From Booklist

The second novel in Zahn's new trilogy is another finely wrought space adventure. Its theme is interstellar war, as a society faces a new, mysterious, insensate, and deadly race--humans. The whole story is told from the viewpoint of the conquerors of the title--the aliens who call themselves the Zhirrzh--as they desperately try to figure out what hit them and to hit back before the humans unleash a rumored superweapon. Matters are further complicated because the Zhirrzh exist in two states, as biological bodies and, after the bodies die, as incorporeal entities called Elders. Both states are involved in every sort of social, political, and emotional complication, all of which Zahn treats with his usual skill. You may wish the characters' names did not contain so many consonants but, otherwise, hardly fault the book. Roland Green

From the Publisher

"This novel takes place from the alien Zhirrzh perspective, as we see the "conquerors" from inside their own culture -- one that believes humans to be the "conquerors without reason." Thrr-gilag and his fellow Alien Specialists face an audience with the Zhirrzh ruling body, the Overclan Seating. The confrontation is politically charged, since a human captive has escaped and the blame falls to Thrr-gilag. But the Zhirrzh race has even greater fears. The information they possess about a Human Conqueror superweapon called Circe makes many Zhirrzh leaders believe they may finally have met an opponent beyond their abilities to withstand. Others have a simple solution: destroy the Human Conquerors and add their worlds to Zhirrzh control.