Uncompromising Honor sequel

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

Michae wrote:As the title says I've been listening to honor Harrington audio-books for a while,and just finished number 14. Is that the end of the series for now,or is there more? As I'd love to know what happens to Mesa when Manticore figures out where they went,apart from them having the entire fleet dropped on them given what they did in Beowulf.

There are two more after that: the Crown of Slaves sequel called To End in Fire is the currently latest in in-universe chronological order. After that, we've got Toll of Honor, but it's set way back in history.

Thanks for that. Looks like I have more audiobooks to listen to when I get my next batch of free credits on Audible.

tlb wrote:Honor was born on Oct 1, 1859 PD and was a midshipman in 1877 PD, which is 17 Manticoran years (?).

Dates given in PD are always in T-years; not local planetary years. (PD being '"Post Diaspora" (i.e., in T-years from the year in which the first interstellar colony ship departed Old Earth)' [OBS])
(And well, if the wiki is correct this time, her snotty cruise started in May 1877. So she'd have been about 17 1/2 when made a midshipman - for that that 7ish months is worth)

FWIW HoS give Manticore-A III (Manticore) an orbital period of 629.83 T-days (about 1.6 T-years) So 1859 PD - 1877 PD would only be ~10.4 Manticoran years.

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Oh, and there appears to be a chronology error in the story Ms. Midshipwoman Harrington - because it calls her a "twenty-year-old midshipwoman on her snotty cruise".
But as noted above, she was less than 18 when starting that cruise - and that is based up by other chronology.
For example shortly after OBS gives her age as over "forty Terran standard years" it says she'd entered the Academy 25 T-years before; putting her entry at around age 15. And then mentioned her "Two and a half years of Academy classes" - so she should have headed out on her midshipman's cruise on War Maiden at 17.5 years old. Which tracks with the date in the wiki. And it definitely wasn't a two years cruise; so she'd have been about 18 when the events happened. Oops.

tlb wrote:Honor was born on Oct 1, 1859 PD and was a midshipman in 1877 PD, which is 17 Manticoran years (?).

Jonathan_S wrote:Dates given in PD are always in T-years; not local planetary years. (PD being '"Post Diaspora" (i.e., in T-years from the year in which the first interstellar colony ship departed Old Earth)' [OBS])
(And well, if the wiki is correct this time, her snotty cruise started in May 1877. So she'd have been about 17 1/2 when made a midshipman - for that that 7ish months is worth)

FWIW HoS give Manticore-A III (Manticore) an orbital period of 629.83 T-days (about 1.6 T-years) So 1859 PD - 1877 PD would only be ~10.4 Manticoran years.

---
Oh, and there appears to be a chronology error in the story Ms. Midshipwoman Harrington - because it calls her a "twenty-year-old midshipwoman on her snotty cruise".
But as noted above, she was less than 18 when starting that cruise - and that is based up by other chronology.
For example shortly after OBS gives her age as over "forty Terran standard years" it says she'd entered the Academy 25 T-years before; putting her entry at around age 15. And then mentioned her "Two and a half years of Academy classes" - so she should have headed out on her midshipman's cruise on War Maiden at 17.5 years old. Which tracks with the date in the wiki. And it definitely wasn't a two years cruise; so she'd have been about 18 when the events happened. Oops.

Over 40 could be 42.5, which would match a starting age of 17.5.

But isn't the snotty cruise in the final academic year (so when she was 20 to 21), because it is considered the true final exam on whether someone graduates? From Shadow of Saganami:

Chapter 1 wrote:"You are here," she told them, "for one final meeting before you begin your midshipman cruises. This represents a custom, a final sharing of what naval service truly is, and what it can cost, which has been a part of Saganami Island for over two centuries. By tradition, the Commandant of the Academy addresses her students at this time, but there have been exceptions. Admiral Ellen D'Orville was one such exception. And so was Admiral Quentin Saint-James.

"This year is another such exception, for we are honored and privileged to have Admiral Lady Dame Honor Harrington present. She will be on Manticore for only three days before returning to Eighth Fleet to complete its reactivation and take up her command once more. Many of you have had the privilege of studying under her as underclassmen. All of you could not do better than to hold her example before you as you take up your own careers. If any woman in the Queen's uniform today truly understands the tradition which brings us all together this day, it is she."

Chapter 3 wrote:"Despite that," Lewis continued, "I do have a certain degree of secondhand knowledge of what you people are getting into. I've seen quite a few snotties come and go, even before I became a Queen's officer myself, and there are only a few points I'd like to make to you.
"The first is one all of you've already had made to you over and over again. But that's because it's an important one. This cruise, here aboard Hexapuma, is your true final exam. Every one of you will officially graduate from the Academy, regardless of the outcome of your cruise, on the basis of your academic record, barring the unlikely event of your committing some court-martial offense in the course of it. But," she let her green eyes sweep their faces, and there was no longer any smile in them, "if you screw up badly enough aboard Hexapuma, you will not receive a commission in Her Majesty's Navy. If you screw up less than totally, you might receive a commission, but it wouldn't be a line commission, and you would never hold command of any Queen's ship. Remember that, Ladies and Gentlemen. This is pass-fail, and it isn't a game. Not a test you can retake or make up. I know all of you are intelligent, motivated, and well educated. I expect you to do well. And I strongly recommend to you that you expect—and demand—the same superior performance out of yourselves.

tlb wrote:

tlb wrote:Honor was born on Oct 1, 1859 PD and was a midshipman in 1877 PD, which is 17 Manticoran years (?).

Jonathan_S wrote:Dates given in PD are always in T-years; not local planetary years. (PD being '"Post Diaspora" (i.e., in T-years from the year in which the first interstellar colony ship departed Old Earth)' [OBS])
(And well, if the wiki is correct this time, her snotty cruise started in May 1877. So she'd have been about 17 1/2 when made a midshipman - for that that 7ish months is worth)

FWIW HoS give Manticore-A III (Manticore) an orbital period of 629.83 T-days (about 1.6 T-years) So 1859 PD - 1877 PD would only be ~10.4 Manticoran years.

---
Oh, and there appears to be a chronology error in the story Ms. Midshipwoman Harrington - because it calls her a "twenty-year-old midshipwoman on her snotty cruise".
But as noted above, she was less than 18 when starting that cruise - and that is based up by other chronology.
For example shortly after OBS gives her age as over "forty Terran standard years" it says she'd entered the Academy 25 T-years before; putting her entry at around age 15. And then mentioned her "Two and a half years of Academy classes" - so she should have headed out on her midshipman's cruise on War Maiden at 17.5 years old. Which tracks with the date in the wiki. And it definitely wasn't a two years cruise; so she'd have been about 18 when the events happened. Oops.

But isn't the snotty cruise in the final academic year (so when she was 20 to 21), because it is considered the true final exam on whether someone graduates? From Shadow of Saganami: [snip]

In some ways its the final exam; sure. Though not of whether you graduate.

Shadow of Saganami wrote:Every one of you will officially graduate from the Academy, regardless of the outcome of your cruise, on the basis of your academic record, barring the unlikely event of your committing some court-martial offense in the course of it.

What it determines is a) whether the navy wants you at all after graduation, and b) if so, do they want you as on the path to captain of a ship

But nothing in that quote says that snotty (midshipmans) cruise is an entire year long.

But even if it is, Honor finished her classes before she turned 18 T-years old. To have been 20 at that point in the story her War Maiden cruise would have had to have lasted somewhat over two years!

(And I really don't think it did - though now that I double-check I'm not sure where the wiki author(s) got the timeline of her postings. I can't find text-ev for many of them -- so I guess I can't rely on those dates; which had claimed she'd graduated, been promoted to ensign and off on her next assignment about a year after joining War Maiden)

Jonathan_S wrote:But even if it is, Honor finished her classes before she turned 18 T-years old. To have been 20 at that point in the story her War Maiden cruise would have had to have lasted somewhat over two years!

(And I really don't think it did - though now that I double-check I'm not sure where the wiki author(s) got the timeline of her postings. I can't find text-ev for many of them -- so I guess I can't rely on those dates; which had claimed she'd graduated, been promoted to ensign and off on her next assignment about a year after joining War Maiden)

NO, Honor started her classes at 17.5; look at the Honorverse Timeline #2 in the Download tab at the top of the Forum page. 1877 PD is listed as the point where "Captain Raoul Courvosier first meets midshipwoman Honor Harrington". Then 1880 PD is listed as the point where "Honor Harrington serves on her midshipman's cruise aboard HMS War Maiden", which puts her in the 20 to 21 age range.

I admit I posted that it would be 22 T-years from now without checking. I had assumed that one would go to Saganami Island at 18, after finishing their basic education courses, and that the Academy would be a 4-year course (probably because the Starfleet Academy is 4 years[1]), not 2.5 years. Unless it's 2.5 Manticoran years, which would be close to 4 T-years, but no.

We have other data points to know that middies are indeed that young, besides Honor: the nasty kittens. Helen Zilwicki was a child (4 according to the wiki) when the convoy she was in with her father and mother was ambushed during the events of SVW, so 1906-1907. She hadn't yet gone to the Island when the "Manpower Incident" happened in "From the Highlands," then she did and finished the Island in time to join the crew of HMS Hexapuma in early 1920. That would put her age at the beginning of her own middy cruise at 17 or 18.

One of her middy colleagues was Ragnhild Pavletic, who looked 13 due to her third-gen prolong treatments being given at an early age.

Another datum is when we meet Abigail Hearns, who was older. She was a middy during the events of Ashes of Victory, before the end of the first war, and she was 19 T-years of age. And she's described as "a good two T-years older than Theodore," the youngest middy who had given the Queen's toast, and also described as "looked about thirteen". Though the same chapter (23) of the book is describing all the students at "Intro to Tactics" as midshipmen, not cadets. Hearns' middy cruise was aboard HMS Gauntlet, in "From the Highlands," when Manticore was still working with Erewhon, and sufficiently early in the inter-war period that HMS Gauntlet was repaired and put back into service after fighting the "four yahoos" and before the start of the second war, in Crown of Slaves, so it's possible that this passage was indeed among the final steps for her on the Island.

[1] Even though Cadet James T. Kirk required 5, for some reason. Maybe they made him retake the last year because he reprogrammed the Kobayashi Maru simulator.

tlb wrote:NO, Honor started her classes at 17.5; look at the Honorverse Timeline #2 in the Download tab at the top of the Forum page. 1877 PD is listed as the point where "Captain Raoul Courvosier first meets midshipwoman Honor Harrington". Then 1880 PD is listed as the point where "Honor Harrington serves on her midshipman's cruise aboard HMS War Maiden", which puts her in the 20 to 21 age range.

Confirmed again by "First Victory" in What Price Victory. The final chapter of that short story is in 1877, when Honor is about to ship out to the Island and Alfred tells her the story of her first victory.

First Victory, [...] December 1877 PD wrote:Honor rolled her eyes. She'd turned seventeen only three T-months ago, but her parents her from the moment she announced she wanted a naval career.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:Though the same chapter (23) of the book is describing all the students at "Intro to Tactics" as midshipmen, not cadets.

In the USA (despite Cadet James T. Kirk), every student at the Naval Academy is a midshipman (no matter what year); as opposed to a cadet in the other academies. So perhaps Kirk graduated from an outgrowth of the Air Force Academy. The difference is that a midshipman is an officer by Naval tradition (with all privileges) and a cadet is not. The first year students are also called Plebes.

tlb wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:But even if it is, Honor finished her classes before she turned 18 T-years old. To have been 20 at that point in the story her War Maiden cruise would have had to have lasted somewhat over two years!

(And I really don't think it did - though now that I double-check I'm not sure where the wiki author(s) got the timeline of her postings. I can't find text-ev for many of them -- so I guess I can't rely on those dates; which had claimed she'd graduated, been promoted to ensign and off on her next assignment about a year after joining War Maiden)

NO, Honor started her classes at 17.5; look at the Honorverse Timeline #2 in the Download tab at the top of the Forum page. 1877 PD is listed as the point where "Captain Raoul Courvosier first meets midshipwoman Honor Harrington". Then 1880 PD is listed as the point where "Honor Harrington serves on her midshipman's cruise aboard HMS War Maiden", which puts her in the 20 to 21 age range.

Which, as I pointed out in my previous post, disagrees with the beginning of On Basilisk Station.

On Basilisk Station wrote:But she was almost twenty-four years old—over forty Terran standard years [...] Fifteen years—twenty-five T-years—since that first exciting, terrifying day on the Saganami campus. Two and a half years of Academy classes

This time I did the year conversion math.
24 Manticoran years is (24 * 629.83 / 365.24) 41.39 T-years; but since she wasn't quite 24, that probably puts her a bit below 41 T-years.
41 - 25 T-years before that would be starting classes around 16 years old.

(Cross check; let's do that in Manticoran years and then convert. 24 - 15 = 9 Manticoran years old when starting classes; or (9 * 629.83 / 365.24) 15.51 T-years

Any way you cut it that seems to be 18 - 24 months younger than Timeline #2 claims. So, as discrepency. (Just one that goes further than just Ms. Midshipwoman Harrington)

Jonathan_S wrote:Any way you cut it that seems to be 18 - 24 months younger than Timeline #2 claims. So, as discrepency. (Just one that goes further than just Ms. Midshipwoman Harrington)

Let's blame it on the "Great Resizing", since the latest number (from "First Victory" in What Price Victory) has her turning 17 before she leaves to join the Academy in December 1877 PD (which still is a one year discrepancy if her birth was October 1859 PD). Also that story has her mother pregnant in September 1858 PD, which should put the birth before October!?