[Andols]

IM about 75% done shards of honour, and i'm really underwhelmed at this point. Does the writing and overall quality of the series improve by leaps and bounds?

Should I read all the way to the Hugo winners? I bought the first 5.

I just have a hard time getting immersed in the story. It's like Heinlien or Niven for me, I cannot immerse myself in their worlds.

[Bond]

Bujold blows hot and cold. One moment she is producing mediocre stuff anyone else can write, the next she produces some really unique scintillating moments. Her writing can be all over the place but the good spots are worth it. Technically I think her writing has lots of weaknesses but it's the situations that she comes up with that are special. Shards of Honor can come off pedestrian but Barrayar is a clear step up. Same with the first Miles book, which is weak in many ways but the fundamental zaniness it introduces is carried to wonderful heights in succeeding books. The style of her writing changes too from book to book. I think she is at her most conventional and uninteresting in Shards of Honor. She writes in the same stolid style but with greater maturity in Barrayar. But the true worth of the first part is the backstory it gives the craziness that comes with the Miles books which take on a more freewheeling style. My recommendation would be to bear with it since Barrayar is solid and Miles is one of the GREAT characters of SFF.

[pox]

I had the same thing last month Andols....

[nquixote]

IM about 75% done shards of honour, and i'm really underwhelmed at this point. Does the writing and overall quality of the series improve by leaps and bounds?

Should I read all the way to the Hugo winners? I bought the first 5.

I just have a hard time getting immersed in the story. It's like Heinlien or Niven for me, I cannot immerse myself in their worlds.

I'd start with The Warrior's Apprentice. If you don't like that, you won't like the Vorkosigan universe.

[Sparrow]

IM about 75% done shards of honour, and i'm really underwhelmed at this point. Does the writing and overall quality of the series improve by leaps and bounds?

Should I read all the way to the Hugo winners? I bought the first 5.

I just have a hard time getting immersed in the story. It's like Heinlien or Niven for me, I cannot immerse myself in their worlds.

The series is very inconsistant... but you should press on as some of her work is very entertaining... that said, I've put the Miles books behind me and don't intend on returning. I'm just not into the Space Opera anymore.

[Andols]

Im going to at least go through apprentice and then decide. thanks for the input chaps.

[psikeyhackr]

IM about 75% done shards of honour, and i'm really underwhelmed at this point. Does the writing and overall quality of the series improve by leaps and bounds?

Should I read all the way to the Hugo winners? I bought the first 5.

I just have a hard time getting immersed in the story. It's like Heinlien or Niven for me, I cannot immerse myself in their worlds.

Shards of Honor is pretty mediocre until near the end when there is a surprising twist to the story.

I didn't get hooked on the Vorkosigan series until I read Barrayar. That is the first really good book in the series but Shards of Honor and Barrayar are really two pieces of one long story.

The writing and the story are two different things to me. There can be great stories with crappy writing and crappy stories with great writing. I care more about the story than the writing. Writing is necessary to tell the story of course. I reviewed the series.

http://www.lunch.com/forbidden_planet/reviews/d/UserReview-Vorkosigan_Saga-121-1436309-17529-Review_of_Vorkosigan_series_by_Lois_McMaster.html

I posted a link to get the Vorkosigan series for free.

http://baencd.thefifthimperium.com/24-CryoburnCD/CryoburnCD/index.htm

psik

[kcmay]

I'd start with The Warrior's Apprentice. If you don't like that, you won't like the Vorkosigan universe.

I'd gotten this advice as well, so that's where I started. I liked it. I'll read the next book eventually, but it's not at the top of my list.

[psikeyhackr]

I'd start with The Warrior's Apprentice. If you don't like that, you won't like the Vorkosigan universe.

The Vorkosigan series changes significantly with the book Memory I have read reviews by people who complain about Komarr and A Civil Campaign. Cryoburn is a different kind of story also.

psik

[psikeyhackr]

I have been rereading some of the Honor Harrington series.

It just occurred to me that Bujold indirectly pointed something that is better about the Honorverse than the Vorkosiverse. In A Civil Campaign Mile's makes a comment about sitting in on his grandfather's political machinations and learning it from him. But although politics is mentioned a lot it is not actually in Bujold's stories much. The politics and military politics is in Weber's stories much more.

That might or might not be to the reader's liking but how much does it help the reader understand the world.

But both series make one wonder about the classism and social conditioning of the military and obviously both writers are products of European culture.

The Killer Thing by Kate Wilhelm would be a good counterpoint to Weber and Bujold.

psik