this book. It’s probably best to just go along for the ride and enjoy where it takes you!

What worked for me:
- The queerness – pretty much everyone is queer, I think. There’s a character with multiple marriage partners, people who are bi/pan, non-binary characters. I can’t even remember it all because queerness was the norm, which I loved.
- The Artificial General Intelligences. AGIs are sentient artificial intelligences that are digitally gestated with a human partner. The one main character, Gita, and her relationships with two AGIs that she gestated is one of the focuses of the book. The AGIs we get to meet are funny, smart, and brave.
- Older women in-charge. Several of the characters were described as being in their 40s or older, gray hair, lots of experience, captaining ships, in charge of action.

What didn’t work for me:
- There were many POV changes, and each different switch included a bunch of new characters. It was a lot to keep track of, and I didn’t feel connected to any of the characters because there were so many.
- There was a major conflict from the past that got resolved really underwhelmingly. And the other sources of plot were rather nebulous. I didn’t really know who to root for or what mystery to try to solve or what we were headed towards. (Other than rooting against the corporation who did not recognize AGIs as independent beings and who thought they had a right to conquer an alien world just because they could – I could get behind disliking them!)

I would recommend this story for someone who wants a plot-heavy space story with lots of characters, tons of action, plenty of danger, and numerous settings.

3 stars for me means I liked it.

I received an arc from NetGalley in return for my unbiased review.

[Terence]

DNF – My batting average continues to sag with yet another novel I couldn’t finish. As with The Dinosaur Lords, I’m not going to rate this since it doesn’t deserve one star but it still doesn’t quite make the two-star level of “just OK.” (If it did, I’d have finished it after all.)

Nothing engaged me. Not the characters (who all acted and talked alike), not the story and not the writing. Especially the writing, which never flowed naturally for me. I found myself thinking of Ursula LeGuin’s The Dispossessed and her ability to realistically portray two very different societies – the largely capitalist Urras and the anarchic Anarres – with sympathy and without flinching from the good and bad qualities of both. It may be unfair to compare Leicht to UKL but the former’s skills haven’t quite reached the latter’s, if they ever will.

As I always like to stress in these negative reviews, everything here is my opinion. You may find Leicht to be the bee’s knees, and I’m happy if you do but I cannot recommend Loki’s Ring.

[Margaret · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an entertaining space opera featuring an all woman and nonbinary cast, many over the age of 30, many disabled and/or neurodivergent, many queer. Yay for representation! It's a fun plot, I enjoyed the characters, a few characters had similar-ish personalities but I didn't mind. I especially enjoyed the AI characters.

[Liv · Rating 4 out of 5]

BANTER. found family. queerness. worldbuilding. aromantic queerplatonic & doesn't renege on that in the end. all of this & barely a man in sight. jesus i love a good space opera.

[Sarah Dawson · Rating 4 out of 5]

The end got a little rushed (weird to say in a 500 page book) but overall I really enjoyed this one. Unique premise, diverse and interesting characters. The AI concept was cool and I wish there was a little more of that.

[Nevergreen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this as I was reading it, but I'm not sure about that ending. I want found family slice of life type space operas but not quite this.

[Joy · Rating 4 out of 5]

*I received this book as an ARC giveaway*
Overall, I enjoyed this book! It took a bit to get into the story simply because there were a lot of names getting tossed into the plot, and by the end I still wasn't sure on some of the characters. The plot moved along at a good pace and I wasn't left with any lingering questions, other than: will we get to see more of this crew? I enjoyed the read and the banter between characters, and hopefully we'll get more stories featuring them! All in all this feels like a solid sci-fi choice and I'm happy to have it on my bookshelves.

[Mark Hartman · Rating 3 out of 5]

So looked forward to this book. Cover is awesome. Writing isn’t very good so far. A lot of filler. For instance message from someone but not in any hurry to talk to them captain meanders around. Happens again after calling a meeting, for pages characters meander around and chat but are in no hurry to get together for a meeting that could send them into harms way. Book needs serious editing and all the filler cut out. Another thing that is bad is the chapter length. All the chapters are insanely long, usually around 30 pages. Chapters are best at around 5 to 10 pages max. Over that it makes for a tiring grind.

[Christopher Goy · Rating 1 out of 5]

Boring and really bad

[Nat · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book had way too much going on. Maybe it's because I didn't read Persephone Station first? They take place in the same universe but there's no indication that they're actually part of the same series. But either way I was swamped in a large cast of characters and lots of different worlds and politics that are all difficult to keep straight and also not that influential on the plot.

The main story follows two separate groups of people crewing spaceships, a task that apparently you only need like 3 people and an AI to do. Besides the two captains of the groups, the rest of the characters are basically interchangeable and just there to cause some chaos and say quippy lines. Some people die at the beginning and Leicht seems to make an attempt at making the reader feel sad about it, but I was still in the "keeping people's names straight" phase of the reading experience so I can't say I felt any emotions at all about it.

It's like everything here could have been interesting if it was more of a core focus. The politics could have been interesting if we'd spent more time on it. The whole AI-in-your-head concept could have been cool if we'd spent more time on it, or if the AI characters were more fundamental to the actual plot. The freaky nanobot disease or the weird ring planet (still not sure if these were related or two separate disasters happening at the same time) could have been cool if we'd actually focused on it. The scene where the plants like took over all the people from the station and they're dead but seem alive was super freaky and interesting and then never comes back or becomes relevant again. I don't get it -- there's a lot of cool material here and a lot that could have been strong but the whole story comes off as so disjointed because we spend it lurching from one topic to another. The book is over 500 pages and it feels way too long, and simultaneously not long enough to actually close out everything it opens.

I like space operas and I like dense scifi, but I prefer it to be more single minded. There's a lot that's good here but taken all together, it's a bit of a mess.

[Shannon · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really liked the concept and vibe of this book. The futuristic world and its ethics and issues surrounding artificial life was extremely interesting. I loved the scenes of space survival and how innovative the characters were.
Having said that, I felt like there were FAR too many POVs and characters. I was bored during Karter’s PoV 90% of the time and there were simply too many characters for me to connect with all of them in one book with this sort of plot.
I loved Aoifa and Ri, and I was very interested in Gita’s motherly connecting with the artificial intelligences she fostered. But again, many of the other characters and their relationships were lost on me as I felt like I was slogging through sections that reiterated information found out in other pov’s.
The idea of the world of Loki’s ring was very cool, and I loved the overall concept and world building. I did feel like I cared more about the earlier plot of the book than the latter half. The pacing could have been better.
Overall a great concept, well written and interesting with some minor flaws. I think people who enjoy multiple povs and slower paced/denser books will enjoy this a lot.


Received this as an arc I’m exchange for an honest review.

[D Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this author's style and the book was really cool. Derring-do, character growth, lots of threads to follow, all pulled into a cohesive story.

Having recently read the Ring World and Ring World Engineers by Niven, I almost felt this was a reply to his stories. Heavily female and queer with an eye to further inclusivity, the story was a serious counterpoint to his rampant misogyny and serious inability to take "the other" seriously.

The Terran World (federation? I can't recall the third word.) was a nice balance against the ... um, other governmental body (I'm so bad with names!). When telling my daughter about the story, I referred to them as Texas. A loosely confederated system of corporations who fought more or less openly with each other, one representative actually said they were fulfilling their god-given right to a second manifest destiny. 🤣

The book seemed better than the narrator managed to convey in the audio version. Which is a shame. I did love the accents tho.

[Annalise · Rating 4 out of 5]

I won this in a giveaway over two years ago and just now got around to reading it.
I really enjoyed this author's writing style and the plot and story was excellent. I wish this book had been multiple because there were too many characters jam packed into 500 pages and I didn't get enough time with the ones I wanted.
I do think Leicht needs to work on how she represents diversity. As other reviewers have noted, her descriptions of non white characters feel really out of place and shoved into the narrative without having a natural feel. For example, in the middle of an action scene, the physical description of a character is emphasized when it could have been discussed earlier. This is not done with white characters.

[Jeffrey · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very good space opera involving ais, aliens, deadly mutations, an almost all female cast and loads action. Its practically an Indiana Jones / James Bond type of book, with the characters constantly careening into one bad situation after another only to find some way to extract themselves or be extracted.

I liked it, but the myriad plot lines and characters sort of overwhelmed the flow for me.

[John O'connor · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've been in a science fiction mood lately. This is a pretty good story, but it didn't quite scratch the itch for what I was looking for. It's set in a future where humanity has spread to the stars, and broke into factions. Some people raise AIs as children, it's kind of a strange setup where AIs get integrated into families and then grow up and go on their own running space ships. It's kind of cool. There's also weird alien planets and secret plots and space pirates and space battles along with complicated interpersonal relationships.I liked it, didn't love it. It looks like the author wrote another book in this setting, I will check it out I think,

[Fornia]

genuinely disappointed that i didn't like this-- it wasn't Bad in any identifiable way, i just felt completely emotionally detached from all the characters and the entire plot and i made it 300 pages in and figured that probably wasn't gonna change

[Aaron E · Rating 1 out of 5]

Got this book at the airport on a random rush of trying to find a science fiction book, it did not live up to my nonexistent expectations.

It will find a home in a free library or not on my bookshelf.

[Raegan]

-Disclaimer: I won this book for free through Goodreads giveaways in exchange for an honest review-

Love the cover. I have attempted this too many times now. The writing is too clunky, dull, and nerdy. Includes trans/nonbinary people.

[Zrinka Sinkovic Lavi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ring world, aliens and a full cast of queer amazing women - what more could you ask for?

[Siara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another great space opera. The body horror was a bit much for me, it will be fueling my nightmares for the next few months

[Cheezsnack · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5. I loved Persephone Station, but this one took until half way through before it caught my interest. Still enjoyed it though.