Reading: Memory
Jul. 16th, 2019 06:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
white_hartI'm glad Mirror Dance clued me in to the fact that after the first couple of Miles books, the Vorkosigan saga really isn't the space opera romp that The Warrior's Apprentice and The Vor Game had made me think it would be, because if I'd gone into Memory expecting a space opera romp not only would I have been very disappointed, I suspect I would have completely failed to appreciate it anything like as much as it deserves.
I'd been told that Memory was a turning point for the series, and it clearly is; Miles starts the book following one path in his life, and ends it on a completely different path. It's also a detective story, although I was spoiled for the resolution of that plot by, of all things, an Ask A Manager comment thread about eighteen months ago and that didn't really seem to matter. (I suspect that even if I hadn't been spoiled for it I might have been able to work it out a long way ahead of the characters.) But what it really is is a serious novel about what happens when your life comes crashing down around your ears; about how you begin to put the pieces back together, and how you start to work out who you really are when you can't be the person you've spent years trying to be any more. It may be set on an alien planet, and it may have a few science fictional trimmings, but the core of the novel is as true and human as any piece of realistic literary fiction.
This is my favourite of the series so far by quite a long way. Partly this was because I liked seeing more of Barrayaran society, in all its complexity and absurdity*, but mostly it was because, for the first time, I was actually able to identify with Miles. Miles the cocky little sod of the earlier books was entertaining enough, but not someone I could relate to, whereas I can look at the Miles of Memory and understand what he's going through because I have been there; I know the despair of feeling like I'd lost everything I had ever worked for, and the slow, difficult process of rebuilding, and I really, really liked seeing that mirrored here on the page.
*I couldn't help reflecting that if anyone ever wrote an academic AU of Barrayar, it would basically be my workplace. Strictly hierarchical? Check. Clear differentiation between the elite caste and everyone else? Check. Absolute respect for tradition, however ridiculous? Check. Importance of personal reputation and influence to actually get anything done? I rest my case.
I'd been told that Memory was a turning point for the series, and it clearly is; Miles starts the book following one path in his life, and ends it on a completely different path. It's also a detective story, although I was spoiled for the resolution of that plot by, of all things, an Ask A Manager comment thread about eighteen months ago and that didn't really seem to matter. (I suspect that even if I hadn't been spoiled for it I might have been able to work it out a long way ahead of the characters.) But what it really is is a serious novel about what happens when your life comes crashing down around your ears; about how you begin to put the pieces back together, and how you start to work out who you really are when you can't be the person you've spent years trying to be any more. It may be set on an alien planet, and it may have a few science fictional trimmings, but the core of the novel is as true and human as any piece of realistic literary fiction.
This is my favourite of the series so far by quite a long way. Partly this was because I liked seeing more of Barrayaran society, in all its complexity and absurdity*, but mostly it was because, for the first time, I was actually able to identify with Miles. Miles the cocky little sod of the earlier books was entertaining enough, but not someone I could relate to, whereas I can look at the Miles of Memory and understand what he's going through because I have been there; I know the despair of feeling like I'd lost everything I had ever worked for, and the slow, difficult process of rebuilding, and I really, really liked seeing that mirrored here on the page.
*I couldn't help reflecting that if anyone ever wrote an academic AU of Barrayar, it would basically be my workplace. Strictly hierarchical? Check. Clear differentiation between the elite caste and everyone else? Check. Absolute respect for tradition, however ridiculous? Check. Importance of personal reputation and influence to actually get anything done? I rest my case.
no subject
Date: 2019-07-17 07:37 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-07-17 07:17 pm (UTC)