[taosaur]

I've been on a hiatus from audiobooks, especially since I rejoined the workforce this month, though I'd say the bigger factor has been a litRPG binge on Kindle Unlimited, which has mostly displaced other forms of entertainment for the time being. It took me quite a while to finish Embassytown, and I lost the thread of it for a bit. I had much the same experience as with The City and The City; Mieville's worldbuilding by implication and elision is intoxicating at first, but develops a cloying aftertaste, somewhat rescued by a more concrete finale. I kind of feel like Max Gladstone took what was good in Mieville and ran with it, to much better effect, though Mieville's themes seem to be more about escaping the grip of the magical and the idealized to plant one's feet in a more mundane reality. In hindsight, his whole body of work may be an allegory for substance abuse recovery (though I've only read the two books).

EDIT: And the narrator, Susan Duerden, 100% deserves an honorable mention. The book is riddled with neologisms as well as characters that speak in two voices simultaneously, and it all comes through with remarkable clarity.