I have to read all the everythings

BrightSoul wrote:

Armed Neo-Bob wrote:Theemile,

I think you forgot Yuri Radamacher was also an aprilist; finding out Cachat was another is, I think, one of the reasons he won't forgive him.

Also, one of the negotiators for Haven during Mission was another (female, also in Prichart's politcal party, iirc; her name escapes me at the moment.

Rob

Senator Bourchier, the one with a Treecat-like mind glow was another Aprilist. - Chapter 10 MoH

And has just been added to my "give me more of this character please now" list right behind Allen Higgins. Yes, y'all get to listen to me obsess over another one.

So here is a dumb follow up:

Will reading the books in the order they were published just happen to feed me chronologically too?

I only just found out there were spinoffs, including one written by the immortal Zahn, about 1-2 books ago, but was too preoccupied wanting to see Highridge die in a fire and see how the Harrington/Alexander rollercoaster went to deviate and start reading them.

But if switching to side lines will give me relevant information that will complement A Rising Thunder, I guess I just need to decide if I am going all the way back to the beginning (all the way back to Basilisk) or if I should settle for going back to More Than Honor. Thoughts?

Second stupid/semi-unrelated question:
Does anyone have a good resource for tracking the development of the graphic novels I saw io9 forecasting a few months ago...?

tiber1978 wrote:So here is a dumb follow up:

Will reading the books in the order they were published just happen to feed me chronologically too?

I only just found out there were spinoffs, including one written by the immortal Zahn, about 1-2 books ago, but was too preoccupied wanting to see Highridge die in a fire and see how the Harrington/Alexander rollercoaster went to deviate and start reading them.

But if switching to side lines will give me relevant information that will complement A Rising Thunder, I guess I just need to decide if I am going all the way back to the beginning (all the way back to Basilisk) or if I should settle for going back to More Than Honor. Thoughts?

Second stupid/semi-unrelated question:
Does anyone have a good resource for tracking the development of the graphic novels I saw io9 forecasting a few months ago...?

I would go back to Changer of Worlds and read the "spinoffs" (which they're not, really, they're essential parts of the main story but just take place in a different area of space) from there. I'll probably be punched for this, but the only short stories you really need to read are, in my opinion, "From the Highlands" (from Changer of Worlds), and "Fanatic" and "The Service of the Sword" (from The Service of the Sword) if you want to understand the ongoing mainline arc.

The Stephanie Harrington books (which I adore) and the Travis Long books (written by Zahn) take place several centuries before Honor's time and while quite interesting in their own right don't have much essential bearing on the current goings-on. "A Whiff of Grapeshot" and "Nightfall" are useful for understanding the Havenite side of the plot, particularly Esther McQueen's career, but not necessary; "Queen's Gambit", "What Price Dreams?", "The Hard Way Home", "Ms Midshipwoman Harrington", "Changer of Worlds", "Let's Dance", "Beauty and the Beast", and "Obligated Service" all provide useful background and are excellent reads but can wait until you've watched High Ridge go down in flames. (It's just as satisfying as it sounds.)

From there:
Changer of Worlds (Mar 01) (Anthology)
-> War of Honor fits here
The Service of the Sword (Apr 03) (Anthology)
Crown of Slaves (Sep03)
The Shadow of Saganami (Oct 04)
-> At All Costs fits here
Storm from the Shadows (Mar 09)
Torch of Freedom (Nov 09)
-> Mission of Honor fits here
Shadow of Freedom (Mar 13) (post-ART)
Cauldron of Ghosts (Apr 14)

The rest of the anthologies aren't essential (but still worth reading!!).

Welcome to the madness. I'm Rose, resident Cupid and Havenite fangirl. Nice to meet you!

Armed Neo-Bob wrote:Theemile, I realize Cachat was too young for the pre-coup Aprilist group; I just took the survivors as "underground and still working," sort of keeping their heads down and re-building. Mostly from the ends of the shorts, which Tiber hasn't read yet.

I sort of viewed Usher as recruiting him into the group, along with the introduction to a classical film education, Bogey, and Casablanca, and thought the second short sort of confirmed it while leaving it deeply murky. Never anything explicit, just being part of Usher's "family." Of course, I am often mistaken.

Rob

No, the Aprilists were not still active. They stopped existing, except in memory, at the time of the Coup. They participated in the Coup. The term Aprilists refers to those people who were part of the group up until they helped lead the successful coup. And they were honored by a lot of people because of their high ideals during the Legislaturalist period. Cachat is not an Aprilist; there was no Aprilist organization to recruit into any more.

There were a number of Aprilists who were not completely satisfied with the way the post-Coup government did things, but that is because the Aprilists had all shared certain ideals. And while Kevin Usher implied that there were people working inside the system, it was not specifically an Aprilist group--it simply happened to have a number of Aprilists in it because of their shared ideals.

tiber1978 wrote:So here is a dumb follow up:

Will reading the books in the order they were published just happen to feed me chronologically too?

I only just found out there were spinoffs, including one written by the immortal Zahn, about 1-2 books ago, but was too preoccupied wanting to see Highridge die in a fire and see how the Harrington/Alexander rollercoaster went to deviate and start reading them.

But if switching to side lines will give me relevant information that will complement A Rising Thunder, I guess I just need to decide if I am going all the way back to the beginning (all the way back to Basilisk) or if I should settle for going back to More Than Honor. Thoughts?

The anthologies have stories scattered around the timeline, so reading those in publication order won't feed you the material in chronological order. On the other hand since that background material basically didn't exist until the anthology story was written you aren't missing much if you read it in publication order.

Towards the end of the series the Torch semi spin-off and the Shadows semi spin-off happened concurrently with the last couple mainline books. It's basically impossible to consume those in strict chronological order because it would require switching books chapter to chapter (and the chapters don't always provide enough time reference to be sure the date they occur).

The anthologies are less important to read in publication order; though they provide good info (at least the stories called out above), but there will be big surprises or confusion if you don't read the following 7 in publication order as events from one sometimes get tied up in another.

17. At All Costs (Nov 05)
18. Storm from the Shadows (Mar 09)
19. Torch of Freedom (Nov 09)
20. Mission of Honor (June 10)
22. A Rising Thunder (Mar 12)
23. Shadow of Freedom (Mar 13)
26. Cauldron of Ghosts (Apr 14)

I'll chime in here, but not to add anything to the question of which books to read in what order, but more to clarify some things.

First off, the Manticore Ascendant "prequels" were not just written by Timothy Zahn (coming from the SW EU, I figured you'd know that name). They were also co-written by David Weber and Tom Pope. Tom is the driving force behind BuNine ( http://www.bunine.org ). While Tom isn't credited on the cover of the first Zahn collaboration as a co-author, I believe he is credited inside, and last I heard, he will be credited on the covers of the two follow-up books.

Next, BuNine is an organization of fans who work directly with David to flesh out the history, politics, governmental and military organization of various star nations in the Honorverse. We also do the artwork that appears in House of Steel: The Honorverse Companion, as well as writing the companion portion of it, whereas David wrote the novella, I Will Build My House of Steel, which also appears in HoS. House of Steel concerns itself with the SKM/RMN and the Protectorate of Grayson/GSN.

The next companion, House of Lies, will detail background and history of Haven/PRN/RHN and the Andermani Empire.

There is a third companion planned as well, but I always forget who we will deal with there.

Anything written in the companions, or talked about by any member of BuNine can be considered hard canon, as if it came from David himself (known as runsforcelery - or RFC - here on the forum).

Lastly, if you want to see what is currently canon for what some of the ships look like, just follow the links in my sig. I'm one of the artists for BuNine, and you can see what my area is from the links. Keep in mind, these are still works-in-progress, and will most likely change, but only in the details. The general look is pretty much set in stone and won't change. We are currently working on adding more detail to the ships, concentrating on the HMS Fearless (CA-286), as that is our baseline ship on which all other ships will be built from. There's still a few things we need to work out over the next few weeks, but I would expect a major update to most of the ships on my Deviant Art page a couple of months from now at the soonest.

MaxxQ wrote:There is a third companion planned as well, but I always forget who we will deal with there.

"House of Cards", on the SL and MA. Ok, that isn't the actual title, though it is a great title that someone clever than me came up with,

kzt wrote:

MaxxQ wrote:There is a third companion planned as well, but I always forget who we will deal with there.

"House of Cards", on the SL and MA. Ok, that isn't the actual title, though it is a great title that someone clever than me came up with,

That title sounds awfully familiar.

Funny thing... up until October of 2013, I worked at Netflix central operations, so I knew about it fairly early on.

kzt wrote:

MaxxQ wrote:There is a third companion planned as well, but I always forget who we will deal with there.

"House of Cards", on the SL and MA. Ok, that isn't the actual title, though it is a great title that someone clever than me came up with,

The title y'all want is House of Shadows, about Mesa, the League, and (maybe) Silesia.

(Don't ask me how I remembered that when it's connected to neither Haven nor Grayson in any conceivable way. I don't know, either.)

Is the Torch companion book named House of Mouse?