The traveling through purgatory was a neat concept, and luckily there was a lot of it.

Some annoying gender essentialism, but all in all cool enough that I'm interested in the sequel to see where it goes. ( )

Jo Walton called this "polyamorous alchemical space opera", and she nailed it, though the three-way love story isn't even part of the story, just a casual plot element.

I really love space opera that just flows, and this nails it. Never even a paragraph of plodding exposition or clumsy "As you know, Captain..." monologue. I'm never a fan of worldbuilding without story, so this world gets a doube thumbs up because it is creative and essential to the story. Spaceships travel faster than light through purgatory using the music of the spheres. Ah, you've heard that one before, I'm sure.

Plotwise, there is a slow start where plot possibilities open up, but not happen, are not even foreshadowed, then things start happening, including the Hegemon's elite space marines. Dig it. I could do with more characterization on the rest of the cast, but Silence Leigh is wonderful. No superwoman, just a woman in a man's job (space pilot) marooned in a society where women have no rights. She is no superwoman, just a person.

And the best part? There are two more books.

This isn't in print, but you can find used copies or borrow mine. ( )

I have so many mixed feelings on this novel.

So... context first. I picked it at random off the shelves, and decided to read it because I liked the title. If you look at the cover, note that it shows a blond woman and two men, a ship in the background--that and the blurb make it sounds like a classic space opera type story.

The cover is bullshit. This is a science fantasy space-opera about a religious mageocracy who rule space travel through magic and enforce a highly unequal society, particularly against women (many of them wear veils, and there is a blatant Jewish/Muslim feel to much of the setting.) The title comes from their unique terms for space travel; subspace, or its equivalent, is called "Purgatory" and looks like literal rivers of fire. Maguses draw their power from "hell" and when ships travel via FTL, their speed is measured in increments of "heaven" so "5/12ths of heaven" is the speed that the Sun-Treader ship travels at. (Presumably, getting to 12/12ths of heaven means you're dead, though this was never explicitly confirmed.)

PRetty cool, huh? Not conveyed on the cover.

Also not conveyed on the cover: The woman, Silence Leigh, is explicitly described as very pale with black hair. That, and the setting, makes me think of her as somewhat Asian. But she's been whitewashed, or perhaps just blond-washed, for the cover purposes. It's doubly annoying since her colouring is relevant to the book's cultures (indicative of caste/class). But no, some twat had to make her blonde. God forbid anyone find brunettes attractive *grumble grumble*

Annnyways. Main plot: Silence Leigh is a crack pilot who has been disenfranchised and lost her inheritance, essentially because she is a woman (this is what it boils down to). She comes to an arrangement with two guys; they're gonna sign up for a threeway marriage so they can all get citizenship in this empire they're in. (The empire has a 0 immigration policy, you only get citizenship through marriage or birth; one of the men is a citizen but the other isn't, and a M/M marriage doesn't confer that citizenship but apparently a MMF one does.)

I mean... on the whole, it's really a pretty progressive book in some ways. There's a little bit of internalised misogyny here and there, and some outdated stuff on gender. But this novel was also published in 1986 (I wasn't even born, lol) so *for its time* it was pretty darn good on that front, imo.

One of the more interesting things is that although Silence agrees to this marriage for cynical and monetary reasons, she does actually develop deep, platonic affection for both men. It's not quite a marriage, and for anyone hopeful of a NK Jemisin style 3 way sex scene, you'll be disappointed--no sex in the book--but it's still reasonably well done and enjoyable.

And yet, despite the ideas, ambition, and surprises, I only mark it at three stars >.>

Structurally, the story drags in places. The pacing is odd, the plots meander or else everything happens at once; the novel lacks focus. "Earth was their destiny" says the tagline, but the subject of Earth isn't raised till almost the end. And yes, this is an older book where, I guess, people were happier to accept cliffhanger endings, but I was still frustrated that the novel felt unfinished, as if it cut off right when it was starting to go somewhere. Presumably the sequel is a direct follow-on, though whether I can find it in this house is anyone's guess.

Silence herself is a bit... exasperating. She feels less like a character and more like a lens with which to showcase the ideas and worldbuilding. Her reactions are inconsistent and she behaves in ways which further the plot or stall the plot as required. I found her hard to to relate to. Again, the rules have changed for modern SFF, but ideas alone are not enough to sell me on a book.

For all that it was engaging, and had a kind of refreshing vigour (and I do appreciate space opera written by women, particularly). I am interested enough in those ideas that I'll be keeping an eye out for other books in the series, if I can find them. ( )

This is the first book of the Silence Leigh trilogy, followed in 1986 by Silence in Solitude and in 1987 by The Empress of the Earth. It was later released in a SFBC omnibus edition, The Roads of Heaven. But that’s a pretty naff title for the trilogy, even if it is, well, pretty accurate (it’s also used by the current small press Kindle omnibus). Because in the universe of Five-Twelfths of Heaven, it’s the music of the spheres which allows for interstellar travel. Starship have “harmoniums” (harmonia?) and it is the music they make which drives starships into orbit and pushes them into “purgatory” (ie, hyperspace) at velocities measured in “twelfths of heaven”. Most starships travel at a sixth of heaven, so five-twelfths of heaven is pretty quick. It’s also the speed of the ship, Sun-Treader, whose crew pilot Silence reluctantly joins when she finds herself trapped on a world of the Hegemon after her grandfather dies. Because her grandfather owned the starship she piloted, but her uncle had done a deal with a local merchant so the ship would need to be sold to cover grandfather’s debts and, as a woman, Silence has no legal standing… But Captain Balthasar of Sun-Treader agrees to act as her representative in probate court, and offers her a job afterwards. He needs a female pilot – and female pilots are very rare – because his engineer has fake papers, but if Silence enters into a marriage of convenience with the two of them they can get him proper papers. Polygamy, apparently, is okay, but not same-sex marriage. Silence agrees. Things go reasonably well, but then Balthasar is called to a captains’ meeting of Wrath-of-God, a major pirate combine, and it’s war against the Hegemon. But the attack fails, and Silence and her two husbands are captured by Hegemon forces, and put under geas. Except Silence manages somehow to break the geas – it seems she could well be a magus. And… well, spoilers. Obviously, the main draw of Five-Twelfths of Heaven is the mix of science fiction and magic. It’s cleverly done. FTL is itself a metaphor, and Scott recognises this and chooses to use a metaphor typically not associated with sf instead. It works because she maintains rigour, her magic system has as many rules, and operates as logically, as some made-up “scientific” FTL drive would. Instead of computers churning out numbers, her pilots have to memorise Tarot-like symbolic diagrams. Instead of laws of physics, she writes about notes and chords and dissonances. Different words for the same things. And a good example why you can’t use tropes to differentiate between science fiction and fantasy. If I’d discovered Scott back in the 1980s, I think it likely she’d have become a writer whose work I sought out. She certainly is now. I’m looking forward to reading the rest of this trilogy. ( )

The book took me a while to get into. The plot starts slow, but picks up quickly, and becomes richer and more engaging as the book progresses. Silence Leigh is an interesting character set in an complex world. Most of her world is controlled by a Hegemony, a social system where women are little more than slaves, without rights or power. Into the system comes Silence, who was raised in the Fringe by a grandfather who supported her desire to be a star ship pilot - something unheard of in the Hegemony. In the end, events force her into a marriage of convenience with two men - yes, a triple marriage. The author, Scott, is apparently known for the gender-bending sexuality of her novels. Since this is my first Scott, I can't speak to more of that.
The most interesting part of the Scott's world building is space flight. It took me until nearly the end of the book to figure out the details, but once I did, I find the system fascinating. To fly by music, literally, is creative and intriguing. And then to add it the concept of magus, and their abilities to bend or manipulate reality. It almost has a Star Wars feel - magic and machine, technology and fantasy blended.
I was also pleasantly surprised by how modern it felt - being that is was published in 1985, I expect some dated references but they're weren't any that I could detect. No gold-lamé jumpsuits or green bulbous aliens or laser swords. Scott did an excellent job of creating logical technology and systems that give the story a credible feel.
In the end, while this book isn't a stay-up-into-the-wee-smaws sort of story, I enjoyed it and I'm looking forward to reading the next two. ( )