Merchanter’s Luck: “Buddy Read” and Discussion ***Spoilers Possible***

[Kathi, Moderator & Book Lover]

Some group members expressed an interest in reading and discussing Merchanter's Luck by C.J. Cherryh, which follows Downbelow Station in the Union-Alliance/Company Wars books. This topic will be for that discussion, but since it is an open discussion, please be aware there may be spoilers. Participants are encouraged but not required to mark spoilers. This is an informal continuation of the discussion of Downbelow Station and not a structured “buddy read” with posted dates for various chapters or specific discussion questions.

I will be starting this book a bit later this month.

[Gabi]

Thank you, Kathi! I will gladly join.

[Oleksandr]

I will join too, in a week I expect.

[Gabi]

I just saw that I have 3 buddy reads coming up next week, so I have to start it now.

[Gabi]

I found this one easier to get into than her other books I've read. It was a bit strange to start on such a personal level. Her writing style is not exactly made for emotional scenes.

[Oleksandr]

I started it and the love story is an interesting departure

[Gabi]

It is, indeed, and rather unexpected on my side. I'm still not sure if I like this insta-love.

I'm some chapters in and struggle a bit with the technical / administrative bubble. My mind starts to wander during these parts which of course doesn't help.

[Oleksandr]

The love seems one sided so far (I'm only 3 chapters in). Surplus employment on a family ship is surprising - don't labor costs erode their profits?

[Kathi, Moderator & Book Lover]

I started this today and am settling into it.

By “surplus employment on a family ship”, do you mean like the many Reillys on the Dublin waiting to getting into full time positions? I figured these are sort of family arks. I don’t know how many ships any given Family has. It seems like just one. So the entire clan lives on the ship, with some marrying off and some marrying on, with retirees and children and unassigned workers (subs and fill-in staff) and various shift workers at all levels from maintenance up through command. They aren’t paying room & board and maybe their wages reflect that. Maybe they all have “shares” in the enterprise.

[Oleksandr]

Kathi wrote: "I started this today and am settling into it.

By “surplus employment on a family ship”, do you mean like the many Reillys on the Dublin waiting to getting into full time positions? "

Yes, they have at least 3 full crews And with rejuv even 2nd crew is not very lively to be promoted. At the same time any major calamity will not spare unposted stuff, as in sea, ships are "own with all hands". Anв marrying seems unpopular - they sleepover to get new blood and the whole community rises the children, kibbutz style

[Kathi, Moderator & Book Lover]

OK, I finished this and I liked it. A more compact story than Downbelow Station, with a relatively relatable, likable, somewhat sympathetic main character (Stevens/Sandor).

I have to confess that the bigger picture (Union, Alliance, Mazianni, independent traders, Merchanter Families) is still so what confusing. Timelines and “geography” (not sure a maps would be all that helpful but I have trouble visualizing all these stations and stars) are confusing for me as well.

[Gabi]

Kathi wrote: "OK, I finished this and I liked it. A more compact story than Downbelow Station, with a relatively relatable, likable, somewhat sympathetic main character (Stevens/Sandor)."

I had the same feeling. I liked the compact story and I liked the way the PTSD of Sandor was handled.

[Oleksandr]

I also finished it and agree with you both re character and his PTSD. I had some problems with dialogues, which sometimes seems written with non-standard English (at least they don't flow well for me, a non-native speaker). Also some info-dumps on space travel physics would have been welcome - they need like 0.5с to jump through a null-point and they can dump speed to zero while approaching a station...

[Gabi]

I'm with you, Oleksandr. Being a non-English speaker myself I found the jargon in the dialogues sometimes pretty hard to get. This happened to me several times in the past with short stories set in war times as well. These are the moments where I wished I would have gone for the translation.

But all in all I think I got it. (The set up was to get the pirates out of hiding, wasn't it?)

[Oleksandr]

Gabi wrote: "But all in all I think I got it. (The set up was to get the pirates out of hiding, wasn't it?) "

Yes, but it seems that Mallory knew they are on the Venture (station) and I would expect that using a bait should work outside the station, so not to damage it, while when Union-Alliance forces approach, the pirates (Australia, etc) are docked and they speedily undock to run away. But weren't they on station before Lucy arrived?

[Gabi]

Oleksandr wrote: "

Yes, but it seems that Mallory knew they are on the Venture (station) and I would expe..."

She did, didn't she? This part was a bit confusing for me. I'm not sure I got everything there.

[Kathi, Moderator & Book Lover]

I think the pirates had control of Venture station before the Lucy arrived but I think Mallory was waiting for one of the Mazian warships (like Edger’s Australia) to come in so she could attack and possibly destroy a bigger target than just the Mazianni on the station. The Lucy was the bait to bring the Australia in. Unfortunately, I think Edger got away.

[Chris, Moderator]

My copy finally arrived, and I devoured this. I really liked the compact storytelling. The depictions of Sandor's life as a marginal trader was believable, and made a tremendous contrast with the Reilly family vessel. It brought home the time and distance issues of interstellar travel; had Sandor not followed Alison, there was no guarantee that they would ever cross paths again. I imagine that is also the impetus for the multigenerational merchant ships; if you left part of your family on a station, or split to another ship, you or they could be so changed when you met again. I agree with a number of the comments above about the murky political situation, but I think it was clear enough for me to get the gist of the action. I enjoyed this!