Mission of Honor, by David Weber

Today I'm looking at the twelfth, count them, twelfth book in the Honor Harrington series. And this is just the main series, this doesn't include the side books and short stories where additional plot has been going on. (More on that later.) But since this is the twelfth book the following obligatory statement must be made.

Dear and gentle readers, it is basically impossible for me to talk coherently about this book without going into spoilers. If you wish to avoid spoilers about this book or series please cease to read at this point. Thank you for your patience. 

At the end of the last book Queen Elizabeth III sent Honor and Eighth Fleet on a mission to the planet Haven to negotiate a peace treaty with the Republic of Haven, hopefully to end the war that's been going on for two decades and has effectively broken both nations after the casualties of the Battle of Manticore. Hence the title, Mission of Honor. However, there are a lot of other things going on in this book and ultimately leads to a fundamental shift in the narrative of the series so far and how it's going to play out in the other books.

As I've mentioned, there have been other plotlines developing in supplemental books to this series, books which I really wish I'd taken the time to read at this point. As I've always said, I'm of two opinions on having a plotline spread and grow from just one medium into a multi-medium series. In this case it's intertwined book series, but another example I could use is the Marvel cinematic universe where TV shows like Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. are starting to cross over with each other (and possibly other series as well). Or like the current Star Wars universe which is growing to be very much like the old Expanded Universe they were trying to avoid where films, tv shows, books, comics, and video games are all interconnected. On the one hand, I can see how cool having a story that arcs across multiple forms of media can be and the potential it has. There are simply stories that you can tell better with a book or a tv show than you can with a two or three hour movie and connecting them together can be really neat.

On the other hand, it makes it all the more difficult to track down all the plot threads and fully understand what's going on. It can also make the universe difficult or intimidating for newcomers to delve into, leaving only a gradually diminishing fanbase. And this is exactly the reason why I never was able to get into traditional superhero comics either. Inevitably every time I would try to start reading comics, there would be cross overs or plot events with other books that you'd have to hunt down and investigate. I personally found it very difficult to get into superhero comics as a result. Obviously this doesn't pose a problem to the huge audience of superhero comic fans, but I think it's a valid concern.

Now I will start by saying that I liked this book. There were things that I enjoyed quite a bit, even if they were loudly telegraphed and I could predict where the plot twists were going to go because Weber so neatly laid them out that even a blind person could follow them. So while this book didn't have any real surprises, I still had a very emotional reaction to this book. And so I think that's a good thing. Unfortunately I gave this book a poor rating on GoodReads simply because I think Weber's gotten to a point where he's thinking, ''Okay, where the heck do I take the series from here?'' And some of the things we're supposed to accept as plausible are a little...extreme.

As I may have mentioned in previous books, the organization known as Manpower which specializes in the genetic slave trade has started popping up, so they're not exactly coming out of the blue. And we've known that they've been stirring the pot and hatching evil schemes for a while now so I can see them influencing certain events for their own advantage. Especially since they intend to create some sort of genetic caste system across the galaxy in a next step of human evolution. The problem I have is that this plan by Manpower/Mesa is a centuries-long plan and apparently these guys have been responsible for pushing both Manticore and Haven towards war for the past seventy to a hundred years. And nobody outside the conspiracy has gotten wise to this plot until the events of this book when people working for Manpower decide to defect.

Obviously this is a work of fiction. With interstellar travel, psychic cats, laser weapons, life prolonging technology, and a variety of other incredibly difficult or impossible things in it. A massive, centuries-long conspiracy involving thousands, if not millions of people should not be all that strange. Except everything that I know about human nature makes me doubt that a conspiracy that big going on for that long could possibly have been going on in the dark. I mean, we have mathematical formulas at this point showing it's basically impossible to keep a conspiracy from being blown if more than a handful of people are involved. So as much as I hate to say it, suggesting that a massive organization of genetic superpeople have been manipulating entire galactic governments from the shadows for centuries just strains credulity. I know, I know. Fiction with interstellar travel and psychic cats, but for whatever reason I'm still stuck up on this point.

I also feel like this diminishes the series on another level. When this series began it was the conflict between the People's Republic of Haven and the Star Kingdom of Manticore. The People's Republic (which was a libertarian's nightmare of a corrupt, bloated welfare state), needed a source of income to prop up their social programs and Manticore with its lucrative wormhole junction was an obvious target. Manticore, of course, did not want to be annexed so warfare was inevitable. And I felt like this was a believable premise, especially with the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars but in Space angle. And it was believable that a well-meaning government like the People's Republic of Haven could establish a robust welfare system, resulting in massive government deficits, and resulting in them looking to territorial conquest as a means to keep cash and resources flowing in the system, with empire eventually becoming something of a bad habit. It was believable, and there were people on both sides we disliked and people we liked.

Except now we're expected to believe that the conflict between the People's Republic of Haven and Manticore was the result of interference by the Manpower faction. They're the ones that turned the noble Republic of Haven into the despicable welfare state People's Republic of Haven (have I mentioned Weber seems to have a libertarian leaning?). Manpower was responsible for the Peep solution of annexing other star nations to fill the coffers to support the welfare state. And because the Peeps and Manties were the two powers most vocally against the genetic slave trade, Manpower decided it needed to take both of them out. You know...in a couple of centuries. (And as a side note, now that I think about it, I'm kind of surprised Manpower didn't try to corrupt either or both of the star nations into changing their stance on genetic slavery. That seems like it would have been easier.) So now the reason bad things happen hasn't been because people were just people, it's because there was a conspiracy of bad people behind everything. Ultimately people are selfish, short-sighted, petty, and a variety of other negative traits which make us not the best at planning things in advance. Bad things happen because people are, at the end of the day, people and we don't always make the best decisions. But now we have a bad guy, someone with obviously evil intentions, and we get to pin everything on them. It just feels dishonest somehow.

Another way Weber kind of got to ''what can I blow up next'' is what he did to Manticore's industrial infrastructure, basically blowing it to smithereens through a surprise attack by Manpower using new, mysterious, undetectable superweapons. It kills several million more people and trashes Manticore's industry and economy, effectively knocking them out of the war until they can get missile and ship production back up and running. Something which promises to be an extremely difficult task. I feel like Weber was looking for a way to both up the stakes and further force Manticore and Haven into an alliance of necessity. And for me it just feels like too much.

So, all this being said, I have mixed feelings about this book. There are a lot of things that I enjoyed, but there are a lot of issues that I had as well. I'm going to continue with this series because I am interested in where it's going, but I suspect it's not going to be the same series that it began as.

- Kalpar

We Few, by David Weber and John Ringo

Today I'm wrapping up the Empire of Man series with the final novel, We Few. The result for this book, and I guess for this series overall, is actually a bit of a disappointment. The biggest thing I'm left feeling is that Ringo and Weber had much bigger plans for this series beyond just the four fairly long books, but for whatever reason they kept the series at just four novels and didn't bother to expand it from there. Maybe they had other projects to work on. Maybe Baen decided it wasn't interested in continuing the series, I don't know. But I'm left feeling like the story Weber and Ringo wanted to tell wasn't completed and we got only a fraction of what we could have.

Warning: Mild Spoilers Ahead

Towards the end of the last book, March to the Stars, we discovered that Prince Roger's mother, Empress Alexandra, had been captured by a coup orchestrated in part by Roger's father, the Earl of New Madrid, and the naval minister Prinz Jackson . Roger and the survivors of Bravo Company, Bronze Battalion, have been declared traitors and are officially wanted people throughout Imperial space. Unofficially rumors of the drugs, torture, and rape that New Madrid and Jackson have been using to control Empress Alexandra has been leaking out of the palace and some people are beginning to think maybe Roger wasn't behind the coup after all. When Roger and the survivors of Bravo Company manage to get back to civilized territory they find plenty of allies ready to help them in a daring plan to rescue the Empress and save the Empire.

Plot-wise I actually liked the idea Weber and Ringo managed to come up with for this book. The best plan Roger's staff is able to come up with is that they start up a Mardukan-themed restaurant in Imperial City as an advanced base of operations and a front for the importation of money and equipment for their raid on the Imperial Palace. Most of the battles the heroes have gone through before have been straight-up fights, massive set piece battles with hundreds or thousands of casualties. Seeing Roger and company work on doing a covert operation with a bunch of green, three-meter tall, four armed aliens is different enough to be really interesting. So for that I give it plenty of credit.

On the down side, there is some stuff that is either terribly dull, or stuff that's left out entirely. Some major space naval battles are part of this book, which I'm all for, but Weber goes into the numbering the missiles the ships launch in a salvo, describing how many get defeated by counter-missiles, how many get stopped by point-defense, and then how many manage to get through and strike hits. This is something I've been noticing a lot recently in the Honor Harrington books and it honestly feels like so much padding. I really didn't want to know the exact number of missiles utilized. You say it's fifty thousand? Great. That sounds like a lot. And then we have descriptions of vectors and time lag from transmissions and so on which is very pretty and I'm sure all manner of accurate, but it really takes away from the story.

Another thing that bugs me is the loose ends left at the end of this book, specifically Prinz Jackson and the Saints. From the first book we've had the Saints described as antagonists, but at a larger scale than what Bravo Company was going through. For the last three books the main enemy Bravo company was fighting was the environment of Marduk itself and the natives. The Saints actually appear in the first and third book to be enemies but aside from some mentions about how they're evil enviro-hippies and enemies of the Empire, that's about it. It's almost outright stated that a conflict between the Saints and the Empire is extremely probable in the near future and presumably some of the events of these books would move the two factions closer to war. But instead, Bravo Company and the Empire are dealing with the issue of a civil war at home. By the end of the book the issues with the Saints still have not been resolved or for that matter even addressed so it almost becomes a question of why were the Saints included at all in the series?

The other thread at the end was the escape of Prinz Jackson, the mastermind of the coup against Empress Alexandra. With Jackson safely out of the Sol system and calling as many admirals loyal to him as he can, the Empire is definitely in a state of civil war. With the Saints eager to snap up territory while the Empire is occupied, it's clear that this civil war needs to be resolved quickly and decisively if the Empire is going to survive at all. And we see the start of it when Roger leads the assault on the Imperial Palace to rescue his mother as well as the division within Home Fleet's forces between those loyal to Alexandra and those loyal to Jackson. But otherwise the war is left incomplete. The start of the book has a brief historical passage on Roger who becomes known as Roger the Terrible so presumably he manages to quash Jackson's rebellion, but we're left with so much to be done and so much unexplored.

There are a few minor things as well, but that's kind of niggling over details compared to the big stuff. These books have left me feeling like Weber and Ringo had plans for a huge, complicated world as deep and interesting as that of the Honor Harrington series. Instead we only catch glimpses of this world in a time period spanning not much more than a year. Maybe this was their intention, but it makes me feel like Roger's story is incomplete more than anything else. And so this series is, ultimately, kind of a disappointment.

- Kalpar

March to the Stars, by David Weber and John Ringo

Today I'm looking at March to the Stars, the third book in the Empire of Man series by David Weber and John Ringo where Prince Roger and the survivors of Bravo Company manage to finally reach the spaceport with their band of Mardukan allies and start working on getting off of Marduk and back to Terra. I had expected this book to be a bit of a finale but it introduces some new plot threads and leaves a lot of things hanging which I presume will be wrapped up in We Few, the final book of the series. My opinion of this book is mixed for a number of reasons which I'll go into more detail.

In the broadest strokes, this book is really more of what we've seen before, just the details have changed. Roger and company arrive at a location on Marduk, there is some sort of obstacle in their way, usually a conflict among groups of Mardukans, and to continue on their way Roger and the marines have to fight their way through, leaving plenty of casualties behind them. Only in this case, they cross an ocean on ships, run into a sentient-sacrificing and cannibalism state religion, ally with some barbarians to fight the crazy religious nuts, opposed to last time when they joined up with the religious nuts to fight the barbarians, and finally, finally get to the space port.

I'll start with what I liked about the book, which is the pulp sci-fi action. As I've openly admitted plenty of times here on the blog, I am perfectly happy with the most ridiculous,  pulpy, sci-fi action you can conjure up for me. Spaceships, robot tanks, plasma weapons, I love the heck out of that stuff. And Weber and Ringo can write pulp sci-fi action. That's something they know how to do. So the result is good. And if you like the pulp stuff like I do, Weber and Ringo are good guys to go get your supply from and I highly recommend it. So that's the good part.

The bad part about the book is not one specific thing, it's a lot of little things that add up to some concerns on my part. The biggest was how everyone apparently couldn't figure out that the fire priests were sacrificing people and then eating them. (Granted, I didn't put together the eating people part, but I got the sacrificing people.) This is something that Weber and Ringo telegraphed pretty heavily with a lot of evidence. For example:

1. The fire priests hold their ceremonies in secret, so the marines aren't told what's going on. Pretty suspicious from the get-go.
2. Everyone in the city refuses to talk about the religion and getting any information beyond there being a fire god is basically impossible.
3. During the religious ceremonies, everyone notices the smell of cooking meat, which means some sort of meat is being put on the fire, however, everyone also notices a lack of any livestock animals in the city at any point. The meat must be coming from somewhere but there are no animals to provide it.
4. One of the only things the marines can learn about the religion is that there are servants of the fire god who are called to the temple for religious ceremonies, but the marines don't see a lot of the servants around the city.
5. Most people emphatically do not want to be servants of the fire god.
6. The city of the fire priests heavily engages in slavery, with a nearly constant demand for slaves despite no apparent labor shortage in the city.

I found myself screaming at the characters, ''THEY'RE SACRIFICING PEOPLE! HOW ARE YOU NOT PUTTING THIS TOGETHER?'' I literally went and asked several other people about this and all of them managed to connect the dots like I did. But for the characters in the book have to reboot their translation software to realize that servants of the fire god are actually sacrifices. Like, did they not think it might have been a euphemism? And the team actually has a historian/anthropologist/sociologist with them so she out of anybody should have been able to figure out what the heck was going on.

But that wasn't the only example. At one point in the book Roger makes a statement along the lines that when they get back home he intends to ask his mother to make him Duke of Marduk so he can rule the planet and help shepherd the Mardukans to civilization. It's a one-off line and Weber and Ringo spend basically no time talking about it after that, but it's very concerning to me personally because it feels incredibly tone deaf. We have Roger, a white man with blond hair and green eyes so he's super Aryan, making plans to bring the benefits of civilization to a backwards planet. The problem I have with this is it basically sounds like an argument for colonialism and imperialism.

Without going into a super lengthy explanation, during the height of colonialism in the nineteenth century European nations said it was their duty to bring the benefits of civilization to the ''backwards'', ''primitive'', and ''savage'' peoples, lifting them up to where they could govern themselves. In actuality, the European nations and states like Japan and the United States were just interested in extracting resources from their colonies and any infrastructure they established in their colonies were for the benefit of white colonials and/or the extraction of resources from the colonies. It is widely argued that colonialism and imperialism were not benevolent attempts to spread civilization but calculated moves to expand markets, resources, and power. So to have a white man in a sci-fi book say he plans to ''civilize'' the ''savages'' of Marduk smacks very heavily of colonialism. I don't think Weber and Ringo meant for this to be as tone deaf as I ended up taking it, but it's rather distressing to say the least.

There are a lot of other little issues like this but I'll end with retaking the spaceport towards the end of the book. It's revealed that the imperial colonial governor is not only corrupt but also incompetent and has left secret passages through the defenses around the spaceport so his messengers and smugglers can get in and out. Furthermore an imperial agent has infiltrated his staff and basically knows everything that's going on in the spaceport and is able to give information to the marines, as well as much-needed supplies. As a result, the spaceport, which has been this final goal the team has been working towards and has promised to be this super hard nut to crack at the end of the journey, ends up being a cakewalk. The marines walk through the holes in the defenses, take out the incredibly incompetent guards, capture the governor, and retake the port. It just feels like a massive anticlimax compared to how much Roger and Bravo Company have had to fight through just to get to this final challenge. I feel like Weber and Ringo built it up to be this huge challenge and it ends up being nothing. Of course, we then get with the whammy of a coup attempt back on Terra and now it becomes critically vital for Roger and company to get back to earth and rescue his mother.

Overall this book is okay. There isn't one major thing that is wrong with the book, but there are a lot of little things that add up and significantly detract from the book. In addition there are the classic Weber exposition dumps which can get a little tedious after a while, but I've grown to be used to those at least. If you like pulp sci-fi action, I'm sure you'll enjoy this, but I don't know if this is really the best pulp sci-fi I've read because of all the little issues.

- Kalpar

March to the Sea, by David Weber & John Ringo

Today I'm looking at the second book in the Empire of Man series, March to the Sea, which follows Prince Roger and the dwindling survivors of his marine bodyguard as they cross a mountain range and make the long trek towards the ocean, where hopefully they can get passage on ships that will take them to the continent with Marduk's only spaceport and get Roger safely back to Terra. However, since nothing else about this trip has gone smoothly it should be no surprise that this portion of their journey is fraught with difficulty as well.

On the other side of the mountains the Bronze Battalion discovers that a collection of nomadic tribes called the Boman have joined together into a mighty warhost and are systematically destroying every city as part of a campaign of revenge against the despot of Sindi. If they're going to get to the ocean, they're going to have to pass right through the ongoing Boman invasion. And if they want help crossing the ocean, they're going to have to save the cities targeted by the Boman as well.

I think my biggest complaint about this book is it really could have been divided into two separate books, and I'm actually a little surprised that it wasn't. There are two distinct halves to the book which are honestly the same storyline repeated, at least in very broad terms. In both books the marines arrive at a city-state which is under imminent attack by the Boman and they are utterly unprepared to defend themselves. The marines agree to help train an army for the city-states in exchange for help in getting to their final objective of the starport. Racing against time, the marines introduce new military technologies to the Mardukans and manage to create semi-professional armies. They then engage the Boman and through a combination of their newly trained and equipped allies, as well as the marines' insanely advanced technology, they manage to win a crushing victory against the Boman. Perhaps at great cost, but the Boman shall bother the people of the city-states no more.

So I honestly feel that this could have been split into two books instead of being crammed into one because it feels like the book repeats itself. Although that might not have been a good thing because then you'd have two books that would be very similar instead of one book with similar halves. I just kind of wish that Weber and Ringo had managed to come up with a slightly, slightly different storyline for one half of their book instead. I did find it really boring when the marines were complaining about supply bottlenecks, again, which were preventing them from getting the troop mix they really wanted.

I'm tempted to go into the politics of this book but I'm hesitant for a few reasons. First, it's not really a major part of the book. Most of the book is spent talking about the problems training and equipping an army in a short amount of time and then fighting the Boman. When the characters comment on the political structures of Mardukan societies it's usually little more beyond, ''Theocracies don't like change.'' or ''Our constitutional monarchy is great.'' So it's not like it's even a full argument for me to analyze, refute, or support. Plus, I'm trying to not complain about books having politics I don't like because while I may not like the politics, the author has every right to put them in there. I may disagree, but the book can still have redeeming qualities.

And it's the same with the pro-imperialism argument made by Roger. He says that some people think humanity shouldn't interfere with alien planets that haven't developed interstellar flight because it could affect their culture and identity. Roger counters by saying that the Empire of Man has lots of benefits to bring alien races like the Mardukans who are at a lower technology level. He specifically mentions ending malnutrition and bringing adequate dental care just as examples, but the benefits could be even greater. The humans of course also introduce pike warfare, breech-loading rifles and artillery, and new tactics which revolutionize warfare on Marduk.

Honestly, this is a really complicated question and if any of the dozens of episodes of Star Trek with the Prime Directive are any indication, it's not an easy one. Everyone seems perfectly fine with not mucking about with pre-warp technology civilizations in the abstract and it certainly seems like a fine idea, but when it comes down to the specific people have a really hard time letting a species die because of a supervolcano eruption which they can easily prevent with some graviton particle beams or what have you. So obviously there is some good to be had by bringing the benefits of advanced technology to less developed areas. Even on our own planet I think it's safe to say people across the globe benefit from modern dentistry regardless of where they are, just to stick with the dental example.

But I think we need to also recognize that there are also disadvantages which we may still not be able to fully understand. And we can look at our own history when Europeans came in contact with native peoples in the Americas and Australia. The Europeans brought steel, firearms, livestock, new methods of agriculture, printing presses, just to name a few of the technologies. However contact with Europeans also introduced disease and alcohol, economic exploitation of native peoples and their land, war, social and economic marginalization, attempts at cultural destruction, and a situation where life is still pretty bad for a lot of native people into the twenty-first century. And considering the marines are mostly introducing military technologies which promise to dramatically shift the balance of power on Marduk, I'm hesitant to say this is entirely a good thing.

Unfortunately Weber and Ringo never really get into a detailed exploration of these issues. It's really mentioned once and dropped once again. But I feel like this is still important enough that once it's been brought up we really can't ignore it. Maybe the other two books will be able to go into more detail about these questions, but that remains to be seen.

As military sci-fi fiction I think this is pretty good, especially if you put aside some of the moral questions for a minute anyway. It does get really repetitive because it's the same plot recycled twice in the same book, more or less, but there are lots of good moments.

- Kalpar

At All Costs, by David Weber

Today I'm looking at the eleventh book in the Honor Harrington series, At All Costs. As with a lot of the other books as I've progressed through the series, this book is considerably longer and I think part of it is simply bloat. I found at least a few examples of stuff thrown into the book which probably could have been left out or trimmed down without losing too much of the book. There's also more of the subplots from elsewhere in the Honorverse getting woven into the main story and I'm suspecting I probably should have gone to read those side stories as well because they're starting to seriously affect the main storyline. I remember when Mesa and Manpower had first been introduced to me, having just read the main Honor Harrington books and it felt a little out of nowhere that there was this whole additional plotline.

With as long and occasionally bloated as this book feels, though, this book spends a lot of time making things happen. Which isn't to say that the other books didn't have major events, but I feel like this was a major turning point in the series because the Maticore-Haven conflict is getting resolved while the Manpower and Solar League plotlines are becoming more important. I'll have to see if my feelings about the series are right as I continue.

Usual warning to my kind and gentle readers. I will try to discuss the book in as spoiler-free a manner as possible, but as I'm eleven books in it's difficult to talk about a book intelligently without mentioning some spoilers. If you wish to avoid them please leave now. 

One of the things I was honestly a little on the fence about was the awesome space battles. I think this book, more than any other in the series, has had the most space battles in it. And that's part of why I was all for this series in the first place. Give me a bunch of ships with missiles and lasers and I'll be pretty darn happy. Unfortunately, the space battles in this book start getting really repetitive after a while. I noticed in particular that Dave has this really bad habit of going through the number of missiles in a salvo, which bloats his description of the battle by a considerable amount. Seriously, a lot of the battles include a passage where Dave says, ''The Manticorans launched so many thousands of missiles. This number of them were decoys. This number of them were recon pods. But this many were live warheads. Haven countermissiles took out this many. Point defense took out this many. This number lost target lock and wandered off. This many missed. And this many hit the enemy ships. And then the enemy ship exploded.''

Like, I appreciate that he's going through the effort of making the battles as detailed and realistic as possible, but at the same time I really didn't want to hear Dave prattle off a bunch of numbers as well. And this happens at least three or four times in the book, possibly more because I honestly lost count. The result was it made the battles feel a lot longer and a lot less interesting to me, which I thought was a shame because it was the space battles that had me interested in the book in the first place.

As I said, there are also major plot developments in the rest of the book. For example there's the Manticore-Haven war which starts up again, then heads towards another peace negotiation, and then turns into a shooting war again and after the events of this book, I suspect they'll have no choice but to agree to a ceasefire, but it's hard to say. And, as I mentioned, there's the plot involving Manpower and how they apparently are involved much deeper than anyone would expect.

I do wish that the Manpower plot had been introduced and expanded on more in the main books. I'm sure I can go hunt down the supplemental books to find out about the genetic slave trade, all the horrors involved with it, and the grand galactic schemes the board of Manpower has going on, but since it's affecting these books I wish I'd had more of an introduction.

Otherwise, I think this book was pretty good. The series is definitely different from when I started with On Basilisk Station, but I'm still enjoying the series and eager to continue reading it.

- Kalpar

March Upcountry, by David Weber and John Ringo

Today I'm looking at the first book in a series co-written by David Weber and John Ringo. If you've spent any time at all looking at my blog, you're probably aware that I've spent a lot of time reading Weber's books. Specifically anything related to the Bolo franchise he's written, and a significant number of the Honor Harrington books. I have a little bit of experience with John Ringo as well, since he wrote Road to Damascus, one of the Bolo books which I had mixed feelings about. But since I could get this book for free from the library, I figured it was worth at least the time to check it out and see if it was any good.

March Upcountry is the first in the Empire of Man series, which I presume follows the adventures of Prince Roger MacClintock. Roger is third in line to the throne and will eventually be replaced in the line of succession by the children of his older siblings, so he's always been superfluous to requirements for the royal family. As a result, Roger has grown up to be a spoiled dandy, more obsessed with his good looks and clothing than anything particularly useful. Much to Roger's dismay his mother sends him on a diplomatic mission to a backwater planet of the empire, mostly to get him out from underfoot. But an assassination attempt on Roger's ship results in Roger and a company of his bodyguards being stranded on an even more remote planet, Marduk.

Marduk is only barely part of the Empire, most of the planet being covered by dense jungles filled with populations of hostile indigenous aliens. To make matters worse, the Saints, environmental extremists and enemies of the Empire, have sent a fleet into the system, which means Roger and Bravo Company of the Bronze Battalion have to land secretly on the surface of Marduk, and somehow manage to trek overland to the tiny space port to call for rescue.

This book is mostly about the challenges Bravo Company faces trying to survive on Marduk and make its way halfway across the planet to get to the spaceport, and Roger's growth from a spoiled dandy into a responsible and capable military officer. Both plots are pretty interesting and handled competently, so I have nothing to complain about there. Having read a ton of military sci-fi including the always diverse Warhammer 40k universe, I'm pretty familiar with both of these plots but I at least enjoyed them. I do kind of wish, considering how darn long this particular book was, that they had gotten Roger and Bravo Company off of Marduk at the end of the book, rather than leaving them only partway to their first goal. I'm just not sure how much more different the second book can be since they'll still be making their way through the jungle, trying to get to the spaceport.

There are some signs that this is definitely Weber and Ringo's work, if only because the native fauna on Marduk has six limbs each. (Dave seems to really like giving creatures six limbs.) And the space combat felt almost like I was listening to an Honor Harrington book. Since I was actually reading an Honor Harrington book at the same time it got more than a little confusing for me because I had to remember which book I was reading!

Plus there's also the Saints who I'm sure will become more important in later books in the series but had at best a cameo in this book. The Saints are extremely militant environmentalists who are pretty much a combination of the worst parts of the People's Republic of Haven in Honor Harrington, and the bad guys in Ringo's Road to Damascus. Apparently they have chaplains whose goal is to minimize harm to the environment and override a spaceship captain's decision if it would cause too much harm. Also the Saints apparently have worlds they've actively been de-terraforming and basically run them as slave labor camps where starving political prisoners attack dandelions with wooden tools. I just feel that they're almost too cartoonishly villainous to be taken seriously, especially considering Ringo's pronounced conservative streak and Weber's strong pro-military and vaguely libertarian streak as well.

On the flip side, the protagonists definitely influence the development of several indigenous cultures on Marduk and give them access to pieces of advanced technology. The characters also mention bringing sociological adjustment teams and more advanced technology to Marduk to help integrate the native population into the empire. This is seen as a good thing but I'm not entirely sure that it is. On the one hand, there are definite benefits to bringing advanced technologies, especially medicine, to areas without as great a technological base to improve the local quality of life. On the other hand, this has a very strong imperialist ring to it and I'm not sure I like the reasons why the main characters are interested in helping the inhabitants of Marduk. It does leave me with a feeling of ambivalence regarding the book's politics.

Overall, the book is okay but there are some warning signs that it might go into some very unpleasant territory later on with crazy environmentalists. Out of the many other military sci-fi books I've read, this one was at least enjoyable. If you like this sort of crazy pulp, maybe you'll like this as well.

- Kalpar

War of Honor, by David Weber

Today I'm looking at War of Honor, the tenth book in the Honor Harrington series and some problems which I've noticed before are starting to become really glaring as the series goes on. On the one hand, I still like a lot of the characters and the universe of the books so I'm still reading them. (Plus I already bought a lot of the rest of the books in this particular series.) So I'm left wondering what to think about this series as the books get longer and longer, the plots get more and more complex, and the issues which were minor before become much larger as the series goes on. It's certainly not easy to watch a series I enjoy seem to flounder like this.

Usual disclaimer to fair and gentle readers. Some amount of spoiling will happen below because with nine books already gone it's almost impossible to talk about anything that's happened. If you wish to avoid spoilers please avert your eyes now. 

War of Honor picks up about four years after Ashes of Victory left off. The Star Kingdom of Manticore and the reborn Republic of Haven have been at an uneasy truce while negotiations over a permanent peace agreement have dragged on interminably. As part of the truce, the Star Kingdom's government, now in the hands of a coalition of the Conservative, Liberal, and Progressive parties after the death of Centrist Lord Cromarty at the end of the last book, has drastically reduced funding for the Royal Navy and cut back on not only active ships but also construction of ships, much to the frustration and dismay of many Centrists, Honor Harrington and Alexander Hamish included. Relieved of their naval commands, both Honor and Hamish have been deeply involved in the Star Kingdom's politics and have forged a close working relationship with Queen Elizabeth III.

As things almost always do in these books, a bad situation get worse, the midden hits the windmill, and it's up to Honor to save the day in some manner. And I wouldn't have it any other way. I think part of the problem, though, is that Honor is so far up the chain of command she's no longer in charge of a ship or a group of ships. She's a full-blown admiral and in command of fleets of ships. So when she's out in the field now, there are whole areas of space that become her responsibility and dozens of subordinates. And we do get to see those subordinates do things, such as the misadventures of the ship Jessica Epps in Silesia and the growing tensions with the Andermani Empire. But it does mean we get to see less of Honor out in the field, taking charge of things, when the series has her name on it. Which isn't to say hearing about people like Eloise Pritchart isn't interesting, she's a good character as well, but the series has definitely grown beyond Honor at this point.

As I mentioned earlier, there are some issues which have grown to be rather significant as the series has gone on. A big example is my perennial problem with Weber's writing: show, don't tell. There's an event mentioned in this book, the Manpower Incident, which has something to do with the genetic slave trade and connections with members of the Manticoran ruling parties which caused a huge scandal in the Kingdom. But we don't actually get to see this event within the book. I did some digging and I found out it's actually covered in a short story anthology set within the same universe which I have not read. And I'm not sure how I feel about that. On the one hand, it kind of makes sense, considering how insanely big Weber's made his net of plot threads, to have different books to handle different parts of the universe. On the other hand, it gets really confusing when the characters are mentioning events I have had absolutely no inkling about or characters I haven't met before suddenly come into the narrative. At least, I'm pretty sure I haven't met them before. There are so many darn characters in this series it's hard for me to keep track sometimes.

So I'm not sure how much stuff that should have been shown in this book wasn't just shown in another book and now I'm wondering how many other books I'm going to have to hunt down and read. But I still have a sneaking suspicion that things that should have been shown were just told to us instead. And as Weber starts cramming in all these other plotlines like a new wormhole junction and the genetic slave trade, I'm worried that the main plotline is going to get muddled as a result.

Another issue I have is how apparently every politician who isn't some flavor of space-libertarian is evil and just waiting for an opportunity to abuse their power. I'm probably not representing this correctly but that's how it's coming across to me. To provide a short summary you have five major parties. The Crown Loyalists, whose platform seems to be pro-monarch, no matter what. Then there's the Centrists, Conservatives, Liberals, and Progressives. The Conservatives are almost entirely hard-right aristocrats who want to bring back the semi-feudal nature of the Star Kingdom and the old rights of the aristocracy. The Liberals and Progressives are both left of center politically speaking, although the Progressives are closer to center. They both favor varying degrees of economic and social reform to adjust imbalances in wealth equality in the Star Kingdom, their biggest difference seems to be their approach to Haven. The Liberals want to ignore the problem until it goes away, the Progressives want to make some sort of deal with Haven. And finally there are the Centrists who favor limited government, the flat income tax required by the Manticore constitution, and strong funding for the Royal Navy. In many ways they come across as libertarian except for their strong pro-military stance, although this is from my experience of libertarians being anti-military as well as anti-government, I could be wrong.

Where this gets frustrating is that almost everyone who isn't part of the Centrists or Crown Loyalists comes across as some card-carrying, moustache-twirling villain who's in government just to get as many kickbacks as possible before absconding with millions of dollars. Or in one case hopelessly naive and willing to compromise their principles if it'll keep them in power and get them what they want in the short-term. We really only see one member of the Liberal Party, Catherine Montaigne, who has any real moral backbone and she explicitly doesn't believe in the economic equality ''claptrap'' that the party platform includes. And several of the social programs which the Liberal and Progressive parties fund to help improve life in the Star Kingdom are explicitly overfunded so members of the government can skim amounts off the top for their own personal gain in a blatant example of embezzlement and malfeasance.

The result is an image that feels far too...simplistic to me. There can be and currently are long and ongoing debates over what exactly the role of the government should play in the economy. Personally I'm a social democrat so I tend to agree with the more interventionist approach to the government and the economy. Which isn't to say I don't recognize where intervention and regulation can go to far and there needs to be a certain degree of freedom. And there can be some strong arguments made for a more hands-off approach. But I wouldn't say people on either side of the argument are inherently bad. I think it's very unlikely that most people who support government programs to help improve the welfare of its citizens see it as opportunities to skim a bunch of money off the top for themselves. And I wouldn't accuse people who oppose social welfare spending as being heartless bastards who just hate the poor and see them as worthless parasites. I know some people who genuinely think like that, but I'm willing to extend the benefit of the doubt to other people.

In this book, however, it feels very black and white. It's implied that not all the members of parliament that aren't Centrists or Crown Loyalists are bad people, but we don't really get to see that. One of the things I've really liked about this book is that Manticore and Haven weren't all good or all bad. There were bad people on Manticore's side and good people on Haven's side and we could like and respect both sides even if the conflict was misguided. But with how Manticore's internal politics are portrayed in this book, it feels like all nuance has gone out the airlock and we've either got heroic statesmen or craven politicians. I just wish for more of a nuance.

Overall this book is okay, and I like seeing characters I like and I still enjoy the universe, but I worry that it's getting to be too big a project and also that the problems like show don't tell are starting to become rather large issues in the series. Not only did we have the ongoing conflict between Manticore and Haven, but we had the genetic slave trade, the expansion of the wormhole junction, Manticore's internal politics, Silesia, and growing conflict with the Andermani Empire. The result was it feels like Weber's trying to take on too much in one book. It certainly makes the universe feel deep and complex, but it makes the book that much more difficult to follow as well. Because I'm invested in the series I'll probably keep trooping through with it, but I definitely understand why some people would want to give up at this point.

- Kalpar

Ashes of Victory, by David Weber

This week I'm continuing with the Honor Harrington series with what's the ninth book, Ashes of Victory. The biggest thing I've noticed with this series is I'm only continuing to read it because I like the characters and I want to see what happens to them as time goes on. I hate to say it, but I've noticed the writing has gotten weaker over time and while I'm still enjoying the series and getting to see Honor and the cast of eight million other characters do lots of cool stuff, I can see where there are some problems coming up. The biggest is the issue of show don't tell, which has been happening a lot as the series progresses. And like Sursum Ursa said, there's a lot of exposition being thrown around as well. Well, and Honor's taking a back seat when she's...you know...the main character. On the one hand it kind of makes sense because she's a full admiral and a duchess now and intimately involved in the political operations of not only Manticore but Grayson as well, but on the other I kind of miss seeing her out in the field, leading ships into battle.

Usual disclaimer, I'll be talking with spoilers after this point in the review. Well, okay, I kind of spoiled earlier but there's no helping this. Honestly if you're not this far into the series you're probably not going to be impressed with this book because it's...okay. Like, I liked it but it's mostly because I liked the characters more than anything else. Also I'm starting to ramble. Anyway, spoilers, beware, so on and so forth.

So I'll briefly cover what happens to Honor over the course of the book. After successfully managing the largest prison break in history, evacuating some half a million people from the prison camps on Hades, Honor has returned to wild acclaim by the members of the Alliance. Because she lost her cybernetic implants, Honor is going to be spending considerable time recuperating and gets sent back to Manticore to teach tactics at the military academy at Saganami Island. She's also given a new duchy since her cousin was granted the previous Earldom of Harrington, and gets some people to work on sign language for treecats which allow them to communicate with humans, something previously not possible. So it's a pretty full docket and Honor's very much on the sidelines for most of the book.

So if Honor's on the bench, where is the rest of the action happening? Well quite frankly all over the place. You've got the Alliance military, in all its disparate locations, who finally have enough of the new weapons to make a decisive change in the war and are getting ready for the next big push. There are plots going on within Grayson which becomes a major issue later in the book. And there are plots galore going on back in Haven as distrust between Pierre and Secretary of War McQueen continues to grow. It's very complex to say the least so it kind of feels like a bridge between what was happening earlier and what Weber has planned afterwards. But that remains to be seen on my end.

As I said, my biggest problem is Weber tends to tell us things rather than show them. The very best example I have in this book is the battle between McQueen and Pierre that finally breaks out in the capital of Haven and leaves Oscar Saint-Just as the man in charge of the People's Republic of Haven. Now, this is a huge event. Pierre's been in this series, at least being mentioned, since book one. We've been watching McQueen manage the Navy and get them back on the offensive, along with her own plans knowing that Pierre and Saint-Just are planning to betray her when they no longer need her. McQueen isn't really as prepared as she'd like to be, but she knows she doesn't have the luxury of waiting anymore.

I mean, this is huge! McQueen launches her coup, there's fighting in the streets, Pierre gets killed by a band of marines, and Saint-Just only manages to escape with his life. McQueen locks down in the Octagon, the military nerve center of the PRH, and takes numerous hostages to prevent Saint-Just from storming the place. Unfortunately, she hadn't counted on him planting a nuke in the basement and actually using it to resolve the situation. This is a huge change in the political scene for the universe.

...but we find out about it after the fact. Like...this is what's so insanely frustrating. We get to see McQueen give the launch order and then later we're told what happened. Pierre and McQueen both die offscreen and it feels very glossed-over. This book would have been so much more interesting if Weber had taken the time to actually write out the events of the coup, at least some of them, than telling us what happened. And there are plenty of other examples, not just in this book but in other books as well. The taking of Trevor's Star which happened between books was another good example which confused me then. Like, I get that there's a lot going on and Weber's created an insanely detailed universe, but I feel like it's starting to get to be too much and we're just getting lists of things that are happening rather than actual events.

There's also a lot of people standing or sitting around talking about things. I noticed it less because I was reading the book rather than listening to it, but that was a huge complaint I had about the Dune series which made me stop listening to it entirely. So I guess it's a good thing that I'm reading these books rather than listening to them. Because it's just a lot of people sitting around and talking about things happening. I think this is a problem of space opera specifically, but somehow I still love the genre in spite of that problem.

Overall the book's okay. I think I enjoyed it because I've come to expect a ton of long debates about politics or economics and less space battle action. And there is a lot less space battle action in this book than in most of the other ones. It's definitely one of the less strong of the books and I think newcomers to the series aren't going to start here, but if you're interested in the series and you've made it this far, well you're probably willing to go a little further.

- Kalpar

Echoes of Honor, by David Weber

This week I'm talking about the...eighth. Wow, really? Eighth book? Didn't realize I was that invested in the series. Anyway, we're looking at the eighth book in the Honor Harrington series and I'm really starting to see where other people, such as Sursum Ursa, have some deep complaints about this series. Don't get me wrong, it's still a pretty fantastic series and there are some really awesome moments, but the book series seems to be growing increasingly exposition-y and with a fresh new crop of plotlines to make a patch of kudzu vine look tame by comparison. I still think it's a good series, but it's definitely lacking the tight character-driven science-fiction which made up the earlier books in the series and suffering, like some other space operas I've been either reading or listening to, from a strong need to show instead of tell.

Obligatory Warning for Dear and Gentle Readers: As we're eight books in it's almost impossible to talk about the book in some meaningful way without going into specific details. The above paragraph provides a good summary of my opinions if you wish to avoid spoilers. 

Echoes of Honor is the first book in this series to be subdivided into separate books, which I think is an organizational choice by Weber more than anything else. Half of the books focus on Honor Harrington and her adventures, while the other half focus on...literally everything else going on in the galaxy right now, albeit in fairly circumscribed manner. The book also covers about a year and a half of time which is a little strange because it doesn't feel that long reading it and I began feeling like maybe other things are happening that I'm just not aware of.

The book begins with a section focusing on literally everyone else, which is kind of weird because instead of focusing on the main character we're treated to an absurd amount of plotlines you have to digest, some of which aren't developed until presumably later novels. The book begins with Haven releasing video of Honor's execution and the response of Honor's parents, and her friends both on Grayson and Manticore and the sorrow both star kingdoms share at losing one of their best commanders. The loss is somewhat muted, however, as anyone who's come this far has probably read the last book and knows that Honor's alive and well. In fact, the very next chapter features the Havenite minister of propaganda gloating over what a good computer simulation job they did with Honor's execution. So while it's useful to see the sorrow and anger of Manticorans and Graysons, it feels a little weird knowing Honor's alive the whole time.

The first part of the book also spends an inordinate time talking about the space economy. Seriously, there are whole discussions and internal reflections on how the economy of Manticore is doing and how it's beginning to strain under the burden of wartime necessity. A large amount of resources are going towards military needs, putting civilian needs on hold although apparently it's not quite yet to rationing, and Manticore is considering the horror of a progressive income tax. (More on that in a minute.) And while it certainly would be a realistic argument that people in those positions of power would have, it's not exactly what I'm interested in when it comes to space operas.

The story is also turning into a patch of kudzu for me because there's so much going on that it's becoming increasingly difficult to keep track of everything. There are so many characters from so many factions that I'm about ready to start making dossiers for all the characters just so I can keep track of them. There's also the introduction of a plot revealing a secret to Grayson's genetic heritage which is played up as this really big deal but then...isn't talked about again. Which could mean it's being saved for a later book, but if it isn't it will ultimately be padding.

And let me take a moment, without getting too political, to state that the argument flat taxes and low government regulation of business is good for the economy. In the short term. In the long term...well it gets far more complicated. Basically members of the Manticore government attribute their great wealth, which had previously been attributed to their high industrial base and location on prime trade routes, to a flat income tax and low regulation. Granted, I seem to fall more in the Keynesian camp when it comes to economic interpretation, but there are problems with this argument. It's kind of been hinted at before, but we're getting to the point in the series where I'm starting to wonder if maybe the Manticorans actually are the plutocrats the Havenites keep accusing them of being. If this was intentional it's very interesting, but I have a feeling it might not have been.

All of this stuff that happened above, mind you, is before we get back to Honor and seeing what she's doing. I can greatly sympathize with Ursa's frustration and wanting to shout ''Where's Honor?!'' while reading the book. And seeing Honor is definitely worth the wait, but I kind of wish the series stayed more focused on one plot rather than drifting all over the place. Which ties into the problem where the book tends to tell rather than show in a lot of places. I'm wondering if this is a problem with space opera as a genre rather than just the Harrington and Dune series, but there are things I really wish they'd show rather than telling us about, especially in reflections by characters. When the book gets into the active tense, it's really enjoyable and Weber is a master at building up the tension to an emotional release point, but that doesn't happen enough in the book for my tastes.

Overall the book is okay. There are some really good parts and I, personally, am too invested in the series to be willing to quit now, but I can see where there are some problems which I suspect will only be exacerbated as the series goes on.

- Kalpar

In Enemy Hands, by David Weber

This week I'm reviewing another of the Honor Harrington series, in this instance the seventh book in the series: In Enemy Hands. As I have stated in previous reviews it has gotten to the point it's very difficult for me to talk about these books without spoilers. That being said, I will try to avoid them as much as possible, but there are definitely going to be some spoilers. Please be advised. Anyway, after her adventures in the Silesian Confederacy Honor is being returned to front-line duty in the growing Haven-Manticore war. However, instead of returning to Grayson service, Honor has been promoted to Commodore in the Royal Manticore Navy and is being given overall command of a squadron of cruisers which will form part of Alexander Hamish's Eighth Fleet. Not one to spend time idle, Honor volunteers her squadron as a convoy escort while the main fleet's still forming as a means to get them in top shape. Unfortunately a Havenite ambush results in Honor, as well as numerous other crew members, becoming prisoners of war, a huge propaganda coup for the People's Republic of Haven.

The biggest problem I had with this book was an issue which I sort of mentioned in the previous one, which was the realization of how much exposition goes on in these books. I'll admit that I didn't really notice it until Sursum Ursa pointed it out in her video, but Weber really crams the exposition in there. And this book is kind of the worst offender by far in my opinion. A good half of the book occurs mostly in a very exposition-dump style where a lot of information and important events are thrown at us. Very often in a character's internal thoughts rather than in dialog. And to an extent, you have to do that because there's information the reader needs to know. But at the same time it's frustrating because I know that Weber can write better than that. I've read numerous books and stories of his and he can write in the active voice. And there are a lot of things that should happen in the active voice instead of being exposited. For example, the decision by Nimitz, Samantha, and a number of other treecats to colonize another planet. (Short version, about a dozen treecats have decided to pack up and move to Grayson.) There is of course surprise on the part of Honor and her family, some outrage by the Sphinxian Forest Rangers, and a suspicion that the treecats are far more intelligent than they let on to humans. It's all very interesting and could make a decent story in its own right, but this all gets exposited to us in a flashback. I don't know if Weber wanted to avoid derailing the plot even further by going into a sub-plot, but it could have been handled better.

Probably the worst example of something that we desperately needed to have shown to us instead of being told to us was the fall of Trevor's Star. To summarize for those unfamiliar, Trevor's Star is an outlying star system that's part of the Manticore Wormhole Junction, which allows effectively instantaneous travel between the two star systems, a process that otherwise could take weeks. This star system had previously been in the hands of the People's Republic of Haven and posed a serious threat to Manticore because a large fleet could be launched from Trevor's Star directly into Manticore's home system as part of an invasion. On the other hand, if Manticore controls Trevor's Star then it gives them a forward base into Havenite territory which allows ships and supplies to be sent much more quickly from Manticore to the front. Obviously there are advantages to both sides holding the star system and quite a lot of effort has been spent in trying to take control of the system. In fact, in the previous novel, Honor Among Enemies, Admiral White Haven spends most of his time trying to decisively win at Trevor's Star and secure it for the Manticore Alliance. At the start of this next novel, however, Trevor's Star is in the hands of the Alliance. We're briefly told that Haven lost control of the system between books and Haven's now trying to stop the overall advance of the Alliance before they push further into Haven territory.

If there was something that should have been shown in a book, it should have been the Battle of Trevor's Star. The emphasis of this star system had been underlined numerous times in previous novels. Hell, the importance of Manticore controlling Basilisk, another wormhole junction, was part of the first book of this series! Haven was trying to gain control of Basilisk so they'd have a second jumping-off point for an invasion of Manticore! Trevor's Star was this big, huge, important thing and it all happens offscreen. And yes, it'd probably result in longer books, but at least everything wouldn't be happening in exposition dumps.

I did have one other small problem where Honor and Earl White Haven have a moment of "connection", like they realize their souls are reflections of each other. It just rubbed me the wrong way, and it may be because I'm a crotchety old man who isn't a huge fan of romance stories. Or even the romance aspects of stories. I got in this for awesome space action. But that's just me, and compared to the reams of exposition it's fairly minor by comparison.

Honestly, my biggest problem is the reams of exposition. And don't get me wrong, I'm the sort of person who goes and reads encyclopedia entries for the sheer fun of it so I don't mind a good bit of exposition here or there. The problem is that so much of the book happened in exposition format that I couldn't get involved in the story. It was like a bunch of things happened, but I didn't get to see these things happen, which would have made a more interesting reading experience. If the later books are also exposition heavy I'll admit that I'll be a little disappointed. But, I'm kind of at a point where I'm so far into the series that I'm invested and I don't want to give up now because I'm interested in the characters. And space battles. SPACE!

If you're this far in the series I'll admit that this book will probably be rough, but I'm hoping the next one will make the journey worthwhile.

- Kalpar

Bolo! and Old Soldiers, by David Weber

This week I'm knocking out two books at once and have come at last to the end of the Bolo series. So alas there will no longer be any more posts with me squealing about giant robot tanks and how awesome I think they are. Technically there is one more book, Their Finest Hour: Best of the Bolos, but that is an anthology of previous stories which I have already read and so I probably am not going to be reviewing it here. The reason I'm tackling two books today is that Bolo! specifically is a collection of four short stories written by David Weber, and three of them have been published before in other Bolo anthologies. The only new story is With Your Shield, which actually is sort of a prologue for the full-length novel Old Soldiers, and gives backstory for the main human character, Maneka Trevor. I'm also aware that I already talked about the other main work of Weber's that I've been reading last week, but I assure my readers that this blog isn't going to turn into just another David Weber fan club. ...I hope.
Anyway, the plot of both of these books is set during the Final War, an event that looms large in more than a few of these books. For anyone who hasn't read any of my other reviews of these books: the Concordiat of Man and the Melconian Empire, through a failure of diplomacy and a battle where neither side was sure who shot first, get engaged in a galaxy-spanning war. The Concordiat has a technological edge, including the mighty Bolos, but the Melconians aren't too far behind and have sheer numbers which more than offset humanity's edge. As the war continues, it escalate into a genocidal campaign known as Operation Ragnarok, where both humans and Melconians begin burning each other's planets to cinders, both sides hoping that the enemy will run out of planets before they do. As the war drags on the Concordiat realizes they've grossly underestimated the size of the Melconian Empire and there's a very good chance humanity is going to lose, even with the Bolos on their side. This begins plans for Operation Seed Corn, an attempt by the Concordiat to send human colonization fleets beyond the explored edges of the galaxy to ensure that humanity, in some form at least, will continue to exist.

Included in this expedition are an aging Mark XXVIII Bolo, named Lazarus, and his commander, Maneka Trevore, both the only survivors of their unit from a Melconian attack on Chartes. Both are suffering from survivor's guilt and will have to work together so they can protect one of humanity's attempt to ensure something survives beyond the Final War.

I will admit that I'm not as huge a fan of Final War stories because it ultimately results in the fall of the Concordiat and the Melconian Empire in a final maelstrom of destruction. Granted, there are stories showing at least fragments of both sides surviving afterwards, but it's small comfort considering what we lose in the process. The writing is fairly good and at least in this one I didn't notice too much extraneous exposition, but that may just be me and my usual love for exposition. What I liked about both these stories the most, though, is that Weber was able to answer a question which had been raised in earlier books and had never really been answered to my satisfaction. Previous books had raised the question is it really right for humanity to create sentient beings that exist merely to fight and die on our behalf? The Bolos are fully-developed people. They have personalities, idiosyncrasies, they make jokes, they have friends, and in a way they can also know fear. Is it truly just for humanity to create a race that you could very well call slaves to do all our fighting for us?

Previous books had raised this question before and had sort of glossed over it or not really looked into it very deeply. And it made me wonder if maybe the Bolos actually resented us for making them our warriors. However, in this book Weber actually manages to answer the question to my satisfaction through the voice of Lazarus. See, Bolos are aware that they exist to fight and die on the behalf of their creators, but they don't see that as a bad thing. Bolos respect humans because humans created them far better than humans could ever hope to be. A Bolo after all is a building-sized weapons platform capable of standing up to fusion warheads and an ability to make decisions in milliseconds. No human could ever hope to out-perform a Bolo on the battlefield. But more importantly, humans made Bolos the epitome of honor, duty, obligation, and other ideals that humanity constantly strive and often falls short of achieving. Bolos believe that humanity has made Bolos better than humanity could ever hope to become, and they feel not only honored by this decision, but an obligation to protect their creators. And the humans have not failed to appreciate this, either. Even though a human commander will probably have very little they can accomplish from the cockpit of a Bolo, humans still ride in Bolos out of an obligation to share the risk with their armored protectors and ensure they do not fight alone.

Although this book has some really sad parts, it has what I thought was a very touching and appropriate ending for the Bolo series as a whole, with hope for the future of mankind. As much as I hate to have finished this series, I'm also very glad I read it as well.

- Kalpar

Honor Among Enemies, by David Weber

Once again I venture into the space-opera awesomeness that is David Weber's Honor Harrington series. As I picked this book up (and was doing a little refreshing on some of the characters, because man are there a lot of them) I suddenly realized that I'm actually six books into this series. I suppose the fact that I'm reading these books on my kindle instead of letting them take up more and more of my diminishing shelf-space has kept me unaware of how far I've ended up delving into this series, but I guess I have no choice but to say that I'm a fan. Anyway, I read the sixth book, Honor Among Enemies and I'll be going into it. As I mentioned in my review of the previous book, Flag in Exile it's getting kind of hard to avoid spoilers at this point. I'll try to do the best I can to avoid them but I'm afraid they're just going to have to slip through at this point.

WARNING TO ALL MY READERS: SPOILERS MAY BE CONTAINED WITHIN THIS REVIEW. READER DISCRETION ADVISED.

Before I get into the plot portions of this review I do want to make a mention to something that has tragically changed how I perceive Honor Harrington books. Well, maybe not tragically. It's definitely brought something to my attention at least. You see a while back I was stumbling across the internet, as I do, and I came across the videos of a lady who goes by the handle Sursum Ursa. I watched a few and I thought, "I rather like the cut of this lady's gib. I should watch more of her stuff." Anyway, it turns out that Ursa is also a fan of the Honor Harrington books and made a video talking about them. However, she also pointed out something that I had only kind of noticed recently: Weber really loves shoving in his exposition. To the point that Ursa parodied it with an "Ode to Exposition" in her review. And I laughed a little and said to myself, "Yeah, that sounds about right." And then I started reading this book and I realized, oh man. It's true. I hadn't realized it before, but it's true! And now I can't stop seeing all the times Weber clumsily shoves in technical details! Aaaaaaaaaahhh!

All joking aside, for the most part I don't really mind exposition. I find it's necessary to the plot, especially when you're establishing something like a science-fiction universe as complex as Weber's working on in this series. You might have to shove it in sort of clumsily, but it's better to have it then have readers going, "Wait, hold on. That doesn't make sense." The problem I'm noticing in these books, though, is that characters will think over expository material in their heads in the middle of a conversation. You might read it and think that five minutes have passed while the characters have had long reminisces about technological, military, economic, or political history, but they're still in the middle of a conversation. It's probably the weakest part of Weber's writing, but as I said, it's better to have exposition rather than leave stuff unexplained. Well, for the most part anyway.

Plot wise this book goes a little further into the economic and political details of the setting, which I think is really cool because it adds depth to the series and makes this feel far more realistic. Well, as realistic as space operas get anyway. (Although I did find the willingness of the large business owners to shoulder a greater tax burden a little unrealistic. Zing!) Basically much of the Star Kingdom of Manticore's income is a by-product of the interstellar trade which utilizes the Manticore wormhole, as well as the technological products which Manticore produces. The Silesian Confederacy is an important market for Manticore but due to a weak central government piracy has always been a problem in that region, but the Royal Manticore Navy is no longer able to spare as many ships for anti-piracy patrols and convoy escorts as they'd like and as a result piracy and commerce raiding is back on the rise. Utilizing what resources they have left, the RMN decides to send a handful of Q-ships, armed ships disguised as helpless merchantmen, under the command of Honor Harrington into the sector. This is important for Honor specifically because while it's not a plumb assignment, it gets her back into Manticore uniform and opens opportunities for her to get back into the war effort of her home country.

Overall it's a really good plot and I liked seeing Honor and her Q-ships take the fight to the pirates, and as always there's a lot going on in this book. Especially with the loads and loads of characters. Personally I was happiest with the arrival of the Anderman Empire, or as I'm personally calling them (and I think other people will too) the Space Prussians. Like, to the point the founder of the Anderman Empire was convinced he was the reincarnation of Frederick the Great and walked around in eighteenth century clothing. (And was shockingly competent as an emperor as well.) I'm sure we'll see more of the Space Prussians as the series progresses, which makes me more than a little happy.

I will say I thought Dave was getting a little too cute again with his readers by having Honor read one of the Horatio Hornblower books in her cabin and having her identify with the main character. Especially seeing as Honor Harrington is unabashedly Horatio Hornblower IN SPACE!!! Yes, Dave, we get it, you're very clever.

I did have one other issue, and considering this book was written nearly twenty years ago in the nineties, I'm actually not surprised to see that it has this problem once again. As I've mentioned before I kind of take issue with rape being used just to up the drama or make someone more vile in a setting. Like Honor's issues with Pavel Young, it could have easily been limited to just class differences and the fact he's a spoiled dandy rather than adding on an attempted sexual assault as well. In this case, some of the pirates are also rapists and it really doesn't add anything but an attempt to make them more evil as a threat. They're not even characters, they're a threat that Honor and the other characters have to eliminate in the book. Going into detail about how they rape female crewmembers of merchant ships they capture is just off-putting and seems like an unnecessary attempt to increase how despicable they are. Honestly, Weber could have left them just as pirates who capture ships, kill the crew, and are just general nasty people. I don't think anyone was on the pirates' side reading the book so it just felt like an unnecessary attempt at vilifying them further. Fortunately that wasn't a terribly large part of the book and we were able to move on to other things.

I guess really my only big issues with this book were the rape thing, as I discussed, and my realizing how clumsy the exposition can get, but I'm sure that's true of Weber's other books as well. We are sort of taking a break from the main war because we're off with Honor fighting pirates, but that doesn't make it any less interesting. And we get to see Honor kick some serious ass as the extremely competent starship captain we all know her to be. I guess I have no choice but to see this series through to the ultimate end now.

-Kalpar

Flag in Exile, by David Weber

A Warning to my dear and gentle readers: Once again I am returning to the Honor Harrington series by David Weber. As I mentioned in my last review Field of Dishonor, this series has started to get complicated to the point it becomes very difficult to avoid spoilers entirely. I shall do my best to avoid them as much as possible, however read ahead at your own risk.

Much to no one's surprise, I am sure, I have returned to a definite favorite of mine, the space opera series of Honor Harrington, with the fifth installment Flag in Exile. (Hard to believe, I'm already five books in. It's a little bit crazy) Anyway, when we last left our protagonist, Honor had been put on half-pay and beached by the Royal Manticore Navy in response to all the political hub-bub caused by her duel with Lord Pavel Young. Honor retires to oversee her estate on Grayson, but the war between Manticore and Haven is beginning to reach a deadlock and the Navy can't keep Honor beached forever. In the meantime, though, Protector Benjamin IX of Grayson offers Honor a commission as an admiral in Grayson's own Navy due to their lack of experienced officers. But how Honor will respond to her first opportunity at flag rank remains to be seen.

In addition to Honor getting bumped up to flag rank there's an ongoing plot about the internal struggles that are still rocking Grayson in response to Protector Benjamin's reforms, as well as the appointment of Honor Harrington to the office of steadholder, the first female to hold such a post. I rather liked this plot because it showed how Grayson is developing and how there are still problems to be overcome on that planet. It makes Grayson appear more complex than simply a one-dimensional Planet of Hats, which you often see in space operas, and shows that Honor's actions in The Honor of the Queen haven't solved everything for forever either. Although it's certainly frustrating to see a bunch of religious fanatics trying to prevent reform and change, (something that's frustrating to me even in real life), it certainly makes for a far more believable planet with varied political and religious opinions.

I will say the cover of the book kind of gave one of the most epic parts of the book away. Instead of some of the more generic covers with Honor and Nimitz we've seen in the past, we now know that Honor's totally going to get into an epic sword fight at some point during the book. Building up to that point was pretty awesome but the fight was surprisingly short compared to how it takes precedence on the cover. But then again, what do I know about cover art? However, there are still some pretty epic and awesome things in this book, even if it makes Honor look freaking invincible compared to all the stuff she's gone through. But I'm sort of okay with that. This is an unapologetic space opera, and that's exactly what I signed on for.

Of course, in addition to all the stuff happening dirt-side that Honor has to deal with, that pesky war between Manticore and Haven has to come back into the plot again. Of course as the saying goes, if Honor cannot come to the war, then the war must come to Honor. Weber kind of spends some time trying to misdirect us about what exactly the People's Republic of Haven is up to with Operations Stalking Horse and Dagger, but I didn't buy it. It was sort of like, "Come on, Dave. You made Honor an admiral in this book for a reason. Just let the Haven fleet show up in Yeltsin already so she can fight them." So although it may take Honor by surprise, I was more, "Finally, let's get this space battle on already." That is sort of a weakness I'll admit, between the cover and the most elementary understanding of how these books work there isn't terribly much of a surprise for the reader. But do you want awesome space battles and sweet sword duels or not? Because I totally do.

As I said, I think the real strength of this installment is showing how Grayson has developed as a planet and making it more three dimensional overall. I will say that compared to the previous novel, Honor kind of takes a back seat, especially since she's still sort of shut down emotionally from all the trauma, which is understandable for anyone in her position. I do hope that Honor can develop more as a character and most likely the Royal Manticore Navy will call her back to duty in the next book.

- Kalpar

Field of Dishonor, by David Weber

Kalpar's Warning: Attention dear and gentle readers, as I have progressed with the Honor Harrington series I have worked very hard in my reviews to keep them largely spoiler-free so that the books may remain enjoyable for you. However, as the plot has continued to build I am finding it more and more difficult to properly talk about the book without having to go into some spoiler territory. I will try to keep it to a minimum but please keep that in mind before reading this review. 

Having become a very strong fan of David Weber's Honor Harrington series, I finally got around to reading the fourth book, Field of Dishonor and was rather satisfied with it, although I'm a little concerned about Honor's development as a character As this is the only book in the series that doesn't feature space combat, its focus is definitely more on Honor as a person and her own development, rather than the larger political and military struggles that are going on between Manticore and Haven. Although some people might be upset by the lack of space battles, I actually welcome it as a change of pace in the series.

The book is very strongly dominated by Pavel Young's vendetta against Honor Harrington and his quest for revenge. After his disgraceful behavior at the Battle of Hancock, Young is finally cashiered from the naval service in disgrace and to top it off his father, tenth Earl of North Hollow, dies in shock. With his newfound power as the eleventh Earl of North Hollow, Pavel Young seeks to get revenge against not just Honor but eventually the entire naval establishment. I will say that the first fourth or so of the book is dominated by a lot of conversations between characters over essentially the same thing: Young's upcoming court martial and the political fallout from any decision made by the navy. The parliamentary government of Manticore needs a majority to officially declare war against Haven and continue offensive operations, but spiteful factions of the House of Lords threaten to break with the majority government and block legislation dependent on the outcome of Young's trial. It creates a lot of build-up before the trial and when the political fallout fails to appear (at least for that reason) it's sort of like everyone worried for nothing.

The other thing that kind of bothered me was certain really important things happened "off-camera" which I feel really should have been on-screen. Paul's duel with Denver Summervale, for example, as well as some of the political shenanigans that went on in the House of Lords. These events feel really important to the story and influence its development, but we're only told about them second-hand from characters rather than experiencing them ourselves. I'm wondering if Weber was trying to condense the amount of stuff going on in this particular novel by leaving this stuff out, but it feels like a case where you want to shout, "Show! Don't tell!"

As I said, I'm a little worried about Honor's development as a character in this particular novel. Of course, Honor does go through a lot of emotional turmoil in this book, but at the end of the book there's a lovely little speech about how everything Honor did was totally justified and while people may judge her now for her behavior, in the end she'll be proven right. It smacks a little of her being "special" and therefore right because of her specialness. (Which is something that irritated the hell out of me in the Harry Potter books.) I will say that Honor at least accepts the consequences of her actions and I think we all know she's going to be back in command of a starship soon enough. I think the most important development for Honor in this book was the realization that there were people who care about her and want the very best for her. Honor has been a very solitary sort of person in previous books. Yes, she has friends, but she basically relies on her bond with Nimitz to fulfill her emotional needs and sees herself as essentially alone. When Honor sees her friends going to great lengths to help her during her personal crisis and worrying about what will happen to her, she realizes there are plenty of people who care about her and who she can rely upon in trouble. Which I think is really important and will go a long way towards developing Honor beyond the stoic, lonely space captain she's been.

Really, with all that character development for Honor I'm really glad Weber's managed to make Honor interesting again as a character. As I said in my review of The Short Victorious War Honor and her career doesn't seem terribly interesting compared to the larger political and military events which Honor is only a very small part of. By focusing on Honor and letting the large plot take a rest, we get to know Honor a lot better and I think it definitely helped to make her more interesting. I'm certainly interested to see how she develops in her role as Steadholder in Grayson, which promises to be the focus of the next novel.

- Kalpar

Hell Hath No Fury, by David Weber and Linda Evans

I'm going to say this straight up, I should not have started with this novel. When I picked this book up at the used book store, I was under the impression it was sort of a stand alone work, rather than part of a series. I did notice on the back cover a “Praise for the Prequel” section, but I assumed that this book had come first so I could safely start there. This sadly is not the case, and I should have stuck with the familiar maxim, “Covers always lie.” As a result I have kind of a disjointed view of this book because I started right in the middle of a larger series. In the spirit of fairness I will not complain about being utterly confused or having to slog through the attached glossary to figure out what the characters were talking about at certain points in this book. That's entirely my own fault for jumping in the middle, but take it from me, you should start with Hell's Gate before continuing to Hell Hath No Fury.

I initially picked up this book because of the authors. Linda Evans and David Weber have become favorites of mine, especially after their work with one of my all-time favorites, the Bolo series. Although I haven't yet read much outside of the Dinochrome Brigade with Evans I plan to read more of her work thanks to Baen's library of e-books, and of course Weber's Honor Harrington series has become another favorite series of mine. So I was rather excited to read another team-up work from these two excellent science-fiction authors. Especially because of the pretty awesome premise. Essentially there is a series of parallel earths, all identical, but only a handful are inhabited. One, known as Arcana, is home to magic-wielding wizards, kings, unicorns, and dragons. Another known as Sharona is home to people with telepathic powers and a technological level similar to our own in the early 1900's. The Sharonans are described by some people as steampunk, but I'm not so sure about that particular nomenclature as none of their technology seems to have the wonder and sheer improbability of what I define as steampunk, but I may just be splitting hairs. Point is dragons and wizards are getting pitted against steam trains and machine guns, what's not to love?

More specifically over the years both Arcana and Sharona have explored what they call chains of universes, linked by portals, and have colonized quite a few. Eventually both sides have discovered what's referred to as Hell's Gate, a universe containing a junction of portals, permitting access all across the multiverse, and through a miscommunication have come to blows over Hell's Gate. The Sharonans at the start are currently in command of the portal nexus, but the Arcanans have agreed to diplomatic talks to try and prevent further bloodshed. Unfortunately there are many, many plots in motion which mean warfare is going to be inevitable, but that's what we signed up for, isn't it?

I will say that I personally saw a bit of difference between the two sides, although this has been described as a gray-on-gray morality setting. I will admit that there are bad guys who are Sharonans and good guys who are Arcanans, but it seems to be that the majority of Arcanans aren't very good people, while the majority of Sharonans are rather noble. Maybe it's better articulated in the first book, I simply don't know. As for their powers, I personally didn't see much of a difference to be honest. The Arcanans have Gifts while the Sharonans have Talents, the difference being that Talents are more common but less powerful than Gifts. Granted Talents seem to be entirely mental abilities while Gifts let you work standard fantasy magic, but they both seem to just...exist. Although when David starts going into a stream of technobabble I tend to just tell myself, “It works because magic.” and don't let myself get bogged down in the details.

The biggest frustration with this book is, as it's part of the middle, it ends on a cliffhanger. As a matter of fact, it even ends in mid-conversation, which resulted for me in a, “That's it?” I did do a little research and found out that unfortunately Linda Evans has suffered a number of health problems recently which has prevented her from writing and has delayed work on this series. David Weber is currently working to get another author involved, but it seems it will be some time before the planned other two books of this series are completed. Hopefully things can get back on track soon and I wish Linda Evans all the best.

If you're as interested in fantasy vs. technology stories as I am, this one is a pretty good choice, but I'd recommend starting with Hell's Gate like I should have done. As is typical for Weber, there are plenty of characters and plot threads, some of which aren't resolved in this book and one of which disappears off the face of the earth. Hopefully they'll get tied up in the later books, but it looks like we're going to have to wait for a while.