Storm from the Shadows (Honorverse: Talbot #2)

My rating:

add to my books

Storm from the Shadows (Honorverse: Talbot #2)

by David Weber

3.86 · rating details · 673 ratings · 55 reviews

"Gloria Michelle Samantha Evelyn Henke has always wished her life could have been simpler. After all, she's a lot of people, with a lot of responsibilities - rear admiral, Countess of Gold Peak, cousin of the Queen, fifth in line for the throne, and best friend of Honor Harrington - and she doesn't even like politics. At least, though, it hasn't been as bad for her as...more

Hardcover, 755 pages

Published March 3rd 2009 by Baen

more details... edit details

Get a copy:

More…

There is a good chance some of your friends read this book. Sign in to see!

Friend Reviews

To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.

Lists with This Book

This book is currently not featured on any Listopia lists. Add this book to your favorite list »

Community Reviews

(showing 1-30 of 973)

filter | sort: default (?) | rating details

Aug 03, 2011

Jesse added it

Storm from the Shadows is the sequel to the "Shadow of Saganami" story arc in the Honorverse. Weber has chosen (and explains in the Forward) that he will be telling the same events from different angles through the three story arcs (Honor, Saganami, Crown of Slaves).

As such, SftS follows Mike Henke through her capture by Haven, parole and then deployment to the Talbott Cluster. Mike, and the other characters presented are written well, though they tend to self-monologue a bit too muc...more

· see review

Feb 18, 2011

Chuck rated it

I think this is, by far, the least effective of Weber's novels (and I will say that I am a HUGE David Weber fan). Very little action, a great deal of political machination, and thousands of words about how hypothetical warheads work. I kept waiting for the book to get exciting and for the 'payoff' scenes because, in every other Weber novel I've read, even if there's been a slow start, there's a point at which I get into the book and just HAVE to finish it.

That never happened with thi...more

· see review

Aug 05, 2009

David rated it

I own many of Weber's earlier efforts. This one was a library read which pretty much confirms my assessment of what's gone wrong with Weber's writing lately.

Big book, interesting developments in the Honor-verse plot-lines, but filled with stylistic and writerly choices that really depress me. Most of the book reads like a series of reports, not characters moving through a story. New characters are name-checked and have one physical attribute and one psychological attribute attached ...more

like 2 likes

· see review

Jul 21, 2009

Theo rated it

Unfortunately my first review didn't "save" so this one will probably be quicker and less thought out...

I have really enjoyed all of Weber's Honorverse books as well as some of his other titles, up until now. This book was awful. Unfortunately it would be difficult to give examples of why this book didn't work without giving out spoilers but I will do my best. He stated in the introduction that part of the book would be retelling events in other books from different char...moreUnfortunately my first review didn't "save" so this one will probably be quicker and less thought out...

I have really enjoyed all of Weber's Honorverse books as well as some of his other titles, up until now. This book was awful. Unfortunately it would be difficult to give examples of why this book didn't work without giving out spoilers but I will do my best. He stated in the introduction that part of the book would be retelling events in other books from different character's perspectives... and it didn't really do that... but for the effort I found it hard to tell when in the overall story I was supposed to be. It just made the timeline for this book jumbled.

Next, there were too many attempts at subplots and character developments so that no one character or group of characters was focused on long enough for me to get interested in them. Nominally, I took it Michelle Henke was the "main character" but she only had two majour scenes. If you liked the characters from Shadow of Saganami, they're in there too... Aivers Terekhov is mentioned early, and forgotten, then mentioned again later... Honor makes an appearance or two... There's (I think) supposed to be development of Helen Zilwicki's and Abigail Hearn's characters, but Weber never really tells what happens with them, more like gives results in a summary later. (a bit of spoiler here) for example, someone has a problem with Abigail, they bad mouth her for a page or two and get talked to by someone else for a page, then no mention of it until later the Captain reports to the Commodore that "Abigail solved it by being Abigail and working really hard." (no, really, that was the solution.) Another point a competition is mentioned, then chapters later the results are stated in a paragraph... that sort of thing.

There's the main pseudo-antagonist in this but mostly, it's a repeat of what happened in Shadow of Saganami just less-so. There's no big battle.... four ships get blown up total, and none of them fought back...

The books was filled with references to one group's master plan... but they were all deliberately vague and not in any mysterious way... just a "oh, and this group is STILL planning something" way...

The passing touch on any character or group got very old very fast because, among other things, it was people reacting to things that had already happened and reacting incorrectly due to lag time in information due to travel requirements, worse the reader ALWAYS knew people were reacting incorrectly because it dealt with what happened and then with people not knowing about it. Further, one group had secretly developed a faster stardrive and so were always ahead of others, but no one figured it out despite constant references and ponderings about how [that group:] could NEVER have orchestrated all this because the time it would take to coordinate it was too long, or how that group always seemed to know things before others... frankly if every other page that held a reference to how that group couldn't have done something or known something due to travel time had been torn out and burned, there would still be too many incidents of it. Same with talking about other things that happend... an assassination attempt on someone (from another book) gets repeated ad nauseam, as do references to Helen's misadventures in Old Chicago.

By the end of the book, I just didn't care. Nothing really happened. Nothing really got done or was resolved. One group has a master plan. Another group is arrogant. Some people are angry and unreasonable. And most of the things that took place in this book already took place in other books. That about sums this book up. If you read Crown of Slaves, Shadow of Saganami and At All Costs, you'll have already covered about half this book. The other half are pointless hints that something else is going to happen. At some point. But not in this book.

I assume the half of this book that isn't already covered in the other three books will still be repeated in Mission of Honor and Torch of Freedom.

I never give up my books. I buy them and keep them so I can reread them. I have shelves in the attic filled with books, but frankly, if I thought I could get away with it, I'd return this book to Borders tomorrow.(less)

· see review

Mar 18, 2009

Deianaera rated it

Recommends it for: people who already want to read it

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

· see review

Jan 12, 2010

John Christensen rated it

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. This book represents, in many ways, Weber's sequel to At All Costs. In that regards, this book has been a long time coming. And, in many ways, it doesn't disappoint. But in some ways it does. The plot concerns the aftermath of the events in Shadow of Saganami and At All Costs and as you read it you can definitely see where the author is completely changing the enemy of the Honorverse from the Havenites to Mesa. This group, with a more sinister objective than the Peeps ever really had, continues ...moreThis book represents, in many ways, Weber's sequel to At All Costs. In that regards, this book has been a long time coming. And, in many ways, it doesn't disappoint. But in some ways it does. The plot concerns the aftermath of the events in Shadow of Saganami and At All Costs and as you read it you can definitely see where the author is completely changing the enemy of the Honorverse from the Havenites to Mesa. This group, with a more sinister objective than the Peeps ever really had, continues to manipulate events from behind the scenes to try to control Manticore's rise.

The book itself goes back over a lot of the events of At All Costs from different perspectives - readers may well be put off as Weber goes about re-telling Henke's capture and the immediate events after that. Henke is, ostensibly, the main character in this book - but it must be admitted that she gets that title only because her name is in the book jacket.

SftS definitely works on the same scale as At All Costs, or War of Honor, or any of the recent Honorverse main works - focusing on many different groups and protagonists as it spins a very large story. This is in marked contrast to Shadow of Saganami which was much more in line with the earlier books of the series, focusing most of its attention on a single Manticoran ship. This is, to my mind, regretful - I liked the idea of a Shadow of Saganami series because I thought that was the intention.

The major problem with this book, though, was pacing. The pace of events in this story is very slow - and even the climaxes turn out to be somewhat anti-climatic. Aside from the first chapter, which really is a prologue, there is all of one combat. Worse than this, both of the big events that this book is clearly leading up to are left out of the book - making this book not so much a stand-alone entry in the series but, instead, a prologue to Mission of Honor (due out in July).

All in all - this is definitely a book anyone who wants to continue following the Honorverse plot needs to read. That said, though, this is one of the weaker entries in that plotline.

Oh, and minor nitpick - the author really, really, really needs to find another expression to replace "such as it was, and what there was of it". The same expression shouldn't come out of three or four different characters, frankly, it breaks the idea that these are supposed to be separate voices if they're going to use the same expressions.(less)

· see review

Oct 16, 2009

Peter rated it

David Weber's space navy series about Honor Harrington is quite popular, and if you read the first book you'll know that much of that popularity is well-deserved. However, the rest of the dozen-or-so books in the series get to be quite repetitive, and the quality goes downhill while the page count climbs. Storm from the Shadows is unquestionably the worst book in this series that I have read so far. The narrative takes long detours into technical data or background information that neither moves...more

· see review

Apr 07, 2009

Roberta rated it

Shelves: sciencefiction

I will say that if you love the series and want a conclusion to a story, you might want to wait to read this one. The book has a HUGE cliffhanger ending. All that being said, I enjoyed the book, but 732 pages and no clear ending in sight is more than a little annoying. Also, it is difficult to keep track of his characters, his info dumps are right in the middle on conversations as thoughts that a character is having, and I truly hope that when this plot arc ends that it isn't as Honor swoops ...more

· see review

May 22, 2010

Matt rated it

Shelves: science-fiction

Someone needs to tell either Weber or his editors that the book could be a whole lot thinner (and easier to carry/handle) if they would just use A SMALLER FONT!!! And Weber needs to be told to cut way back on the pages and pages of strategy confabs between characters and the endless missile-tech neepery. This book took me two whole weeks to slog through, reading at every possible opportune moment while awake. If the next Honor-starring novel, MISSION OF HONOR, is like this (and the back-of-book ...more

· see review

Apr 14, 2009

Nick rated it

Shelves: military-science-fiction

This book might get a fifth star but for the fact that the author has painted himself into a corner, and is now having to scramble to get out of it. The menaces that the good guys now face are just a little bit too big, a legitimate result of the previous books, and that is a problem. The cliffhanger ending of this volume is not out of line with the others in the series, but in this case leaves ALL of the plot threads to be wrapped up in later volumes, which is less than completely satisfying.
...more

· see review

Jun 19, 2009

Guy rated it

Shelves: science-fiction-and-fantasy

Excellent as always, but not quite perfect due to the unfortunate decision to retell quite a few scenes, albeit from a different perspective, that have already appeared in previous books ("Saganami" and "At all Costs"). Despite the claims of the author in his introduction (i.e., that the duplicate scenes were needed to establish additional characters) I suspect that the real decision to do so was triggered by the publisher's desire to produce a stand-alone book that did not ...more

like 1 like

· see review

Mar 09, 2010

David Broussard rated it

Continuing to move his Honorverse intonation story that spans more then just Honor Harrington Weber gives us the saga of Michelle Henke and the expansion of the Empire of Manticore into the Talbott cluster. After AicRs Terekov's victory at Monica, Countess Gold Peak is asked to reinforce him with a squadron of battlecruisers. Unfortunately for her, the nefarious Mesans are continuing to manipulate things in the cluster and have caused the deployment of a fleet of Solarian battlecruisers there as...more

· see review

Sep 14, 2009

Donna rated it

This was my least favorite of Weber's stories about the Honorverse. Honor Harrington plays a bit part. Rear Admiral Michelle Henke, Honor's close friend and the 5th in succession for the Manticore throne, has the main role for the first third of the book but fades into a bit role as well.
The story flips from the war with Haven and Henke's capture as a POW and then her release to the Talbot confrontation to Manpower's instigation of the escalation of the Talbot conflict and to the attempted...more

· see review

Jun 19, 2011

David rated it

I am finding Weber's spin-offs from the main Honorverse series more and more interesting than the main story arc. The events in the Cluster capture the spirit of Honor's earlier escapades much more effectively. Main characters are dealing with finite resources and more believable obstacles than any sort of fleet-wielding admiral may find him--or her--self facing. I am also enjoying the development of Henke as an independent character, though I am privately hoping she will become more distinct fr...more

· see review

Feb 27, 2009

Mike rated it

Full review at my blog!

Storm from the Shadows is David Weber’s latest book set in the “Honorverse.” A fact that is amusing given that the titular character, only has a marginal pressence in this novel. Indeed the hero’s point of view belongs to Michelle Henke (amongst others) and focuses on the events in the Talbot Cluster, the newly annexed star cluster that expands the Stark Kingdom of Manitcore into the Star Empire of Manticore. The book clocks in at a massive 800 pages and, in...more

· see review

Nov 05, 2010

Kathy Davie rated it

Shelves: action, homey, military, sci-fi

This was good. Frustrating in that it felt as though it spanned about three of the HH series although it really was concurrent with #11, At All Costs and a bit beyond it. (Weber has the cheek to admit in an Authorial Note that he had planned to kill off Honor in #11! He'd better keep her on...if only because she deserves it!). Mike learns something about herself and...thank god...we finally got to the action the whole story was leading up to. I thought I would expire with impatience!! Hah!! F...more

· see review

Mar 20, 2009

Amy rated it

Shelves: 50-books-2009, sci-fi, owned

I honestly didn't realize this was a "main line" Honor book when I got it. Then again, I was just so excited to see a Honorverse book again, I didn't care. ^^; Instead of it being focused on Honor, it focuses on her best friend, Mike Henke. Fine by me, cos I'd always liked Mike. Like most of what Weber writes, it's got character development for those that want that, military for those that want that, intrigue, space battles, and a bit of humor tossed in when things look their grimmest....more

· see review

Mar 14, 2009

Michael rated it

In this book, David Weber continues slowly advancing one of the three plot threads that the Honor Harrington story has broken into. Here he advances events in the newly-annexed Talbott cluster by following events surrounding Honor's friend, Michelle Henke. At the same time, he pushes forward the machinations of Manpower, Inc. and the plotters behind the mask of Manpower. Given the sheer amount of backstory to the series at this point, this is not a book for casual readers looking to enter the...more

· see review

Sep 06, 2009

Laura rated it

Shelves: 2009, speculative-fiction, commented-on

This book is a disappointment. Generally the honorverse books make up for excessive exposition by including a fair amount of plot. Usually there is build up, several small to mid sized conflicts, then the end has a large conflict that resolves something. In this novel the resolution is not that exciting and is 1/4 from the end and the sneaky people who have been becoming more important to the series have launched something unspecified that will happen in the next book. Very cliff hanger ending, ...more

· see review

Apr 28, 2009

Chris rated it

Shelves: ebooks

Pretty good, but not particularly good for this series. There is exactly one major surprise, and Weber keeps hinting at it over and over again, less and less vaguely, until he's spelling it out. There's quite a bit of military honor & glory. Too many characters & titles and navies, so about half the sections ran on a while before I knew who I was reading about.

But the thing that bothers me is in all this top about manipulation (and to Haven it's particularly obvious), nobody every pu...more

· see review

Jul 26, 2010

Barbara rated it

Shelves: sf-f

Very sad to admit that one of my favorite authors has crossed over into the "I'll just skim this one, maybe" territory. But this book falls into that category. It covers the same ground (from a different view point) as At All Costs (another one I just skimmed). I'm sorry Mr. Weber, but, IMHO, you have dragged the Honor Harrington series on just a little too long. I no longer really care.
That was my 1 star review from April 2009.

What a difference a year makes:
...more

· see review

Dec 11, 2009

D.w. rated it

Shelves: reviewed

Thank goodness for not having an income and not paying for this book at list price. How do you turn a 200 page story into 730 pages of Blather? Ask David Weber. He is becoming the master of Blather.

So we know governments have meetings to discuss things. And that they engage in small talk. I hope you like that, since every bit of a meeting is discussed. Who attends, what they do, how they got the job, what their secret thoughts of, what their middle name is, when they pick their nose....moreThank goodness for not having an income and not paying for this book at list price. How do you turn a 200 page story into 730 pages of Blather? Ask David Weber. He is becoming the master of Blather.

So we know governments have meetings to discuss things. And that they engage in small talk. I hope you like that, since every bit of a meeting is discussed. Who attends, what they do, how they got the job, what their secret thoughts of, what their middle name is, when they pick their nose... That is the point, that these meetings are pointless to the story. They can be handled in a paragraph rather than in a 10 page chapter.

They are filled with unimportant tertiary characters, characters that the main characters will never interact with. They show things that have been told to you the reader three times. Then there are meetings that are written up many times, and because Weber changes the plot line, those meetings are now 100+ wasted pages that no longer are part of the story.

It is equal to be part of the peace talks with Japan prior to Dec 7 1941, when we weren't at war, but there was tension between the countries. So they set up fake talks to allay the fears of the Americans. Would you like to read the transcripts of all the meetings before Dec 7 1941 that dealt with the preparations for the meeting that was a hoax? Well read this book, it is the same thing.

There are 2 battles and if I have to hear another officer talk about whether the Manticorans are not as good as the Solarians, but they really are, I should go shoot Weber. He says it at least 20 times, with every character he mentions in the book.

But let me clarify the battles, one was in a previous book, and then the second is a big game of Chicken. It is basically the Cowboys and the Indians, and the Indians not believing the Remington can outshoot a bow and arrow, but when it takes the head of the chief, the fight goes out of this war party.

I said before that Honor was too powerful, too perfect, and when she is written, Weber holds to that. She is the Superwoman. But now we still have other things that make no sense. He tries to describe the Solarian government which could never exist in reality. He spends pages on all sorts of inconsequential details that are details. Cut. Cut. Cut. He is no longer paid by the word, why not give a story that does not have to take so much damn space.

Would I ever read this again. No. Why read it now? Because I and a few friends have been reading the series for a long time. We can talk about it. But if you have better things to do with your time. Do them. If needed we can summarize the entire tail in five minutes. For 732 pages, that is pretty lousy exchange for what the author put on paper.(less)

· see review

Aug 16, 2009

Liviu rated it

Shelves: genre-sf, 2009_release_read, read_2009

Having the opportunity to read what seems to be the final draft of this one, the 14th novel in the Honor Harrington saga which is the series in which I expect the most eagerly the next book - having it followed since its first installments 14 years or so ago - I have to say that for once Mr. Weber - true to his word and warning since this latest installment will consist of 3 novels that run in parallel with the last one presumably solving the situation - ends with a huge cliffhanger that almost...more

· see review

Oct 29, 2011

Robin rated it

Shelves: audio-books

The story itself was fine and very typical of the series. However, a different narrator was used for this book than was used in previous books. I didn't mind the switch from a female voice to a male voice, since this isn't really an Honor book; it's just set in the Honorverse. I have listened to all of the books in sequence, starting with Basilisk Station and have to say that I enjoyed the performance of this one the least.

The thing that bugged me most about this particular performan...more

· see review

Apr 29, 2009

E. rated it

A convoluted complex space opera that is Weber's hallmark. The sheer number of characters and intricate plots are sometimes overwhelming and he skates over a pretty major engagement between Haven and Manticore but the twists and turns keep the reader engaged and, of course, the story ends with a cliffhanger although at more than 700 pages this is a pretty long story as it is. Honor Harrington has been relegated to the role of a secondary character and the treecats are only briefly seen while t...more

· see review

Sep 30, 2010

Jimmy rated it

Shelves: pulp-sci-fi

It's a betweener book.
Al the characters are familiar from previous books and this entire book feels like an effort to get them into the right places for the next story arc with the bad guy's changing to be "the alignment"

Almost all of the big events in the book actually happen in other books and it's hard to escape the feeling that the entire cast of this book are sitting in the wings waiting to be cool.

Feel free to skip this book until the 3rd book in thi...more

· see review

Jun 10, 2010

Tandriin rated it

Shelves: science-fiction, honorverse

First i have to admit, that the english version of the book is a lot better then the german one. You'll get a fascinating insight into the new established talbot quadrant and the mesa/alignment situation. Especially the "conflict" between Admiral Goldpeak and the solarian admiral Byng is a gripping chapter. At the end of the book you'll be suprised that Khumalo isn't really the weak and uncertain as many of us thought at the start of the talbot-plot.

· see review

Mar 13, 2009

Mikolaj Habryn rated it

Yay, more Weber! He does the things he does very well, though I'm not totally comfortable with the shift from the usual lead character. So far my fear that he can only write a single character has not been entirely borne out, but I'm not convinced either way. Still, great fun, and it's interesting that he's diverging from the usual structure in so many ways - overlapping timeline, cliffhanger ending, etc.

· see review

May 28, 2009

Peggy Lo rated it

Shelves: scifi

I still like the Honor books the best but I'm glad that real evil behind the scenes is finally standing up and the Manpower is taking their rightful place as the big bad. The analysis of the cracks in the Solarian League was also fascinating.

It's hard to just jump in because I have to start reminding myself who the other people are and then I feel like I have to go back read the last Shadow book just to get back into the swing of things.

· see review

Aug 10, 2011

Caleb rated it

Shelves: science-fiction, z-2011-read

Most likely the weakest of the Honorverse books so far. 1100 pages in paperback and less than fifty were of combat. Much of the story was a re-telling of events covered in the main story arc. That wouldn't be so bad if the rest of the book wasn't just various people sitting around talking about what other may or may not be thinking. This book could have easily been 500 pages and not lost any of the richness that we expect from David Weber in the telling. I hope the next couple are better.

· see review

« previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 … 32 33 next »

new topic
Discuss This Book

There are no discussion topics on this book yet. Be the first to start one »

Recommend it | Stats | Recent status updates

combine
Other Editions (7)

More editions...

Genres

Science Fiction

44 users

Science Fiction > Space Opera

6 users

War > Military

6 users

Adventure

4 users

Space

4 users

Science Fiction Fantasy

3 users

War

3 users

Womens

2 users

War > Soldiers

2 users

Literature > American

2 users

See top shelves...

Readers Also Enjoyed

About David Weber

David Mark Weber is an American science fiction and fantasy author. He was born in Cleveland, Ohio in 1952.

Many of his stories have military, particularly naval, themes, and fit into the military science fiction genre. He frequently places female leading characters in what have been traditionally male roles.

One of his most popular and enduring characters is Honor Harrington...more

More about David Weber...

Books by David Weber

On Basilisk Station (Honor Harrington, #1)

The Honor of the Queen (Honor Harrington, #2)

The Short Victorious War (Honor Harrington, #3)

Honor Among Enemies (Honor Harrington, #6)

Field of Dishonor (Honor Harrington, #4)

More…

Share This Book

Facebook Twitter Your website

Pin It

Trivia About Storm from the Sh...

No trivia or quizzes yet. Add some now »

Groups That Shelved Storm from the Sh...

Honorverse

29 members

last activity Jan 11, 2012 01:27pm

shelf: read

MobileRead Book Challenges

82 members

last activity 6 minutes ago

shelf: to-read

title link	preview: Storm from the Shadows
avg rating	preview: Storm from the Shadows Goodreads rating: 3.86 (673 ratings)
small image	preview: click here [close]
med image	preview: click here [close]
BBCode	[url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3667676-storm-from-the-shadows?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1256064902m/3667676.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3667676-storm-from-the-shadows?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]Storm from the Shadows by David Weber[/url]

Storm from the Shadows (Honorverse: Talbot #2)

Friend Reviews

Community Reviews

Readers Also Enjoyed

Share This Book

Share This Book on Your Website