Um. Wow. This is absolutely brilliant.

I read this courtesy of NetGalley and the publisher; it’s out in February 2026.

Humans have spread through the stars. People die on spaceships, and in accidents, and sometimes lost slow-traveling generation spaceships are found with all crew dead. In those instances, monks of the Starlit Order are often called on, to lay the dead to rest, and to remind the dead that they are one with the Infinite Light. Not everyone believes in the Infinite Light (and the Infinite Light doesn’t care about your belief), but the monks seem to carry out a role that people need. People have always needed closure with death.

Iris is a Starlit monk, and as such has a personal AI in their head – not something that is very well regarded any more. Iris isn’t sure that he’s a very good monk, but he wants to be good at it. He is sent to a newly ‘arrived’ generation ship – sent many generations ago, just now arriving in populated space, and all crew dead. When Iris arrives onboard, however, he is not alone: there’s an archaeological team onboard as well, which just makes everything more difficult. And then things get even MORE difficult, but it’s not the fault of the humans…

I’m tempted to say that this is a little bit gothic – a giant spaceship is kind of like a house, right? I’m not sure whether or not it’s horror; I did not find it scary, although I imagine that if it were a film I would have found it so. Guess it’s a good thing I’m not doing the genre marketing.

No matter the genre, I absolutely adored this book. I love Iris and his inner conflict, although I definitely wanted to scold him at several (many) points and urge him to take better care of himself. I was deeply amused by Iris’ relationship with his AI (VIFAI), as well as occasionally troubled. The archaeologists and engineers are characterised swiftly and beautifully – even the ones who don’t live all that long (spoiler!). The arguments between the different groups were all too believable. And I was utterly intrigued by the eventual reveal of what was going on; it may not be an entirely unique take, but it’s incredibly well done and feels like a really fascinating direction for further exploration.

AND THEN I got to the end and discovered there’s another book in the offing! Truly a wonderful surprise. A.D Sui keeps being one to watch.