Shards of Honor

SHARDS OF HONOR by Lois McMaster Bujold: Baen Pub.: 1986: Sci-Fi: 313 pages

Cordelia Naismith is the Commander of a Betan Survey Ship exploring the flora and fauna of the planet when her base camp is attacked. When she returns to the destroyed camp, she’s also attacked. When she wakes up, there is a soldier guarding her – Captain Aral Vorkosigan, who was the captain of the Barrayaran Imperial War cruiser whose men attacked her camp, and him as part of a mutiny.

Forced to cooperate so they can find a cache of stores and a way for Vorkosigan to communicate with his ship, they traverse the sometimes hostile planet. The Barrayarans are known as a warlike and rather uncivilized planet compared to Cordelia's Betans and she knows that Vorkosigan has the nickname "The Butcher of Komarr" from the story that he killed all the prisoners of another planet, Komarr, after they surrendered. In their six day journey they come to understand something of each other, and the fact that they both have a sense of honor that, although different, is complementary. Cordelia is eventually rescued from her prisoner status on Vorkosigan's ship by some of her Betan colleagues, but the dividing line of "goodies" and "baddies" is no longer clear. Especially after Vorkosigan proposes marriage to her.

The story continues with them meeting again - in the middle of a war - and Cordelia's brush with the evil side of Barrayaran culture. Once again she is returned to Beta Colony, but now she no longer fits there, and in fact discovers the bad side of her planet that cannot understand the Barrayarans and cannot allow them redeeming features. Cordelia has to escape her own people to be reunited with Vorkosigan. The enemy has become her home.

Intelligent, complex, moral characters with reasonable explanations for their actions, acceptable romance, and interesting new worlds.

DB