(no subject)

[skygiants]

Before I read the Young Miles omnibus this weekend I was convinced that I hadn't read The Vor Game before . . . but, um, that turned out to be a lie! It seems that I have in fact read all of Young Miles before, because I remembered almost everything about the Kyril Island bit, and apparently I just managed to completely and utterly blank out the second half of the plot of The Vor Game to the point where none of it when described to me rang any bells at all.

Anyway, some brief thoughts on what, it turns out, is a complete reread of Miles Vorkosigan's early, hyperactive years:

- Gregor never stuck in my head much before as a character, but despite several acts of idiocy, he really grew on me this time! I think it is an automatic fondness for characters whose main descriptor is 'glum'; I found myself just wanting to pat Gregor on the head and introduce him to Eeyore, Puddleglum and Marvin the Paranoid Android for a tea party.

- Ivan remains my favorite from the beginning, but it is very interesting to watch him growing on everyone else after being initially introduced as highly unsympathetic.

- The much-invoked concept of 'forward momentum' is also a good way to describe the zippity readability of the prose in the series. I always zoom through the books much more compulsively than I expect to.

- I like Tung, but - and I might not have noticed this if I hadn't been reading with an extra eye out for race stuff due to recent incidents - it disturbs me that he is constantly referred to as 'the Eurasian' like he is the only one in existence. (And as far as I can tell, in this universe, he is . . .)

Comments

[ceitfianna]

Oh that's one of my favorites of the Vorkosignan's just because I love the interaction and relationships between Miles and Gregor and Ivan.

Gregor really became one of my favorites in The Vor Game and it held up through the other books and I think one of the best descriptions of him is from Memory, "He would be shy if he could be."

[skygiants]

I liked it too, and better than Warrior's Apprentice, I think, so I'm still not quite sure how I managed to literally forget I ever read half the plot . . .

Gregor's one of rymenhild's favorites, and I am starting to understand why. I think I just never really had a clear impression of him in my head before. (The book that made the strongest impression the first time around is A Civil Campaign, which has much more Miles and Ivan than Gregor.)

[ceitfianna]

A Civil Campaign is one of those wonderfully lasting books, I've bought it twice when I saw it and went oh I want to read it again. I think Gregor's best in Vor Game and Memory because you see two parts of him, as he takes on the mantle of being Emperor and when he's made it suit him.

Luckily I have a copy of Young Miles so I can do some rereading after I finish The Abhorsen Chronicles. Oh and Conrad's Fate was just as wonderful as I remembered, he has a wonderful matter of fact voice along with being quite perceptive.

[rahkan.livejournal.com]

There are weirdly stereotypical warriors from Kshatriya in the background, too. Yay for us being in the future!

Also Cavilo's some flavor of Asian as well.

[skygiants]

Is she? She was using a vaguely Asian name at first, but given that Bujold seems to telegraph race pretty loudly when she puts it in, and she doesn't in Cavilo's case, I figured that the name was just there to (consciously or unconsciously) invoke the Dragon Lady stereotype. Though either way that's problematic, really.

[rahkan.livejournal.com]

I mean, she slips in some ethnic stuff with the four peoples / languages of Barrayar. Like some are Greek (vorhalas), some are russian (Vorpatril), some are...something else.

[skygiants]

Yeah, there's some Greek stuff going on in Vor Game - most of the soldiers that are in the semi-mutiny thing are Greek-speaking, and it is a Political Issue, which is interesting. I think there is also a French-speaking contingent? Though I could be making that up.

[genarti]

You are not; there is indeed a French-speaking contingent. And... something else um. I forget what the fourth is, although I think it's broadly European too. (Unless I'm mistaken, which I could be.)

[rymenhild.livejournal.com]

Okay, I am commenting to this comment almost a year late, but I think the fourth language of Barrayar might be the local and very late equivalent of English -- in any case, the lingua franca of the rest of the galaxy.