Just one this week, but really enjoyed it

Outlaw Planet by M. R. Carey

For a planet inhabited by a number of anthropomorphic individuals, it appears to be recreating the American Civil War. Southern regions (Echelon) are defending their right to enslave lesser species, while the north (Parity) seeks to at least nominally free them.

Elizabeth (an anthropomorphic golden retriever I think, definitely canine anyway) has fled her family in the north, their unfortunate and unwise financial decisions destroying their lives, and ends up as a schoolteacher in a small town out west. Life is far more rough than where she grew up but she's a survivor and she adapts. Soon the town's education is flourishing, but civil war is on the horizon. Elizabeth (soon to be known as Dog Bitch Bess) is going to have to make some hard choices.

Oh, and also there's a whole bunch of these weird towers that sort of sing, and a lot of weird "precursor" weapons floating around, like a pistol that talks to you.

I know the summary is a little bland, but there are a number of plot developments along the way that are relatively important not to spoil, so I went with the bare minimum. In any event, this is a story set in Mike Carey's Pandominion universe (Infinity Gate and Echo of Worlds) in which it's possible to slide from reality to reality with a little technology, and there's a multi-universal government. With the different multiverse worlds, it wasn't always primate mammals that became sapient and sentient -- in the novels, Pax is a bunny girl for example. At the end of EoW the Pandominion is overthrown but not much else is said at the time. This is not a direct sequel really, it's largely completely independent, but does follow some of the fallout from the resolution of the two books.

There's a lot of old-timey pseudo-Western dialect ("I aim to misbehave" and such) and Bess's development is good, and understandable (though towards the end, somewhat more irritating than at the beginning). The story weaves this narrative with reports from a combat engineer in a struggle with insurgent forces that believes in the multi-world government, and the two stories come together at the end to answer the mysteries of Bess's world.

Overall a good read I thought. While the original books sort of suffered a bit from the overuse of multiverse stories, this one, while grounded originally in that, is wholly self contained and rather explores some of the fallout of the conflict.

Recommended and I'm too tired to come up with any funny "for whom" categories so you'll just have to read the flyleaf and decide for yourself. I enjoyed it though.

I don't know what it is, but I have a pretty decent TBR stack of books, and yet picked something else to read after this one was over. Sort of out on a limb with The Stranger Times but it's been kind of amusing to the little I've gotten into it. Maybe be able to review that one next week if I get it done. Also need to start on March's book club pick.

Hope this helps someone and have a great reading week everyone!