Month: August 2012

Drag­on Ship by Sharon Lee
My rat­ing: 5 of 5 stars

Sharon Lee and Steve Miller con­tin­ue to please with this lat­est install­ment in the Liaden Uni­verse series. Theo Wait­ley, now First Pilot on the sen­tient ship Bechi­mo, is in the process of decid­ing whether she’s going to bond with the ship per­ma­nent­ly as its Cap­tain. She and the Bechi­mo are being pur­sued, togeth­er and sep­a­rate­ly, by the Depart­ment of the Inte­ri­or. Despite that fact, she goes out to estab­lish a new trade route for Clan Kor­val, with for­mer Jun­tavas Boss Clarence O’Berin sit­ting as Co-pilot.

Theo’s for­mer lover Win Ton is con­fined in Bechi­mo’s restruc­tur­ing facil­i­ty, some­thing a step beyond the autodoc, where he is being rebuilt cell by cell after being tor­tured by the Depart­ment of the Inte­ri­or in its pur­suit of the Bechi­mo. There’s no guar­an­tee that Win Ton will sur­vive the process, or what shape he’ll be in when it is completed. 

They aren’t far into the route when they receive a dis­tress sig­nal from space sta­tion Codres­cu, in orbit around Eylot, the plan­et where Theo began train­ing as a Pilot. The polit­i­cal sit­u­a­tion on Eylot has come to a head, and all Pilots there are in dan­ger. Codres­cu has put out an emer­gency call for help, so Theo takes Bechi­mo to the res­cue — despite the fact that she has good rea­son to nev­er want to see that sys­tem again.

Theo is a very young woman, but grow­ing by leaps and bounds. She makes any deci­sion that does­n’t rely on social intel­li­gence very well, guid­ed by good basic instincts and oth­er types of intel­li­gence. Her social skills still leave much to be desired, but she’s slow­ly improv­ing those and she knows she has a weak­ness in that area. 

It is always a joy to read a Liaden nov­el, but watch­ing Theo grow up adds a new dimen­sion of plea­sure to the read­ing. While I’ve paused to read and re-read some of the chap­books in order to put off the time before I ran out of new mate­r­i­al, the time is here now. I’m back to the same old com­plaint: I want more, now! Please?

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Ghost Ship by Sharon Lee
My rat­ing: 5 of 5 stars

Theo Wait­ley has met her father’s Clan and been Seen by the Delm of Kor­val now, at the end of both I Dare and Salta­tion. She does not, how­ev­er, con­sid­er her­self of Kor­val — she is a Wait­ley, as is rea­son­able for a young woman raised in a matri­lin­eal cul­ture. She did, how­ev­er, take two issues to the Delm for solv­ing, and one has been resolved: she has been reunit­ed with her miss­ing father.

How­ev­er, she also car­ries the Cap­tain’s key to the sen­tient ship Bechi­mo, and that ship is look­ing for her. The Delm chose to put that issue aside, trust­ing that it would solve itself, giv­en enough time. How much time, though, and in what manner?

In the mean­time, she acts as couri­er for Uncle, one obvi­ous­ly known to the Clan and not as an ally — although not nec­es­sar­i­ly as an ene­my, either. As his couri­er, she flies his ship, Arin’s Toss, which is hunt­ed by his ene­mies, includ­ing the Depart­ment of the Interior. 

Theo acquits her­self as well as any child of Kor­val could in meet­ing her chal­lenges. She con­tin­ues to expe­ri­ence more than the usu­al num­ber of them, though, because of her Ter­ran rear­ing and Liaden appear­ance. It seems to me that a father as duti­ful as Jen Sar Kila­di (or Daav yos’Phel­li­um) would have giv­en her more prepa­ra­tion to encounter Liaden society.

Ghost Ship cer­tain­ly isn’t lim­it­ed to Theo’s sto­ry. We rejoin Val Con and preg­nant Miri as they move to Sure­bleak, and check in with Daav as he set­tles in to being Daav again after his long sojourn as Kila­di. There are also appear­ances by Pat Rin, Nate­sa, Quin, Padi, Shan, and oth­er fam­i­ly mem­bers. Def­i­nite­ly an ensem­ble cast this time out, and just as absorb­ing as fans have come to expect.

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Salta­tion (Theo Wait­ley, #2) by Sharon Lee
My rat­ing: 5 of 5 stars

Salta­tion (Theo Wait­ley, #2) is good enough that I fin­ished Fledg­ling (Theo Wait­ley, #1), then read it in one sit­ting. It sim­ply has the sort of momen­tum that does­n’t allow for good stop­ping points — some­thing that is true of many of the Liaden Uni­verse novels.

At the end of Fledg­ling, Theo was spon­sored into pilot school by Scout Cho sig’Ra­dia. Salta­tion begins with her time there, just as polit­i­cal­ly naive as ever, but a much more con­fi­dent per­son than she was at the begin­ning of Fledg­ling. Many of the char­ac­ters from Fledg­ling reap­pear, includ­ing Win Ton, Kamele, and Jen Sar. There are new char­ac­ters too, though, such as Kara ven’Arith and Orn Ald yos’Senchul (who, by the way, also appear in a free sto­ry, Land­ed Alien, that has just been released at the Baen web site and should be read after Saltation).

Theo is a legal adult now, but a very young one, and she has plen­ty of grow­ing up left to do. That said, this is a young ADULT nov­el, not a chil­dren’s book — while it isn’t dis­cussed specif­i­cal­ly, Theo does take a lover. 

She con­tin­ues to flex and stretch into an admirable hero­ine. She isn’t per­fect, by any means, being some­times short-tem­pered and not under­stand­ing social cues eas­i­ly. She’s some­one read­ers can relate to, though, and that is impor­tant. We were brought up con­cur­rent with the end of I Dare, which was vast­ly sat­is­fy­ing. I will go right on with read­ing Ghost Ship, because I def­i­nite­ly want to know more!

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