Captain Vorpatril's Alliance

[ffutures]

I forgot to comment on Captain Vorpatril's Alliance. Some plot discussion follows, mostly nothing you won't know if you read the first few chapters on Baen's site:

[Spoiler (click to open)]Basically, it's a typical late Bujold romantic comedy of errors, and immense fun. Ivan is his usual impetuous but somehow strangely efficient self, and (entirely for the good of ImpSec

Comments

[gonzo21]

I've tried to read a couple of her books, but I don't think I had good jumping in points. Is it best to start with the very first one, or is there one of the earlier books that is particularly good, that would make a particularly good introduction to the series?

[ffutures]

It's tricky because there was a BIG change in direction midway through the series.

The first one is a reasonably good introduction to the characters and society, but lacks a lot of the complexities of the later works. And there are some big backwards and forwards chronological jumps.

Bujold's preferred reading order is here

http://www.myspace.com/loismcmasterbujold/blog/543224694

It's about what I'd recommend; though the later books are to me the most complex and enjoyable, you need the back-story first.

[dsample]

Looking at that list, my main recommendation is that of the earlier books, you read "Shards of Honor" before "Barrayar" (in many ways they are two halves of the same story, even though they were written years apart. SoH/Barrayar started out as one book, but LMB got half way through the second half, and realized that it was getting much too big, so she backtracked to find a good stopping place, and then put the rest of the story on hold for a few years.)

The rest of the earlier books in the series all work pretty well as stand-alone novels. While there are references to events from earlier books, you don't *need* to have read them to follow what's going on.

From "Mirror Dance" on, though, you are liable to find yourself getting very lost if you read them out of order.

[whswhs]

I found it the most enjoyable of her recent books. She really seems to be a bit tired of writing about Miles; her portrayal of Ivan in this book had a lot more freshness.

I thought the introduction of a classic caper plot in the second half of the book was a curious twist.