Book: Memory

[liv]

Author: Lois McMaster Bujold

Details: (c) 1996 Lois McMaster Bujold; Pub Baen Books 2001; ISBN 0-671-87845-X

Verdict: Memory is heartbreaking and very satisfying.

Reasons for reading it: It's in the adored Miles Vorkosigan series, need I say more? Besides, when I reviewed Mirror dance, everybody kept telling me how wonderful it is.

How it came into my hands: My wonderful Beau lent it to me just in time before I exploded of anticipation.

The first hundred pages of Memory absolutely broke my heart, and in so many ways. I have just reread The color of light which is mindblowingly good, but I think Memory actually comes close. The brief scene between Miles and Elena is fantastically poignant. And the whole slow, unbearable progression where all Miles' flaws come together to create a chain reaction of disaster. He suddenly stops getting away with incredibly stupid plans through his amazing good luck and ability to salvage the most disastrous situations. His habits of always trying to pull one over his superiors, and of stringing along all kinds of characters who are in love with him, suddenly come back and bite him with full force.

After that opening which was wonderful and at the same time completely unbearable to read, the story settles more into the typical Miles frame, where the situation is world-threateningly dire and he comes up with some off the wall yet brilliant scheme to sort things out. But the set-up makes that adventure part far sharper, it's no longer a cosy swashbuckling romp, I really believed that Miles might not succeed this time. And his utter despair seems real, in sharp contrast to all the usual Miles emo wallowing. The horror of what happens to Illyan is also portrayed extremely well.

In some ways the latter part of the book feels a little too glib, as if Bujold drew back from the full horror of what she'd set up and took the easy route of a happy ending. But that's only by contrast with the opening and middle sections, it's still very good. I am very close to deciding against reading any more in this series, because MD felt like a satisfying ending to everything that has come before. All the strings, all the characters, are tied off somehow, some lives end tragically and others with glory, but pretty much every single one of the major characters (except Mark) has an emotionally satisfying outcome. It's particularly amazing to see Miles as an integrated adult, achieving something even greater than what he thought he wanted. Since there are couple more books still to go, I probably will succumb to temptation and read them because they're likely to be enjoyable, but I almost wish MD was the last in the series, because I fear that anything after that triumphant ending is going to look like self-fanfic.

I really can't say whether this or Mirror Dance is the stronger book. I think I'd probably take Memory to the proverbial desert island, if I had to choose, just because it picks up so many echoes from the rest of the series and has such a great payoff. I think my favourite is still the short story collection Borders of Infinity, but only by a hair.

Comments

[llennhoff]

I understand from the body of the reivew you are talking about Memory, but the title says Mirror Dance.

The best one sentence review of Memory I ever heard was "Memory is a book about elephants."

[liv]

Oh right, yes, I did write the wrong title, I had the comparison so much in my head. Thanks for the correction. A book about elephants is lovely, though!

[llennhoff]

[Pedant] Also, Memory should not be abbreviated MD. The first sentence also says Mirror Dance when it should say Memory. [/Pedant]

[jack]

Ooh, I love that description.

[llennhoff]

I think I heard it from Jo Walton either from her Tor reviews or from her livejournal. I could be wrong though.

[rysmiel]

Memory is kind of the point where the series changes direction, and I think what it does after that in Komarr and Civil Campaign is interesting and different; I like what it does but it's enough not the direction I was actually hoping for for me to still be a little bit wistful for what I was hoping for, which was that Miles' attitude to his superiors would end up pushing him into a smoewhat different intolerable situation, one where the only way he had to save the Empire involvd disobeying a direct order from Gregor and where while he did save the day he did so at the scost of becoming perceived as every Barrayaran cliche of the mutant villain; I think Memory is the point where that becomes impossible. The later books are still very much worth reading; in some ways Memory is the first movement of an adult-Miles trilogy.

(I would also have really liked to see a book that stood relative to Cetaganda where Mirror Dance does relative to Brothers in Arms, but that does not seem possible either.)

I am also just a little bit less than satisfied with the Imperial Auditor position as solution ex machina.

[jack]

I am also just a little bit less than satisfied with the Imperial Auditor position as solution ex machina.

Did you dislike the Auditor concept, or that it was slid into place in this book without prior warning? It felt out of place that the concept was introduced quickly, but good that Miles gets to play detective.

[rysmiel]

I have no problem with the concept per se, but it could really have done with better set-up; I underestand the auditor in the frame story of the original publication of Borders of Infinity the collection has been retconned as an Imperial Auditor, but the title and position were not at all specified when that came out.

[llennhoff]

Another horrible outcome that is still possible is that Gregor starts to go mad, and Miles has to lead the revolt against him, with access to Gregor and Laisa's children initially firmly in Gregor's hands.

[liv]

Gosh, you guys are possibly even more cruel in your imaginations than Bujold herself. That would be a scary thing to read, but I think Memory makes it impossible. Partly because Gregor has become too perfect, and I suspect Bujold has succumbed to liking him too much to be as horrible to him as she is to everyone else. And partly because the premise would be too similar to that of Memory, with Illyan's madness and Miles having to fight someone with incredible amounts of power and accumulated trust.

[llennhoff]

Oh and the horrible outcome that I can't ever see happening - Barrayar acquires a genuine movement to make the monarchy and aristocracy purely ceremonial. This can split families right up the middle, including the Vorkosigans.

[liv]

Yeah, I think both the temporary Imperial Auditor allowing Miles to bypass all the problems of trying to investigate ImpSec when it's corrupt at the highest levels, and the permanent position giving him the ultimate reward in spite of all the reasons he can't have what he thinks he wants, are just a bit too convenient. I thought about complaining about deus ex machina in my review, but decided that was too much of a cliché and not quite accurate. But it's something along those lines, Bujold puts Miles in an impossible situation and then just plucks him out of it by fiat, which is unsatisfying, yeah.

That's why I sort of want Memory to be the end of the series, because the Gregor being Miles' fairy godmother like that feels more acceptable if it's a final happy ending after Miles has plunged to the greatest depths imaginable earlier in the book. Also, I'm not sure I want to read about adult Miles, because I think the most interesting thing about him is his slow, indirect progress towards finally finding himself. I like bildungsroman stories which end with the hero becoming an actualized adult, but I don't like following what happens to them after that, it always spoils the growing up part for me in retrospect. But I probably will read the others just because they're too much fun to pass up in order to keep a nice tidy impression of a satisfying ending.

[leora]

Fun is not what I think of when I think of Komarr. I think it is a very good book and does certain things very well, which I won't comment about. But fun... not so much so.

However, what I really liked about Memory is that Miles finally does pay for his reckless ways and his ego that thinks he always knows best and can always find a path through any problem. And yes, he grows up a bit.

Some other people, including those who have read the later books, agree that Memory is a place to end the series. And you can end it there and have it be good. Although I quite like the way it progresses. Even though it still varies a lot from book to book with whether it is a fun book or a good book that is not exactly fun. I don't consider Memory to be a fun book.

[liv]

So far, I've found even the disturbing books (Borders of Infinity and Mirror dance in particular) fun to read. There's something about the way that Bujold tells stories so that they just gallop, even if the subject matter is grim.

I definitely do like the way that Memory depicts real consequences for Miles beign so reckless and arrogant.

I probably will read the sequels. I generally do, because I am always happy to have more words to read! Unless people tell me that the sequels are utterly dire and will spoil the earlier books, the temptation will be too great. I just really like the shape of the overall story from Shards of honor to Memory, and feel that any addition to that can only harm the balance.

[leora]

*nods* I definitely don't think the sequels harm the earlier books. Although I have tossed books out of cannon (as far as I am concerned) every now and then when they were just that bad.

The Second Foundation trilogy not written by Asimov was incredibly disappointing to me and I tell people not to read it. The first book was fun and interesting, the second was also intriguing, and then you get the answers in the third book and the whole story is just stupid. Plus, the third book was very badly written. It had a flashback to something that had happened just two pages back. *sighs*

But this is nothing like that. I don't think most people feel the later books are bad. It's just that there is an arc that Memory makes a great cap to, so some people like the aesthetics of ending there. And I can see that. Personally, I am so glad it continued. I kept wanting more and more. I'd read another Miles book right now if I had one I hadn't read.

[jack]

Hm. Having thought about it, I now see what some people object to in the Auditor thing. Miles is less torn between impossible loyalties than he might be, if you can just assume the government Works Despite it All rather than expecting horrible (realistic) trade-offs in everyone's loyalties.

But I really like what Komarr and Civil Campaign do do: they're definitely not just tacked on, they represent the challenges a more mature Miles faces. (Though I love it a lot, the last book, Diplomatic Immunity, does feel more so tacked on, although I'd still definitely want to read it.)

[azurelunatic]

Diplomatic Immunity wouldn't have been a hardback book for me, had I read it before I bought it.

[liv]

I think it's partly that Gregor carries on perfectly trusting Miles, even in the direct aftermath of a massive betrayal. Also, it looked at the beginning as if Miles was going to have to fight the whole of ImpSec to rescue Illyan, but instead he basically solves the problem in one fell swoop by getting himself appointed Auditor.

I think I'm going to be fairly easily persuadable to read the next couple of sequels, don't worry :-) It's just that I have a bit of a bad reaction from when I was a kid and awesome child protagonists ended up with boring sequels about what happened when the hero I was interested in turning into a dull, generic grownup. (Eg What Katy did, Anne of Green Gables, etc.) Miles isn't a child hero, but he's interesting to me as a young man trying to find his place in the world. And unlike a lot of Bildungsroman books, there are older people portrayed, particularly Cordelia and Aral, but others too, so it's not purely about Youth.

[jack]

that Gregor carries on perfectly trusting Miles, even in the direct aftermath of a massive betrayal

IKWYM. Although I actually didn't find it so: I think everyone knew Miles always had been unreliable but loyal, and probably always would be unreliable but loyal. Which is not a bad deal for the imperium, but that this was the kick that they had to draw a line and say "however much we love you, we cannot have completely maverick field commanders, or someone will get hurt even worse." However, I'd seen no reason not to trust him at a personal level.

a bit of a bad reaction from when I was a kid and awesome child protagonists ended up with boring sequels about what happened when the hero I was interested in turning into a dull, generic grownup.

*hugs* IKWYM. I don't want to trigger that nausea. However, I earnestly assure you that the remaining books are not "lets try to tack on some more" but books that I consider at least as much my favourites in the series as any of the others and as fundamental to my image of Miles' character.

[siderea]

For the record, Miles isn't the protagonist of the next book (Komarr). He's a very major character, but we see him from the outside, following someone who falls within his orbit.

It's not a great book, but enjoyable enough.

I adored A Civil Campaign. Despite having no tolerance for romances, Regency or otherwise. Thing is, you have to read Komarr before ACC. Despite in some ways being "light", I find myself quoting ACC more than any other Vorkosigan book.

[leora]

Hmm, I think Komarr is a great book. But I don't want to try to make the case for it when that would involve spoilers.

[liv]

Certainly there are a whole lot more stories that could be told in the Vorkosigan universe. The world building is at just the right level to encourage fanfic! But I'm not a hundred percent certain I want to read fanfic, even if it's fanfic written by the author herself.

But having Miles not be the protagonist could actually solve the problem that my main interest was in how he got to the point he reaches in Memory. And if A civil campaign is back to the romance structure, it might make an interesting counterpoint to Shards of honor. I think Bujold is "light" and "feminine" and "romantic" in almost exactly the same way that Jane Austen is, which is to say, not at all, because she understands just how important these supposedly trivial things can be.

[siderea]

And if A civil campaign is back to the romance structure, it might make an interesting counterpoint to Shards of honor.

BWAHAHAHAHAHA-AHAHAHAHAH AHAHAHAHAAAA *wipes tear* BWAHAHAHAHAHA-AHAHAHAHA *grabs sides* *wheeze* AHAHAHAHAHAHA

Oh, you have NO IDEA.

I can't tell you, it would be a spoiler.