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Shards of Earth by Adrian Tchaikovsky

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Popular In Shards of Earth

Ash
Castigar
Essiel
Hannilambra
Heaven's Sword
Hiver
Naeromathi
Ogdru
Pythoness
The Architects
The Broken Harvest
Tothiat
Transient Component Engine
Trine

Popular Quotes And Their Visualizations

"A bulk like a moon, its near half a crazed mountain range of gleaming crystal spines a hundred kilometres long. The light of Berlenhof’s star touched them and gave back rainbows, cut apart into its constituent frequencies. The dark side of the Architect was a faceted hemisphere, semi-translucent, monstrous suggestions of form all the way down. A machine or a rogue world or a force of nature; no mere human could fathom it."



A vast, moon-like structure with a crystal spine mountain range and a dark, semi-translucent hemisphere, illuminated by starlight, creating rainbows. Illustration of a colossal moon-like structure with crystal spines and rainbow reflections, set against a starlit sky and alien landscape. Image of a colossal, crystalline spherical structure floating above a futuristic cityscape, its surface reflecting rainbow light against a starlit sky. A colossal, moon-like structure with a crystalline, jagged surface reflecting rainbow light, set against the backdrop of space, suggesting its vast, enigmatic nature.

"while a six-armed golden Hiver with a sad metal face"



Illustration of a six-armed golden creature with a metallic, sad face, surrounded by floating golden particles. Digital artwork of a six-armed, golden robotic creature with a somber metallic face, inspired by a book description. A six-armed, golden robotic Hiver with a melancholic metal face, showing wear and age.

"It was three metres tall and walked on two columnar legs, ending in thorned pads with jagged clutches of talons. Most of the front of it was mouth, easily big enough to slurp up any one of them, and it had a dozen tentacles like a beard reaching to the ground, all of them lined with vicious hooks. Its hide was a mottled blue-white that interacted weirdly with the yellow and azure foliage around it, making it leap out one moment, blend in the next. On either side of the mouth there were big circular organs, probably not actually eyes."



A towering creature with a massive mouth and jagged talons stands among vibrant yellow and blue foliage. It has a mottled blue-white hide and tentacles lined with vicious hooks.

"Beyond the walls and the surrounding fields, the native plant life stretched away in clashing shades of yellow and indigo-blue. Those “trees” moved, Solace knew. The fences kept up a modulated electromagnetic babble that repelled the local life, but the forest still made the odd slow rush for the barricades, overwhelming the fences until the farmers retaliated with chainsaws and flamethrowers. Even the trees were at war with people on Jericho."



A surreal landscape features twisting trees amidst vibrant yellow and indigo-blue plants, blending nature's resilience with remnants of human structures, capturing a scene of conflict on Jericho. A vibrant landscape of yellow fields and twisted indigo trees, enclosed by rustic fences, evokes a scene of nature's struggle against human intervention.

"There was a singular mind at the heart of all that crystal, a consciousness as vast as oceans."



A luminous crystal flower spirals towards a bright core, set against a cosmic backdrop of stars and galaxies, embodying the vastness of a singular consciousness.

"It clipped off the Hiver’s leg and a slick of frantic metal insects spilled out like living intestines."



A monstrous tree creature with a gaping mouth looms amidst vibrant pink flowers, while a stream of metal insects spills from its body, evoking the imagery of frantic, living intestines. A towering, gnarled tree looms under a deep orange sky, its roots sprawling across a rocky landscape. A lone figure stands nearby, evoking a sense of mystery and impending transformation.

"It rose up on a frame that was mostly segmented metal tentacles, black ringed with gold at the annular joints."



A robot with segmented metal tentacles, featuring a sleek black design accentuated with gold rings at the joints, stands prominently against a white background. A futuristic creature emerges, featuring segmented metal tentacles with black and gold joints, topped with a sleek, metallic head, all set against a mystical, cloudy background.

"And Idris could see through its senses that the planet was mottled with a kind of rot, a disfiguring decay that the Architect needed to clear away. That rot was thought, the collected minds of all the people living there. They exerted a pressure on the fabric of space that the Architect, for reasons Idris had never grasped, felt the need to release."



A blue-skinned figure with glowing blue eyes and cracked skin radiates a sense of decay and otherworldliness, embodying the rot of collective thought in a dystopian landscape.

"The Architect had launched a couple of its smallest spines into the Heaven’s Sword, inflicting significant but incidental hull damage. Then the spines had begun fragmenting out into… soldiers, Trine had said. Individual mobile units. They had been made of the same crystal as the spines and took on many shapes. Some were humanoid, most were not: many legs, no legs, serpentine, arachnoid, flying ray-forms and other less recognizable things."



A colossal, crystal-like structure looms in a blue-hued landscape, surrounded by various organic forms, both humanoid and bizarre, emerging as soldiers amidst debris. A figure stands amid swirling, crystalline soldiers of various shapes, including serpentine and arachnoid forms, surrounded by an ethereal glow and fragmented light.

"Transient Component Engines? The high-level Essiel stuff—not the toys they give to their underlings. They generate ghost fields in fluids, so that the substrate springs into the shapes they need. Infinitely reconfigurable tech… you need a toaster, it’s a toaster; you need a cutting torch, it’s a cutting torch.”"



A futuristic scene depicting vibrant, glowing appliances like a toaster and a blender, emerging from a central energy source against a backdrop of circuit patterns. A futuristic laboratory scene features a swirling, colorful energy column as scientists observe. The space embodies advanced technology and the concept of infinitely reconfigurable devices. A luminous, abstract installation with floating spheres and intricate designs hovers above a spiraling blue surface, evoking advanced technology and reconfigurable tools in a serene environment.
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Genres Featured In Shards of Earth

Science Fiction (Dominant)
Space Opera (Major)
Adventure (Prominent)
Fantasy (Notable)
Cyberpunk (Sub-Genre)

Themes Featured In Shards of Earth

Identity and Self-Discovery (Significant)
Survival and Resilience (Major)
War and Conflict (Moderate)
Exploration and Discovery (Significant)
The Nature of Humanity (Noticable)
Technology and its Impact (Moderate)
Interconnectedness of Life (Minor)
Redemption and Forgiveness (Noticable)

Tones In Shards of Earth

Intense (Strong)
Mysterious (Moderate)
Melancholic (Noticable)
Hopeful (Mild)
Tense (Very Strong)
Reflective (Noticable)
Dramatic (Strong)
Foreboding (Moderate)

If You Love Shards of Earth You Might Also Enjoy Discovering:

Books: Children of Time Gideon The Ninth The Fifth Season The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers The Space Between Worlds by Micaiah Johnson The Broken Earth Trilogy by N.K. Jemisin A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine Premium Users Get Customized Recommendations

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