Taura’s a great character 
<== what her smile sort-of looks like.
Hey! I just caught something. Re-reading Shards of Honor (in parallel with my husband.)
When Cordelia escapes from Beta Colony she convinces a certain jump pilot running a freighter that she is embarking on a secret mission assignment from the President.
The name of the jump pilot? Officer Mayhew.
ETA: ‘‘Borders of Infinity’’ - Welcome Brother Miles! God I love how Miles can take a perfectly bleak situation and turn it into this crazy scheme of hope and laughter. That is his charm.
So, let’s see–you read “The Mountains of Mourning”, right? It’s included in Borders of Infinity (the book, which also contains the story “Borders of Infinity”).
At some point before you get to Diplomatic Immunity–which is still a ways off (though at the rate you’re going…)–you’ll want to loop back and pick up Falling Free, if you haven’t already. She wrote it quite early, and it’s a far prequel to the Vorkosigan books (about 200 years before Miles is born) but a good read, and has a number of nice resonances with Diplomatic Immunity (and “Labyrinth”, for that matter).
Oh, yes. And part of Bujold’s charm is the way she can seamlessly weave together heartstopping drama and (sometimes very black) humor.
Yes, she’s brilliant, and when I’m getting frustrated with my own writing I feel like she restores some sanity to me.
So far I read these books in this order. Just for fun, I’ll rate them on a scale of 1 to 10, relative to each other:
Shards of Honor (8)
Barrayar (9)
The Warrior’s Apprentice (8)
‘‘Mountains of Mourning’’ (8)
The Vor Game (inc. ‘‘The Weatherman’’) (7)
Ethan of Athos (9)
‘‘Labyrinth’’ (8)
currently on ‘‘Borders of Infinity’’ (9… so far)
I think next will be Brothers in Arms
I am amazed that the quality has not slipped at all. On the contrary, these last two are among my favorites.
My husband (himself a student of clinical psychology) was very amused by the annoying mental health professionals in Shards of Honor. Except the last chapter, leading up to Cordelia’s escape, he was much more disturbed than amused. I think he found that more disturbing than Vorrutyer.
Oops, I left out Cetaganda (7)
I don’t think I’m majorly giving anything away: indeed, everyone in the Vorkosiverse is hom. sap. sap., of one or another “shape or make”. As Bujold puts it, “We are the aliens”.
My personal opinion is that Bujold did have a dip in her later career. I don’t feel books like Diplomatic Immunity, Cryoburn, The Hallowed Hunt, and her Sharing Knife series were as good as her earlier work (although they’re not bad). But she jumped back up with Captain Vorpatril’s Alliance, which I feel is as good as anything she’s written.
I have an odd thing concerning Taura. Comes from my having long been intrigued by – I’m a bit embarrassed to admit – the mystery of “Bigfoot”. At a certain level, I find myself obstinately visualising Taura as looking a lot like a Bigfoot: reckonably, because she’s about 8 feet tall and broad to match; and thanks to a thing quite often raised in “Bigfooting” circles – the Cold War tale of Stalin’s scientists allegedly working to develop a strain of giant-ape-men super-soldiers.
I “know with my head” from the books, that Taura is not covered in hair – but seem unable to rid myself totally, of the notion that she is: whence tending to feel, “How in the name of wonder can Miles find this brute the slightest bit sexy?” I recognise that this is highly unjust vis-a-vis Taura – who is, besides, a sweet person when not in lethal mode.
Little Nemo - I think Memory is one of my favorite books. I love the humanizing of Illyan, Miles’ despair at his situation and Ivan’s attempts to get him out of his depression.
StG
Memory is PHENOMINAL. If I had to pick one book from this series to be the only one I could ever read again, that would be it. Yes, it benefits a lot from a grounding in the rest of the series, but even standing on its own, it is SO GOOD.
Memory is great but I personally would rank A Civil Campaign higher. I reread it recently and I’m still impressed by how Bujold was able to run several storylines along side by side and then bring them all together.
Memory is my absolute favorite but I have a huge soft spot for A Civil Campaign.
In my opinion the sequence of Mirror Dance, Memory, Komarr, and Civil Campaign contains the best of series, with all four of them being just about equally good. Civil Campaign does provide a payoff for many incidents from previous books, which is satisfying, but each of the other books is terrific too.
Finished ‘‘Borders of Infinity.’’ Oh, it was wonderful and horrible. Definitely one of my favorites in the series. We can see now how Miles’ duties take their toll on him.
Started Brothers in Arms… people take shots at Miles all the time for benefitting from nepotism and I think it’s the first time I’ve been genuinely pissed off on his behalf. Knowing the weight of the decisions he’s made and their real consequences it’s more than just an insult now, it’s an injustice.
I’m happy to see Ivan and glad to know Elli is not enthralled with him. To me her character is so believable because Miles showed her nothing but kindness and respect at one of the most vulnerable times in her life. I think her plasma burn experience has given her a depth of insight into human nature that most people lack. And I guess the same would be true for Miles.
I never thought “Ivan-You-Idiot” was dumb. There’s an early book where he says something vaguely like “Coz, my “dumb” act gets me out of dangerous jobs, has stopped my mom from marrying me off to some fat widow and leaves me free to do what I want…plus I get all the girls.” Ivan isn’t dumb, he just doesn’t have Mile’s ambitions. And frankly, in terms of “getting what he wants out of life”, Ivan is far, far smarter than Miles.
As an aside, while I mostly love Cordellia, there’s a…smugness(?) about her that’s occasionally abrasive. The “I’m the only rational person on this planet” thing. Cordellia steamrollers people as thoroughly as Miles (he gets it from her), she’s just able to do it politely. I’d love to see someone confront her with it. Not a big cat-fight kind of thing, just a quiet “Other people might see things differently from you Cordellia, and still be right.” response.
Absolutely true. But there was one passage where it was implied that Gregor’s the one who calls out Cordelia the way Cordelia calls out everyone else.
I think you’ve just articulated why I find it so hard to relate to her. I like Cordelia. I just don’t think she could ever be ‘‘my character.’’ I think she’s rude as hell sometimes.
[QUOTE=Little Nemo]
Absolutely true. But there was one passage where it was implied that Gregor’s the one who calls out Cordelia the way Cordelia calls out everyone else.
[/QUOTE]
I’d love to be a fly on the wall during one of their little chats. There are hints of it at the end of The Vor Game when Gregor promises to discuss his suicidality with Cordelia, but we never see.
I get the feeling that this tends to be a trait of Betans in general. They know with total certainty that they are the most civilised / advanced / enlightened society in the Nexus, and they can be decidedly brash about it.
I think it is Word of God that, roughly, Barrayar = Czarist Russia, Cetaganda = Imperial China/Imperial Japan and Beta Colony = California.
And Jackson’s Whole? Mmm, maybe the less attempting-precise-identification the better, with that place…
I’ve certainly always seen likenesses in various ways, between Cetaganda and Japan (past and present).