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35th out of 68 books
—
747 voters
The Vor Game (Vorkosigan Saga (Publication order) #6)
by
Lois McMaster Bujold (Goodreads Author)
Miles Vorkosigan graduates from the Academy, joins a mutiny, is placed under house arrest, goes on a secret mission, reconnects with his loyal Dendarii Mercenaries, rescues his Emperor, and thwarts an interstellar war. Situation normal, if you're Miles.
Mass Market Paperback, 346 pages
Published
September 1st 1990
by Baen Books
(first published January 1st 1990)
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Following the resounding success of my Locus Quest, I faced a dilemma: which reading list to follow it up with? Variety is the spice of life, so I’ve decided to diversify and pursue six different lists simultaneously. This book falls into my HUGO WINNERS list.
This is the reading list that follows the old adage, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". I loved reading the Locus Sci-Fi Award winners so I'm going to crack on with the Hugo winners next (but only the post-1980 winners, I'll follow up with...more
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Finished! Have now read AND written reviews for The Vorkosigan Saga, a militaristic space opera with some romance (but not in this book), plenty of suspenseful action-adventure, and sound character development. I read about 19 books in the past month, crushing on Lord Aral and Lady Cordelia Vorkosigan and their midget-like son Miles, aka The Mutie Lord, Shorty, Admiral Naismith, etc. Aka bloody brilliant.
I loved the main bulk of the story, with Miles and Gregor and the Dendarii Mercenaries. Lo...more
I loved the main bulk of the story, with Miles and Gregor and the Dendarii Mercenaries. Lo...more
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After a re-read, I still love this one. It begins with the new Ensign Miles Vorkosigan stationed at the arctic Kyril Island to see if he can maintain his proper place in a military hierarchy. (He can’t.) Then on to his next mission when he stumbles across a runaway emperor, who Miles either rescues or further endangers, depending on your point of view. Then onwards to prevent a war.
As long as you don’t let yourself be bothered by incredible coincidences, improbable chains of events, and nick-of-...more
As long as you don’t let yourself be bothered by incredible coincidences, improbable chains of events, and nick-of-...more
Miles graduates from the Academy and receives his first post. Being Miles, he quickly finds himself at odds with his commanding officer. After the discovery of a possible murder, making everyone at his new post uncomfortable, and a bit of insubordination, Miles must face Imperial Security and detainment. In an effort to save his own hide, Miles makes a deal with Security. As Miles juggles being Lord Vorkosigan, Admiral Naismith, and a new personality, he must stop a war, uncover intelligence for...more
Our hero, Miles, is shuffled off to an Arctic station where his assignment is to keep his nose clean and learn how to get along with superiors. If he manages to do that for six months without getting into trouble, he can get a cushy assignment on a new ship being built.
It's Miles, though, and he can't stay out of trouble for six days, let alone six months. Before too long he has led a mutiny, gotten almost everyone in trouble, and (if I remember correctly) set a few buildings on fire.
So much f...more
It's Miles, though, and he can't stay out of trouble for six days, let alone six months. Before too long he has led a mutiny, gotten almost everyone in trouble, and (if I remember correctly) set a few buildings on fire.
So much f...more
The Vorkosigan Saga
It's been a long overdue read of mine this series. I've been wanting to read it for a long, long time.
I was quite prejudiced when it came to start reading it because I thought I wouldn't like it at all.
Actually, it reads quite well, in a Golden Age of Scifi spaceopera way. It has all the elements I got to love in a spaceopera when I was a teen: Long saga, intelligent characters, a cohesive universe... Oh! I would have loved it very much back then.
Nowadays? I haven't loved it t...more
It's been a long overdue read of mine this series. I've been wanting to read it for a long, long time.
I was quite prejudiced when it came to start reading it because I thought I wouldn't like it at all.
Actually, it reads quite well, in a Golden Age of Scifi spaceopera way. It has all the elements I got to love in a spaceopera when I was a teen: Long saga, intelligent characters, a cohesive universe... Oh! I would have loved it very much back then.
Nowadays? I haven't loved it t...more
This was a reread for me, of one of my favorite books, that I literally have not read in 14 years. You can see that I rarely reread anything. Stranger still, I read this in an odd order: I read the last third first, and then the first and second third. I can't really explain why I did that. I was desperate to distract myself with a really good book so I picked this one up and opened to the beginning of the climax, trying to decide if this book was as good as I remembered it. I was not, however,...more
Miles’ first assigment after graduation from the Barrayar Service Academy seems like a complete dead end. Weather officer at a remote arctic training station. He is replacing an officer who has spent fifteen years at the base, and uses his nose to compile the forecast. Miles has been more or less promised a very attractive ship assignment if he can prove that he can follow orders and keep out of trouble for six months. For even after graduation there are many who believe Miles is too weak and sh...more
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This time Miles gets sent to (the Barrayian version of) a Siberian training base to see if he can't figure out that whole being a subordinate thing . . . because he's gotta learn to obey if he's ever gonna live the dream of serving on a starship, but what's a tiny-brittle-boned-hunch-backed-hyperactive-genius supposed to do when his commanding officer is on the verge of committing mass-murder (and creating a political disaster that could undermine his father's hard won carefully balanced planeta...more
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After finishing at the academy, Miles is sent to serve as the weather officer of a remote training base. It's a disappointment, but he's told that if he does well for six months then he could get assigned to an under-construction spaceship that's nearing completion. When those hopes are dashed by an unstable general and a difficult decision, Miles gets a new mission - one that could bring him back into contact with the mercenary fleet he once commanded.
Like the earlier Vorkosigan books, this is...more
Like the earlier Vorkosigan books, this is...more
Aug 24, 2009
Jon
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
space opera lovers
Recommended to Jon by:
Beyond Reality Series Selection
3.5 stars
I read this as part of the omnibus edition Young Miles.
We return to Miles while he and Ivan are collecting their first duty assignments after graduating from the Imperial Security Academy. Miles yearns for ship duty. Ivan receives his orders staioning him in the capitol at ImpSec HQ. Miles orders send him to the farthest reaches of the Barrayar arctic as the weatherman for Kyril Island. Miles questions his assignment, especially since he only took one perfunctory meteorology course his...more
I read this as part of the omnibus edition Young Miles.
We return to Miles while he and Ivan are collecting their first duty assignments after graduating from the Imperial Security Academy. Miles yearns for ship duty. Ivan receives his orders staioning him in the capitol at ImpSec HQ. Miles orders send him to the farthest reaches of the Barrayar arctic as the weatherman for Kyril Island. Miles questions his assignment, especially since he only took one perfunctory meteorology course his...more
"Miles Learns About Command." For a book with only seventeen chapters, I was astounded at how it felt like I was reading two or three separate books. Miles, Ensign Vorkosigan now, is tasked with his first commissioned assignment: don't piss anyone off for six months. To his credit, his complete failure is not entirely of his own making.
When I say "learns about command" I mean both the assumption of and subservience to, only one of which he arguably excels at. In many ways the military-political...more
When I say "learns about command" I mean both the assumption of and subservience to, only one of which he arguably excels at. In many ways the military-political...more
This book really reads as two separate stories--the episode on Kyril Island and then the adventure with Ungari and Gregor. Miles has difficult choices to make, and his nimble mind makes the unexpected connections out of conjecture.
I am coming to like and appreciate Miles, conflicts in his life, the forces that drive him. His "Admiral Naismith" persona is engaging and amazing, but it is the reality of his Vorkosigan life that I appreciate the most.
New and old relationships shape this story, the c...more
I am coming to like and appreciate Miles, conflicts in his life, the forces that drive him. His "Admiral Naismith" persona is engaging and amazing, but it is the reality of his Vorkosigan life that I appreciate the most.
New and old relationships shape this story, the c...more
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This series is undeniable space opera, but it's smartly written, witty, character-driven space opera. Bujold's protagonist, the dwarfish, fragile Miles, is an unusual hero, but the way he uses his brilliant mind and clever tongue to compensate for his physical handicaps is a lot of fun, as is the way his overconfidence tends to get him into trouble. Miles' homeworld is interesting, too, a planet with a feudal background that's trying to shed its old prejudices, modernize, and find its place amon...more
I love a good rogue - or I love reading about them, rather. I may have mentioned elsewhere that, prior to five or six years ago, I liked my protagonists to be heroic in the more traditional sense of the word: followers of order and justice, keepers of the peace - Lawful Good, to use the parlance of Dungeons and Dragons and other tabletop role-playing games. However, recently I've developed a marked preference for rogues: clever, street-smart, and whose loyalties and actions are defined not by th...more
Very satisfying second novel featuring Miles Vorkosagian, a crippled son of an aristocratic planetary premier who must use his wits, courage, and leadership skills to excel in the Imperial Barrayar space navy. Bujold is very skillful in engaging the reader�s empathy for this underdog whom she has described as bearing three besetting sins: pride, imprudence, and despair. In this tale, Miles gets assigned to serve as a weatherman in a god-forsaken arctic outpost. He ends up having to resolve a mut...more
The Vor Game is a fun, intellectual and not too serious sci fi romp.
I had heard a lot of praise for Lois McMaster Bujold's work as top-rank military or adventure sci fi, and I can see why. I tried this one even though it's not first in the series, but didn't find it hard to follow along. It starts out small-scale enough, but partway through I did get a bit lost with all the names, because I was listening to it on audio and didn't have the luxury of seeing the names and referring back to them....more
Another excellent entry into Bujold's Vorkosigan saga. (And now I get to check one more off my list of Hugo winners - now at 74% done!).
This one's quite heavy on the space opera, which isn't at all a bad thing.
Miles has left his alternate identity as Admiral Naismith behind, in order to study at the military academy at home on Barrayar. Upon graduation, he hopes to be assigned ship duty, and to get back into space. It's about as far from his dreams as he can imagine when he's assigned to the po...more
This one's quite heavy on the space opera, which isn't at all a bad thing.
Miles has left his alternate identity as Admiral Naismith behind, in order to study at the military academy at home on Barrayar. Upon graduation, he hopes to be assigned ship duty, and to get back into space. It's about as far from his dreams as he can imagine when he's assigned to the po...more
This is the second book in the series with Miles as the main character. In the first part of the book Miles graduates from the Academy and gets sent to a remote frozen island to be the weather officer. It almost reads like a mystery as a dead body appears and Miles tries to figure out the sordid history of his commanding officer.
In the second part of the book, Miles is reunited with the Dendarii mercenaries in his Admiral Naismith persona and has to rescue the AWOL emperor. While the two parts...more
In the second part of the book, Miles is reunited with the Dendarii mercenaries in his Admiral Naismith persona and has to rescue the AWOL emperor. While the two parts...more
SOA Listening Challenge 2012: Surprise Me 2nd Quarter
Choice #4--Listen to a non-romance
SFR Reading Challenge 2012 #12- I was doing the Moon Challenge (15 books) but will now up my status to the next level.
4.5*
Grade A
Watching Miles "grow up" is almost as difficult and nerve wracking as watching my own children's progress. Although I'm very grateful my children won't be juggling the future of the known universe in their hands any time soon. I was on the edge of my seat for much of the book, and la...more
Choice #4--Listen to a non-romance
SFR Reading Challenge 2012 #12- I was doing the Moon Challenge (15 books) but will now up my status to the next level.
4.5*
Grade A
Watching Miles "grow up" is almost as difficult and nerve wracking as watching my own children's progress. Although I'm very grateful my children won't be juggling the future of the known universe in their hands any time soon. I was on the edge of my seat for much of the book, and la...more
The Vor Game did not carry me along like The Warrior's Apprentice did. I enjoyed it, but it seemed to be built more on the workings of improbable coincidence than on cause and effect. Miles is a little older and a little wiser, and perhaps that means a little less impulsive, therefore a little less fun to follow. The story was also not what the title led me to expect — something about Vor politics and political maneuvering — and coming away from it, I'm still not sure what the title is supposed...more
Good space opera is my crack. And Miles Vorkosigan one of my literary heart throbs. Miles was born into Barayar's aristocracy, which doesn't mean he has it easy--he was born practically crippled in a society that routinely killed infants with birth defects. He's not tall and handsome--he's short, brittle-boned, with a bit of a chip on his shoulder--but brilliant. This is the fourth book in the series, certainly not the book to start with or you'd be lost, and the last of three included stories i...more
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В начале второго романа выпускника военной академии Майлса Форкосигана отправят синоптиком на полярную станцию. Пойми, это вовсе не наказание, объяснят ему в генштабе, а необходимый урок. Ты – талантливый стратег и манипулятор, но у тебя явные проблемы с субординацией, что для армии очень плохо. Ты должен научиться выполнять приказы и не спорить с начальством. Ближе к концу книги герой поймет, что сейчас на гаупвахте, в одной каюте, сидят все командиры, под началом которых он служил последние по...more
This was a nice space opera yarn, but I'm a little surprised that it won the Hugo Award for best novel. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the book, but it wasn't nearly as good as some of the other Hugo-winning books I've read. Perhaps competition wasn't very steep for the award in 1991.
This book continues the adventures of Miles Vorkosigan, now that he has graduated from the Academy on Barrayar. The story seemed to jump around alot, even though it's told from Miles' exclusive point of view and foll...more
This book continues the adventures of Miles Vorkosigan, now that he has graduated from the Academy on Barrayar. The story seemed to jump around alot, even though it's told from Miles' exclusive point of view and foll...more
My major regret for this novel is that the mercenary theme from the previous novel wasn't carried on. While I adore Miles in all of his roles, I have to say Admiral Naismith is my favourite among them all. As semi punishment/incentive upon his graduation from the Military, Miles is sent to serve as Chief Meteorologist on Kyril Island.
Stranded with a raving commander officer, Miles quickly finds himself in trouble and back home in no time. In an effort to keep him out of trouble, Illyan recruits...more
Stranded with a raving commander officer, Miles quickly finds himself in trouble and back home in no time. In an effort to keep him out of trouble, Illyan recruits...more
The Vor Game is the fourth book in Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan Saga, the second to focus on main character Miles Vorkosigan. It's a thoroughly entertaining space romp. I don't want to write too much because I don't want to spoil either this book or earlier books in the series. Supposedly, each novel in this series can be read as a standalone, but that has not been my experience. This book builds so totally on the events of its predecessor and I can't imagine enjoying this book without read...more
While I enjoyed The Warrior's Apprentice, I didn't love it enough to immediately read more of Miles Vorkosigan's adventures. Now after reading this novel, which won the Hugo, I'm a big fan. Miles is placed in many difficult and deadly situations that he needs to think his way out of. He even meets his "opposite number", a five foot tall blond woman named Cavilo, who is just as smart and cunning as Miles. She was such great fun to read and I hope she turns up later in the series. I also enjoyed M...more
This is a wonderful story and I highly recommend the entire series. The story follows Miles Vorsigan who tries to prove himself in a militaristic society that idealizes strength and tradition. In most people's eyes Miles does not meet up to society's standards thanks to toxins that were introduced to him as a fetus that left him physically handicapped. Finding his plans ruined Miles tries a new life and using his advanced tactical mind and silver tongue Miles ends up in more and more trouble. As...more
Bujold is one of those authors I have been wanting to read for a while, and I must say that her reputation and Hugo awards are richly deserved. The Vor Game is one in a series of space operas starring Miles Vorkosigan, the physically stunted but intellectually gifted son of a warrior lord. This is one of those stories, rather like Star Wars, that features a futuristic monarchy, yet has the tenor of a more democratic society. The characters' temperament is somewhat old school, in a good way, evok...more
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| Sci Fi Aficionados: * 2013 Series Read: The Vor Game and The Mountains of Mourning (Vorkosigan Saga) | 13 | 20 | 22 hours, 5 min ago |
One of the most respected writers in the field of speculative fiction, Lois McMaster Bujold burst on to the scene in 1986 with Shards of Honor, the first of her tremendously popular Vorkosigan Saga novels. She has received numerous accolades and prizes, including two Nebula Awards for Best Novel (Falling Free and Paladin of Souls), four Hugo Awards for Best Novel (Paladin of Souls, The Vor Game, B...more
More about Lois McMaster Bujold...
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“A weapon is a device for making your enemy change his mind.”
—
49 people liked it
“Think of the glory. Think of your reputation. Think how great it'll look on your next resume."
On my cenotaph, you mean. Nobody will be able to collect enough of my scattered atoms to bury. You going to cover my funeral expenses, son?"
Splendidly. Banners, dancing girls, and enough beer to float your coffin to Valhalla."
- Miles coaxing Ky Tung to agree to an almost suicidal mission”
—
17 people liked it
More quotes…
On my cenotaph, you mean. Nobody will be able to collect enough of my scattered atoms to bury. You going to cover my funeral expenses, son?"
Splendidly. Banners, dancing girls, and enough beer to float your coffin to Valhalla."
- Miles coaxing Ky Tung to agree to an almost suicidal mission”
