soph (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sophia_sol) wrote2016-07-13 09:57 pm
sophia_sol) wrote2016-07-13 09:57 pm
Valor's Choice and The Better Part of Valor, by Tanya Huff
Valor's Choice (Confederation #1), by Tanya Huff
A fun space opera/mil-sf book about people being competent and about cross-species interactions! It was great. Not deep literature but an enjoyable time, and I look forward to reading the rest of the books in this series.
The Better Part of Valor (Confederation #2), by Tanya Huff
These books are really in a lot of ways about a variety of competence porn, watching Staff Sergeant Torin Kerr be hypercompetent at everything she does, which is pretty great. I particularly enjoy watching her competence at managing up (manipulating her superior officers to make sure things work out correctly despite the superior's incompetence) which is something I have some familiarity with in my work history so it's particularly fun to watch.
The books are also highly dedicated to getting the largest ratio of snark-to-dialogue possible, which is largely fun but gets a bit much occasionally.
Relatedly, the constant offhand references to how sexual the di'Taykan are is mostly fine but also I'm just SO CURIOUS whether there are any di-Taykans who don't fit in with this monolithic understanding of the species, whether being less sexually inclined, less sexually adventurous, interested in only their own gender or their own species, or uninterested in sex entirely. Somehow I doubt this is ever going to come up BUT ONE CAN HOPE.
I really enjoyed that in this book the main antagonist was really the possibly-sentient alien spaceship, not the "Other" who are the longstanding enemy of the Confederation. The Other do make a significant appearance in this book, but mostly they're just another tool the alien spaceship uses to further its mysterious ends. I love incomprehensible alien consciousnesses, and I love sentient alien spaceships, so I am here for this!
I am undecided on my opinion of whether I like that we never find out what's up with the alien spaceship. I think it works in the context of this book but also I WANT TO KNOW MORE so I really hope we get further details in later books in the series.
But also - am I just missing something wrt the mention of 12 large grey canisters nobody notices in the last sentence of the book? Is the reader supposed to understand what that is referring to, or is it set-up for what's going to happen next?
A fun space opera/mil-sf book about people being competent and about cross-species interactions! It was great. Not deep literature but an enjoyable time, and I look forward to reading the rest of the books in this series.
The Better Part of Valor (Confederation #2), by Tanya Huff
These books are really in a lot of ways about a variety of competence porn, watching Staff Sergeant Torin Kerr be hypercompetent at everything she does, which is pretty great. I particularly enjoy watching her competence at managing up (manipulating her superior officers to make sure things work out correctly despite the superior's incompetence) which is something I have some familiarity with in my work history so it's particularly fun to watch.
The books are also highly dedicated to getting the largest ratio of snark-to-dialogue possible, which is largely fun but gets a bit much occasionally.
Relatedly, the constant offhand references to how sexual the di'Taykan are is mostly fine but also I'm just SO CURIOUS whether there are any di-Taykans who don't fit in with this monolithic understanding of the species, whether being less sexually inclined, less sexually adventurous, interested in only their own gender or their own species, or uninterested in sex entirely. Somehow I doubt this is ever going to come up BUT ONE CAN HOPE.
I really enjoyed that in this book the main antagonist was really the possibly-sentient alien spaceship, not the "Other" who are the longstanding enemy of the Confederation. The Other do make a significant appearance in this book, but mostly they're just another tool the alien spaceship uses to further its mysterious ends. I love incomprehensible alien consciousnesses, and I love sentient alien spaceships, so I am here for this!
I am undecided on my opinion of whether I like that we never find out what's up with the alien spaceship. I think it works in the context of this book but also I WANT TO KNOW MORE so I really hope we get further details in later books in the series.
But also - am I just missing something wrt the mention of 12 large grey canisters nobody notices in the last sentence of the book? Is the reader supposed to understand what that is referring to, or is it set-up for what's going to happen next?