Cetaganda by Lois McMaster Bujold

(Acquired: bookshelf)

My husband introduced me to Lois McMaster Bujold through the Vorkosigan series a few years back. He gave me a stack of books that I was blissfully working my way through, enjoying the political trickery and sheer inventiveness of the characters. Then we moved and the pile vanished. Out of sight, out of mind, sad to say. With a “”to be read”” (tbr) pile like mine, there’s rarely the urge to go seek out something that got mislaid :). My youngest started in on the series though, and loved it. Right up until he reached this gap where a book was missing. Some searching found it tucked in a corner of my tbr pile, overlooked because it wasn’t in a big stack. I had a bunch of newer books to read and so didn’t pick it up until this week, when I couldn’t quite figure out what mood I was in.

Now I’m kicking myself. I love the Vorkosigan series. It has what I favor in military, political, and diplomatic fiction combined with a self-aware, sometimes ridiculously so, character leading a cast of interesting people through amazing chaos that could collapse at any moment but somehow manages to stay afloat. This book is one of those that makes me wish I could take a year off just to read, give myself time to enjoy other people’s worlds and inventions.

I read a wide variety of genres, though not as wide as some, and I’ve been lucky to find some fabulous authors. It means sometimes an older book falls through the cracks. You can bet though, I’m getting my stack back on the shelf, because I now have (again) someone to fill that “I don’t know what I want to read” slot. Of course I also have to take the leap and try her fantasy as well. Though SF is my first love, if authors I enjoy take the plunge, I usually find myself pleased with the results.

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3 Responses to Cetaganda by Lois McMaster Bujold

  1. jjmcgaffey says:

    Uh-oh. Jacob is reading Miles? I’m scared….

    I like her Chalion trio (not trilogy, the third is same universe but not otherwise related). The Sharing Knife series aren’t as good.

    Neat, coming back to Cetaganda. That’s one of my favorites – I find most of young Miles very hard to take, I like him much better at Memory and after. But Cetaganda he’s relatively sane. For Miles, anyway.

  2. jodi says:

    OMG—!!!!!OMG, you haven’t read the Vorkosigan series??? What have you missed? My absolute very favorite, ultimate favorite book in the whole world is Shards of Honor. That and Barrayar.

    I told my Cp if Bujold ever killed Aral and Cordelia, I’d have to stop reading her.

    Evry single one–every single one–of her Vorkosigan books are great, and if you haven’t listened to Michael Hanson from the Readers Chair read the Vorkosigan books on cd, you’ve missed more.

    There are so many layers in the series, layers on layers, I can re-read them and still love them each and every time. It’s all about honor and redemption, and finding a seperate peace–Mark is fabulous, and it all winds up nicely in A Civil Campaign. But I think–outside of Shards and Baraayar, Mirror Dance is my favorite. It’s like Bujold says, a picture of the inside of Mark’s head.

    The Chalion series was good, but only the first two. The Sharing Knife is horrible. I understand she has an Ivan book coming. Thank God.

  3. Margaret says:

    Yeah, well, there are SO many books out there. I have a to be read BOOKCASE :p.

    I was reading them chronologically, so I read the first two Cordelias and at least 2 Miles ones so far.

    Thanks both of you for the hints on the fantasy side. I’ll get there eventually.

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