"He sees the conflict within them: tradition against progress, the known past against the unknown future. They have come so far, as a species; they have the intellect to break from the shackles of yesterday. But it will be hard."

A wonderful bit of chunky science fiction. The story is told from two parallel perspectives: refugees from a dead Earth seeking a new home in the galaxy; and a species of intelligent jumping spiders accidentally uplifted by a botched terraforming project. The main attraction is, of course, the development of an advanced arachnid civilisation, and Tchaikovsky has really put the leg work into figuring out what that might look like. Underpinning it all are musings on artificial intelligence, empathy, and the tensions between tradition and progress.