The Fifth Season (The Broken Earth #1) (Paperback)
Staff Reviews
There is a reason that all three books in the Broken Earth trilogy won Hugo awards! The style of writing is like an old friend telling you a story, and the plot is threaded together so well that the world feels familiar after only a few chapters in. The land is called “The Stillness” and it is anything but still. The tectonic plates are constantly changing, causing apocalyptic disasters every few hundred years, and we are just witnessing the latest in a long line. Instead of following the story of a civilization ending, we follow the story of a mother with the power to control the earth around her. She has lost her daughter, and will use all the strength she has to get her back.
The Fifth Season is a beautiful start to a trilogy with a fantastic setting and amazingly dynamic characters. As I read, I realized the biggest motivation to keep reading was to learn more about the history of this fascinating world they live in. If you need a new fantasy, The Fifth Season is it.
This is the way the world ends. . .for the last time.
It starts with the great red rift across the heart of the world's sole continent, spewing ash that blots out the sun. It starts with death, with a murdered son and a missing daughter. It starts with betrayal, and long dormant wounds rising up to fester.
This is the Stillness, a land long familiar with catastrophe, where the power of the earth is wielded as a weapon. And where there is no mercy.
Read the first book in the critically acclaimed, three-time Hugo award-winning trilogy by NYT bestselling author N. K. Jemisin.
"Intricate and extraordinary."—The New York Times
"[The Fifth Season is] an ambitious book, with a shifting point of view, and a protagonist whose full complexity doesn't become apparent till toward the end of the novel. ... Jemisin's work itself is part of a slow but definite change in sci-fi and fantasy."—Guardian
"Astounding... Jemisin maintains a gripping voice and an emotional core that not only carries the story through its complicated setting, but sets things up for even more staggering revelations to come."—NPR Books
"Jemisin's graceful prose and gritty setting provide the perfect backdrop for this fascinating tale of determined characters fighting to save a doomed world."—Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)
"A must-buy...breaks uncharted ground."—Library Journal (starred review)
"Jemisin might just be the best world builder out there right now.... [She] is a master at what she does."
—RT Book Reviews (Top Pick!)
"The Fifth Season is a powerful, epic novel of discovery, pain, and heartbreak.... It is a novel that demands much of its readers; it rewards them aplenty and is one of those novels that becomes more powerful after deep consideration and subsequent readings."—SFF World
"This is an intense, exciting novel, where survival is always on the line, set in a fascinating, original and dangerous world with an intriguing mystery at the heart of it. I can't wait to see what happens in the next book!"—Martha Wells
"Brilliant...gorgeous writing and unexpected plot twists."—Washington Post
"[A]ngrily, beautifully apocalyptic."—B&N.com
"Heartbreaking, wholly unexpected, and technically virtuosic, The Fifth Season is a tour-de-force. I felt every shock--and the book is packed with them--in my marrow. It's no exaggeration to say that Jemisin expands the range of what great fantasy can be."—Brian Staveley, author of The Emperor's Blades
"With every new work, Jemisin's ability to build worlds and break hearts only grows."—Kirkus (starred review)