Finally I see what people who love Delany have been telling me is here (Triton, the only other long Delany I've read, did not work for me). Lovely mosaic novel, with lots of pieces that come together, but not perfectly, and with pieces missing. Makes you want to discover more. Feels like fantasy but with very few of the usual hallmarks of the genre, but with a distinctive feel of anthropological discovery and nostalgia but-not-totally for the imagined past (or imagined other culture) that I really love. I get the feeling this will improve on reread when trying to remember half-mentioned details and names from previous tales within this work is less of a struggle, but even without that I enjoyed this!