Shards of Honour

This was interesting, with what felt like a unique take on the space opera genre (the slightly more mature main characters were a nice touch). While most of the prose was very good, with a nice turn of phrase, there was the occasional rushed scene that felt a little "boy's own", although not enough to detract from the overall story. In summary, very good and I am curious about the next in the series (and indeed, the wider series).

Cordelia Naismith is a terrific heroine and this is a wonderful love story. I listened to Shards of Honor in audio format, read by Grover Gardner. At first I thought the choice of a male narrator was strange until I remembered that most of the VORKOSIGAN books are written from Miles??? perspective.

I had heard about these books, so wanted to try them. I didn't like it. Not because it was poorly written or because I didn't like the characters. the primary plot of the book involves political intrigue, palace plotting and complicated social relationships. I don't generally like any of these nor is it easy for me to follow these kinds of plot threads. But, if you like this stuff, than dive right in, you will probably like this book. The author writes clearly and well.

The other thing that irritated me was that the SF trappings in the book were just stage settings. If you replaced every reference to a space ship with a sailing ship, planet with country you would have the same story set on Earth