Most hated character

There are so many. I love to hate them all. But if I had to pick one. It would be Admiral Byng, because there is nothing I hate more than belligerent stupidity.

roseandheather wrote:I simply cannot loathe Janacek and High Ridge unconditionally, for the simple reason that if they hadn't come into power, the RMN would have bombed Nouveau Paris into smithereens and... yeah. That particular idea does not sit well with me, for obvious reasons.

St. Just was neither suicidal nor willing to let people be killed for no reason. Suspicion of potentially becoming hostile to the committee in the future and just being in the way might count as good enough reasons for him, but not no reason. He certainly would have kept fighting longer than practical due to a poor grasp of operational realities, but would have surrendered once White Haven held the high orbitals (or else he would have been killed or captured by Theisman or someone else willing to surrender). What kind of government would have emerged on Haven under a Manticoran occupation is hard to say, but it's unlikely they would have flattended Nouveau Paris out of hand. Most likely Theisman would have had a prominent role in it because Honor (and therefore Hamish) considered him trustworthy.

drothgery wrote:

roseandheather wrote:I simply cannot loathe Janacek and High Ridge unconditionally, for the simple reason that if they hadn't come into power, the RMN would have bombed Nouveau Paris into smithereens and... yeah. That particular idea does not sit well with me, for obvious reasons.

St. Just was neither suicidal nor willing to let people be killed for no reason. Suspicion of potentially becoming hostile to the committee in the future and just being in the way might count as good enough reasons for him, but not no reason. He certainly would have kept fighting longer than practical due to a poor grasp of operational realities, but would have surrendered once White Haven held the high orbitals (or else he would have been killed or captured by Theisman or someone else willing to surrender). What kind of government would have emerged on Haven under a Manticoran occupation is hard to say, but it's unlikely they would have flattended Nouveau Paris out of hand. Most likely Theisman would have had a prominent role in it because Honor (and therefore Hamish) considered him trustworthy.

While that's an excellent point - and, I'll admit, 'bombed into smithereens' was an exaggeration, though there's no doubt Elizabeth would have liked to do so - my main point was that Janacek and High Ridge were instrumental in bringing Manticore and Haven to an equal peace. As Theisman pointed out, under any other circumstance, Haven would have surrendered, and the entire Haven Sector would have been unstable because a surrender only lasts until the surrendered party builds enough of a military to kick the crap out of the party who made them surrender (see: World War II).

Because of the High Ridge government's interference, Tom, Eloise, and their cohorts had time - time to stabilise Haven's government, time to rebuild from the chaos of the revolution, time to gel as a (mostly) cohesive unit, and time to decide the direction the new (or restored, rather) Republic was going to take.

And because they had that time, we wound up with the Grand Alliance. If Haven hadn't had that time to rebuild, there was no way a Grand Alliance would ever have been in the cards. It only came about because Haven was finally able to draw nearly equal with Manticore in terms of military hardware. I'm reminded of something Eloise said in Mission of Honor: "...if there's ever going to be an end to the cycle of violence between Haven and Manticore, it has to be achieved on some sort of equitable basis, not because one of us simply pounds the other into such bloody ruin that she has to yield."

And given what the Alignment had been up to, that sort of situation - a Haven forced to surrender at missile-point, with building capability that Manticore would never find, and every reason in the world to start building ships just as fast as they possibly can - would have been made-to-order for Detweiler and his cronies. Now they're going to be crushed like bugs by the three star nations in the galaxy that most want them dead, and I am going to munch popcorn while I read about it.

...I have a lot of feelings about the Grand Alliance. Sorry!

Midshipman Yow,
Easy, I'm already lth.
But at least Admiral Byng had a real good excuse. He obviously drank from the same fount of wisdom as the rest of the SLN.
It has to be something in the water...hasn't it?

I'm not sure I can pick a character I hate the most-- he's very good at writing the hate-able!-- but I have to say that the one villain he's tried to write three-dimensionally that I still feel nothing for is Albrecht Detweiler.

Pierre lost his son and fought back, only to find himself unequal to the task. St Just at least had his loyalty and friendship with Pierre to soften him. Ransom and Young just don't hit my buttons as much, and the Masadans aren't around for enough books for me to really sink my teeth into hating them.

But that bastard Detweiler and his happy little family and his self-pity about his own guilt and sorrow and his !#$@ line about, "And now that we've plotted the deaths of millions of people, let's have some lobster!"? Hate him. Hate hate hate.

Plus he killed Webster! And ruined Tom and Eloise's chance at peace and got Javier killed! HATE.

Ok, nevermind. Now that I think about it, I hate Detweiler most for sure.

Commander,
No need to apologize. I hear venting is food for the soul. Always helped John McEnroe after he yelled at a few linesman to play his best tennis.

Ensign NortonIDaughter,
Thanks for sharing. If I am ever sad again. I am definitely going to visit this post straightway. Funnnny!

NortonIDaughter wrote:I'm not sure I can pick a character I hate the most-- he's very good at writing the hate-able!-- but I have to say that the one villain he's tried to write three-dimensionally that I still feel nothing for is Albrecht Detweiler.

Pierre lost his son and fought back, only to find himself unequal to the task. St Just at least had his loyalty and friendship with Pierre to soften him. Ransom and Young just don't hit my buttons as much, and the Masadans aren't around for enough books for me to really sink my teeth into hating them.

But that bastard Detweiler and his happy little family and his self-pity about his own guilt and sorrow and his !#$@ line about, "And now that we've plotted the deaths of millions of people, let's have some lobster!"? Hate him. Hate hate hate.

Plus he killed Webster! And ruined Tom and Eloise's chance at peace and got Javier killed! HATE.

Ok, nevermind. Now that I think about it, I hate Detweiler most for sure.

I knew I liked you for a reason.

But just think.

The whole "ruining the peace" thing didn't work out so well for him, did it? Eloise and Elizabeth don't think so, anyway, since they've put their heads together and decided to exterminate him and his plan from the known universe.

Honor Harrington, Thomas Theisman, Lester Tourville, Hamish Alexander, Michelle Henke, Aivars Terekhov, Michael Oversteegen, and Abigail Hearns are all coming after him. Not to mention Warner Caslet, Alfredo Yu, Judah Yanakov, and Mark Brentworth. And a whole whack of really, really angry Manticorans, Graysons, and Havenites. Oh, and the entire treecat species.

And Shannon Foraker and Sonja Hemphill are very, very busy girls dreaming up new toys for them to do it with.

And I think Eloise might be a bit ticked off that she lost Javier to those bastards. (Not that I think for a moment she's lost him completely; if that man isn't with her in every breath she takes I don't know anything about love.)

I think Elizabeth might be a bit ticked off that her navy was used to make Eloise lose him.

And it turns out all these brilliant tacticians have a bone or two to pick with Detweiler and his little Alignment too!

I'm already making the popcorn.

if that man isn't with her in every breath she takes I don't know anything about love

Stop making me cry!

roseandheather wrote:I simply cannot loathe Janacek and High Ridge unconditionally, for the simple reason that if they hadn't come into power, the RMN would have bombed Nouveau Paris into smithereens and... yeah. That particular idea does not sit well with me, for obvious reasons.

St. Just was neither suicidal nor willing to let people be killed for no reason. Suspicion of potentially becoming hostile to the committee in the future and just being in the way might count as good enough reasons for him, but not no reason. He certainly would have kept fighting longer than practical due to a poor grasp of operational realities, but would have surrendered once White Haven held the high orbitals (or else he would have been killed or captured by Theisman or someone else willing to surrender). What kind of government would have emerged on Haven under a Manticoran occupation is hard to say, but it's unlikely they would have flattended Nouveau Paris out of hand. Most likely Theisman would have had a prominent role in it because Honor (and therefore Hamish) considered him trustworthy.[/quote]

While that's an excellent point - and, I'll admit, 'bombed into smithereens' was an exaggeration, though there's no doubt Elizabeth would have liked to do so - my main point was that Janacek and High Ridge were instrumental in bringing Manticore and Haven to an equal peace. As Theisman pointed out, under any other circumstance, Haven would have surrendered, and the entire Haven Sector would have been unstable because a surrender only lasts until the surrendered party builds enough of a military to kick the crap out of the party who made them surrender (see: World War II).

Because of the High Ridge government's interference, Tom, Eloise, and their cohorts had time - time to stabilise Haven's government, time to rebuild from the chaos of the revolution, time to gel as a (mostly) cohesive unit, and time to decide the direction the new (or restored, rather) Republic was going to take.

And because they had that time, we wound up with the Grand Alliance. If Haven hadn't had that time to rebuild, there was no way a Grand Alliance would ever have been in the cards. It only came about because Haven was finally able to draw nearly equal with Manticore in terms of military hardware. I'm reminded of something Eloise said in Mission of Honor: "...if there's ever going to be an end to the cycle of violence between Haven and Manticore, it has to be achieved on some sort of equitable basis, not because one of us simply pounds the other into such bloody ruin that she has to yield."

And given what the Alignment had been up to, that sort of situation - a Haven forced to surrender at missile-point, with building capability that Manticore would never find, and every reason in the world to start building ships just as fast as they possibly can - would have been made-to-order for Detweiler and his cronies. Now they're going to be crushed like bugs by the three star nations in the galaxy that most want them dead, and I am going to munch popcorn while I read about it.

...I have a lot of feelings about the Grand Alliance. Sorry![/quote]


You have seen how Manticore deals with the losers in a war, Trevor Star and Endicott Systems come to mind.
If 8th fleet had got in to orbit around Haven, forced a surrender I believe they would have dealt fairly with Haven, they would have had no choice.

Yes, Manticore would have had to deploy a sizable garrison force, and fleet to support it but the Haven Sector would have entered into a new golden age (after Manticore liberated all the occupied nation states, arrested and tried the 'nasty people' running State Security etc.).

Also with access to real history of Haven, and not the export version, its possible that someone may have noticed the MA campaign of manipulation.


It would then also have had the military capability to better protect the Talbolt cluster when the Linx terminal was discovered (after all its military units wouldn't be redirected to deal with Haven), and therefore the first Mesan plot wouldn't have been successful and potentially the MA agents would have been captured. This could also have allowed RMN to act directly against Mesa as they wouldn't have to pass through SL space to get there or aggressively deploy anti-slaver patrols right on the 12 hour limit of the system.

The RMN would have been available to ensure the Andies, actually talked to Manties about the confederacy probably resulting in either the situation we now have or the confederacy being engulfed by the Andies or the confederacy having to 'clean up its act'.

But back to the main question, is there a character I hate, no not really the series is so well written that though I may not agree with what they are doing something, I can understand why they are.
Though the enigma that is Charles is getting annoying.