It’s really a bit frustrating that, having finished the third book of the trilogy (after I voted for both previous books in the BSFA and Hugo ballots last year and the year before) and again hugely enjoyed it, I now find that I can’t really express why I like this book, and these books, so much. I guess a lot of things come together: the fish-out-of-water leadership of Breq, the central character; the interplay between the other established characters from previous books; the humorous social and linguistic malapropisms of the Translator; the completely overt yet subtly done political threads in the plot, and the interplay between wielding power and communication. Others have written at greater length than this about its merits and its few flaws. Me, I’m just going to vote for it.