Really moody and atmospheric. Starts with two veterans, one human and one alien “Qitan.” They are sharing drinks at an inn, telling each other stories from the war; the story unfolds from that center like a flower. The stories change and shift; the addictive brew that the Qitan makes is more than it seems; the peace that their planets have reached is more complicated than it pretends to be. There’s also a side story with the human’s estranged son that seems like a distraction at first, but then grows to take over the direction of the story. The book has a lot to say about what makes a community vs an individual, and the tales that we tell each other to make our actions palatable. It’s smooth reading, but the dreamlike pace lacks urgency; the action gets really hard to follow towards the end.