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Dec. 23rd, 2009 12:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skygiantsBrothers in Arms has the distinction of being the first of the Vorkosigan books that I had not read before. (Well, unless Ethan of Athos counts. But I think it only half-counts.)
I think my favorite thing about Bujold is her ability to combine high-stakes dramatic tension with super space slapstick - this book contains some of the funniest fight scenes I've read, not to mention a very high pitch of dramatic irony. Converging secret identities! Lies twisting around so far that they actually become true again! I knew about the existence of [spoiler character] from reading A Civil Campaign, so I saw the dramatic irony coming a mile away, but possibly that made it even better. (I also love the bit where Elli Quinn ends up accidentally rescuing Miles based on a complete coincidence.) And after the way the ending of this book plays out, I am now even more curious than I was before to see what happens with [spoiler character] in Mirror Dance and Memory. (Okay, mostly I just really want to see [spoiler character] meet Cordelia.)
I do have to say, though, I found myself twitching at the way that the book casts the Resistance Against An Occupying Power as absolutely, one hundred percent the bad guys. I mean, yes, I get that there are practical reasons why violent resistance does not always work, and also that the whole premise of the series centers on offering the Barrayaran perspective, but . . . it would be really, really nice to have it recognized that the decision to rebel rather than assimilate is an understandable and moral choice. I spent a lot of time closing my eyes and telling myself that this was Miles' biased viewpoint and not Word Of God, but it did not always help. (I also find myself having to do this every time the Vorkosigan books stop to remark on how the hermaphrodites are a bizarre failed experiment of a culture. I love Bel Thorne! He's an awesome character! Why is it then necessary to constantly diss his identity and origins ;_;)
One last comment: David, with his aunt Rebecca, dealing with themes of being from an outsider culture and trying to assimilate and having to change his name and work twice as hard as everyone else to get ahead within the system while facing accusations of thievery and being involved in labyrinthine conspiracies? Three guesses what my mental canon on the Galens is!
I think my favorite thing about Bujold is her ability to combine high-stakes dramatic tension with super space slapstick - this book contains some of the funniest fight scenes I've read, not to mention a very high pitch of dramatic irony. Converging secret identities! Lies twisting around so far that they actually become true again! I knew about the existence of [spoiler character] from reading A Civil Campaign, so I saw the dramatic irony coming a mile away, but possibly that made it even better. (I also love the bit where Elli Quinn ends up accidentally rescuing Miles based on a complete coincidence.) And after the way the ending of this book plays out, I am now even more curious than I was before to see what happens with [spoiler character] in Mirror Dance and Memory. (Okay, mostly I just really want to see [spoiler character] meet Cordelia.)
I do have to say, though, I found myself twitching at the way that the book casts the Resistance Against An Occupying Power as absolutely, one hundred percent the bad guys. I mean, yes, I get that there are practical reasons why violent resistance does not always work, and also that the whole premise of the series centers on offering the Barrayaran perspective, but . . . it would be really, really nice to have it recognized that the decision to rebel rather than assimilate is an understandable and moral choice. I spent a lot of time closing my eyes and telling myself that this was Miles' biased viewpoint and not Word Of God, but it did not always help. (I also find myself having to do this every time the Vorkosigan books stop to remark on how the hermaphrodites are a bizarre failed experiment of a culture. I love Bel Thorne! He's an awesome character! Why is it then necessary to constantly diss his identity and origins ;_;)
One last comment: David, with his aunt Rebecca, dealing with themes of being from an outsider culture and trying to assimilate and having to change his name and work twice as hard as everyone else to get ahead within the system while facing accusations of thievery and being involved in labyrinthine conspiracies? Three guesses what my mental canon on the Galens is!
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Date: 2009-12-24 01:25 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-12-25 03:30 pm (UTC)One of the rare few who can sit through several minutes of Miles at his most brilliantly manipulative and then go, "Uh huh. So what are you really up to?"
Of course, then poor Ivan gets suckered into the scheme anyway, somehow, but then nobody's perfect. =)
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Date: 2009-12-25 04:52 pm (UTC)