Shadow of Victory - Quality of the Story / Plot?

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Given that this apparently is the second to last book in the main honor harrington line and we either see a time jump or generational leap if they do more books introducing a ton of new side characters who it is hard to see how they have much if any impact on the larger overall near term story conclusion and probably will be old to have much impact if they do a time jump makes for a lot of characters whose overall influence is minimal.

Combined with at least two of the main rebellions we already knew how they would end as we had already seen their build up and conclusion. It is hard to really invest much in reading chapters where you either know they are all going to die horribly from KEW shortly or that in the end the manties come in and save them in a big stunning conclusion that happened a book prior to this one. Had this book taken place before the last couple books it probably would have been fine but it coming out after a lot of the pay off had already occurred leaves it in an awkward spot. When I eventually get around to rereading it I probably will just switch up the order which likely helps the overall readability of it.
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Your comment about the new characters is well taken and probably one of the main reasons I found the first ten or so chapters a bit less than expected ...

SPOILER?!!?

The common thread is Harahap and, the last time I saw him he was leading team two after being caught in a civil war with the Grahams.
I suspect that he is the key to this entire book and that (though I haven't found out yet) the upgrade that Badass boss of his gave him is a big key in the problem that Honor and Emily share. I also think that the fact he did not get the final treatment (with the suicide switch) is a factor.
Colin Detwiller did not know that he had not gotten the last treatment and he also said more than he thought he did about Jack McBride and the other events on Mesa.

C. O. Thompson wrote:Muon,
I suppose it depends on why you are telling your story... I have been wrong before, but I think that David tend to the Anthropological Allegory to help direct us to a conclusion that he has reached in his own spiritual trek. His characters are developed in realistic (if we strip away the FTL stuff and use ships and airplanes) that they could be the CEO, Cabinet Member, Senator etc., of today.
He gives us a What If platform and then shows us the fundamental... crime doesn't pay, you can't take it with you and no man has a good enough memory to be a liar... and yes, way too many people that you know and love don't care about anyone but their selves and a small circle of friends.
I wish it were otherwise and, I think David does too so, he shows us that "good things happen to bad people... but only for a while"

I think we're slightly talking past each other here, actually. When I said that '2/3rds of the book can be summed up with "I don't care what happens to these people."', I wasn't intending to describe the characters or events themselves with that statement, but rather to describe *my reaction as a reader* to those characters and events.

It is certainly true that the MA in general and Firebrand in particular don't care what happens to the rebellions they're sponsoring. And I completely agree that it's quite a realistic attitude for them to have, and completely consistent with how they've been developed in the story. I don't have any complaints about that being the case.

Rather, I just was trying to say that regardless of the realism of the events presented, from the perspective of *storytelling* the *way* that they were presented simply completely failed to get me as a reader interested or emotionally involved in them. The problem wasn't that the MA and Firebrand don't care about the rebellions, the problem was that *I* didn't care about Firebrand or the rebellions. (And that's what I was referring to when I said that you don't want your readers to react that way - not that you don't want your readers to be confronted with *bad guys* who callously don't care about their victims, but that you don't want your *readers* to stop caring about the bad guys and their victims.)

MuonNeutrino wrote:

C. O. Thompson wrote:Muon,
I suppose it depends on why you are telling your story... I have been wrong before, but I think that David tend to the Anthropological Allegory to help direct us to a conclusion that he has reached in his own spiritual trek. His characters are developed in realistic (if we strip away the FTL stuff and use ships and airplanes) that they could be the CEO, Cabinet Member, Senator etc., of today.
He gives us a What If platform and then shows us the fundamental... crime doesn't pay, you can't take it with you and no man has a good enough memory to be a liar... and yes, way too many people that you know and love don't care about anyone but their selves and a small circle of friends.
I wish it were otherwise and, I think David does too so, he shows us that "good things happen to bad people... but only for a while"

I think we're slightly talking past each other here, actually. When I said that '2/3rds of the book can be summed up with "I don't care what happens to these people."', I wasn't intending to describe the characters or events themselves with that statement, but rather to describe *my reaction as a reader* to those characters and events.

It is certainly true that the MA in general and Firebrand in particular don't care what happens to the rebellions they're sponsoring. And I completely agree that it's quite a realistic attitude for them to have, and completely consistent with how they've been developed in the story. I don't have any complaints about that being the case.

Rather, I just was trying to say that regardless of the realism of the events presented, from the perspective of *storytelling* the *way* that they were presented simply completely failed to get me as a reader interested or emotionally involved in them. The problem wasn't that the MA and Firebrand don't care about the rebellions, the problem was that *I* didn't care about Firebrand or the rebellions. (And that's what I was referring to when I said that you don't want your readers to react that way - not that you don't want your readers to be confronted with *bad guys* who callously don't care about their victims, but that you don't want your *readers* to stop caring about the bad guys and their victims.)

When I read the book, I thought of the word "greeble". A greeble or "nurnie" is the name of the little useless details placed on a space ship model. They make the ship look cool, and more realistic, increasing the complexity of the design, but they have no intended function. Maybe they are plumbing, or electrical conduit, sensor, or radiator- who knows. They just make the model look cool and add visual detail.

And this book was mostly greebles. And don't get me wrong, we want greebles; it rounds out the main details and makes them feel real. Too few greebles, and the story is boring, and bland.

But when someone takes a kitchen bowl, and glues 2 boxes of shaped macaroni and 3 pounds of leftover sprue parts to it with Elmer's glue and quickly paints it with whatever is left in 2 mostly empty mismatched spray cans, and uses a Crayola marker to hurriedly write "USS SpaceShip" on it, we get a model that feels like this book.

Ok, I exagerate; the book was well written. The details were in order, made sense, and told a good story. But it truly felt as if all the extra greebles which were cut from the other books were collected from the cutting room floor, assembled properly, rounded out, and added to a small amount of new storyline. As others have pointed out, it was an anthology of side stories, with the side stories snipped and transitioned so they flowed together in time.

Don't get me wrong, as a book I liked the story. And I will read it again. But it is not the expected book and not the book the published blurb sold us. And most importantly, way too many greebles...

Theemile wrote:When I read the book, I thought of the word "greeble". A greeble or "nurnie" is the name of the little useless details placed on a space ship model. They make the ship look cool, and more realistic, increasing the complexity of the design, but they have no intended function. Maybe they are plumbing, or electrical conduit, sensor, or radiator- who knows. They just make the model look cool and add visual detail.

And this book was mostly greebles. And don't get me wrong, we want greebles; it rounds out the main details and makes them feel real. Too few greebles, and the story is boring, and bland.

But when someone takes a kitchen bowl, and glues 2 boxes of shaped macaroni and 3 pounds of leftover sprue parts to it with Elmer's glue and quickly paints it with whatever is left in 2 mostly empty mismatched spray cans, and uses a Crayola marker to hurriedly write "USS SpaceShip" on it, we get a model that feels like this book.

Ok, I exagerate; the book was well written. The details were in order, made sense, and told a good story. But it truly felt as if all the extra greebles which were cut from the other books were collected from the cutting room floor, assembled properly, rounded out, and added to a small amount of new storyline. As others have pointed out, it was an anthology of side stories, with the side stories snipped and transitioned so they flowed together in time.

Don't get me wrong, as a book I liked the story. And I will read it again. But it is not the expected book and not the book the published blurb sold us. And most importantly, way too many greebles...

As a 3D modeler, I approve of the analogy.

As a reader, I see your point, and yes, there IS such a thing as too much detail/greebles. However, I still enjoyed the book, despite having the same issues as many others: all the Polish and Czech names/agencies/governments were confusing, and I certainly would have liked the book to have moved the storyline farther along.

Like I said, despite all that, I still enjoyed the book.