[Macklyn]

I've been a fan of the series for over a decade and not long ago finished At All Cost.

As much as I liked the space combat aspects of this book, I have to say I was sorely disappointed with the personal aspects.

Did any other fans of the series find that DW wrapped up Honors personal life way too neatly to be believable?
In regards to her marriage?
Samantha/Hamish?
And still no end to the war?

Maybe this isn't his last Honor book, but I sure got the feeling it was meant to be, and it left me feeling a bit empty.

I did however enjoy his offshoot novel Shadow of Saganami.

[suciul]

For in depth discussion, speculation and so on on HH, check Baen's Bar. There are thousands of posts including by Mr. Weber about what not related to HH, the latest rumors...

Mr. Weber planned AAC to end with the heroic death of Honor in the Battle of Manticore, her last words to Queen Elizabeth being "make it worth", so the Queen bites the bullet and accepts peace with Haven despite her feelings.

20 years later, Honor' son stars in the new series pitting Manticore and Haven against Mesa and genetic slavery, with the background of the disintegration of the huge Solarian League and rearrangement of the political map of the human space.

However based partly on fan response, partly on the developments in Crown of Slaves written by E. Flint (especially that Cachat and Zilwicky proved so popular with fans as the true-believer Haven revolutionary/spy and the jaded Manticore superspy who intuit that Mesa is the enemy and want to prove it), the above developments have been moved back in time to "now", so Honor will most likely lead Manticore's fleet against the splinter of the Solarian league backing Mesa, and in the battle of Manticore someone else very close to her died.

In the meantime, while CofS and Shadow of Saganami presage the new plot line, CofS 2 and SofS2 will slide the series there, so next (about early/mid 08) we have SoS2, then depending on Mr. Flint's schedule (most likely fall 08) we have CofS2, and in 09 the next mainline Honor book.

These are firm plans as far as I know, though the dates may change, but already Mr. Weber is writing or preparing to write SofS2 (as soon as he finishes OAR2 named By Schism Rent Asunder)

Personally, after an uneven War of Honor, followed by a brilliant Shadow of Saganami, I thought AAC the best book in the series, with a most powerful ending, but with lots of powerful moments in between. The dual marriage Grayson style was telegraphed from the beginning, actually even from a long time ago, but now the rumors are that since Honor lives most likely to retire, White Haven will die and she will marry someone from Haven or Grayson.

[Macklyn]

Thanks for the heads-up!
Checked out that site and indeed found a lot of info.

And I agree AAC was a good book - don't get me wrong - I enjoyed it.
I just felt Honors personal life was wrapped up too neatly.
As you mentioned, I could accept the three-way marriage: ala Grason style, but that, coupled with Samantha adopting Hamish, was just too much much for me.
All other cats have adopted instantly at first meeting of their persons.
For centuries.
The way that DW worked Sam/Hamish just didn't sit well with me and then to pile on the three-way marriage was ?

I guess we all have our complaints, eh?

[suciul]

To be honest, I sort thought that White Haven as love interest for Honor was stretching it from a long time ago in the series when this began (even in Field of Dishonor you can see it, when White Haven tries to stop Honor from killing Pavel Young in a duel, not because she would lose her command as he originally claimed, since for once she could and did get a command in Grayson and for another with the war set to go on for a long time, she would be needed back as she was, but mostly because he wanted to protect her, and he wanted to be with her even though as her commanding officer at the point he could not get involved with her).

But Weber is quite realistic and understands well the constraints power, money and celebrity put on personal relationships, so he had few acceptable choices. From then on, and given the Grayson setup, the 3-way marriage was kind of in the cards, and at least I loved the way it pokes fun at people accusing Mr. Weber of being a right wing conservative...

[Macklyn]

It was a bit telegraphed from In Enemy Hands, but I'd always hoped it wouldn't happen. Can't say why really, as at that point I don't think Emily was even mentioned yet.

What didn't sit well for me was the Emily aspect.
Through Nimitz, Honor knows what other people feel and along with her own intellect, she had to know that no matter what the circumstances that every time she slept with Hamish had to be another knife into Emily's heart, no matter what Emily said and said she accepted. She'd still burn over it and Honor would know it.
This is a relationship doomed to a sad and pathetic end.
Honor being Honor, never thinking first about herself, this just seemed very out of character for her.
DW should have killed off Emily if he was going that way.

Better yet, he should have given Honor someone totally new.

Despite her wealth and titles Honor would never see the lack of same as any bar to a relationship with someone.

For a time I had hoped she'd fall for her chief armsman, Andrew.

[suciul]

Better yet, he should have given Honor someone totally new.

Despite her wealth and titles Honor would never see the lack of same as any bar to a relationship with someone.

For a time I had hoped she'd fall for her chief armsman, Andrew.

Personally I always thought that Allistair McKeon is most likely but... Regarding celebrity, titles, it's not that Honor would really care (after all she is the daughter of middle class Sphinx residents), but that however enlightened, society has a way of making these kind of relationships hard to sustain, not impossible, but hard. Paul Tankersley after all found out how hard...That thing would never have happened with White Haven.

Anyway, gravepine has it that Honor ends up with someone else, a Havenite or Grayson most likely...

[dougied]

I enjoyed all the early HH books but from Ashes of Victory onwards the apparent lack of proper editing at Baen has removed that enjoyment.

The problem is presumably due to their policy of putting the early chapters of each book on their website while writing still seems to be in progress.

Ashes of Victory, the dreadful War of Honor and At All Costs are all miles to long with reams of verbiage.

A competent editor would have shortened each book by a third – would probably have stopped the ending of the war in AOV if the series was to continue – would probably have stopped WOH in its tracks and considerably tightened up AAC.

The Shadow of Saganami was much better.