Books: Tanya Huff, The Truth of Valor
Dec. 23rd, 2013 06:33 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethA Confederation Novel, which means it's about space marines, or, by this point in the series, ex space marines. There's three fighting species on the main character's side, humans, sex obsessed space elves, and short bitey orcs that eat everything. Except they have different species names. There's also a whole bunch of other species who claim they've evolved past fighting, so they hire the youngest to do all the war for them. And then there's the Others, who were the enemies in the war, but the last book had Torin basically end the war single handed. Plausibly. So that was cool.
The main character is Torin Kerr, a female human Gunnery Sergeant. I'd say ex Gunnery Sergeant but a recurring thing in this book is there's no such thing as an ex Gunnery Sergeant. So the theme in this book is that the end of the war is not the end of the fighting, and that quitting the Marine Corps doesn't install an off switch on all that violence. War has repercussions personal, social and political, even or especially after it ends.
All that gets explored by having Torin chasing after space pirates to rescue her male love interest when he gets captured. It's pretty awesome.
I like how her relationships progress, I like that she doesn't walk away from previous books unchanged, I like that she keeps all her competence but without the whole marine corps at her back the change in pressure and support both leave her off balance. And there's lots of running around fighting and blowing stuff up, but also stopping and wondering if this particular time there actually needs to be fighting or blowing stuff up. Is good.
The only teensy tiny thing about it was I was kind of expecting a slightly different book. The previous book ended with a big revelation, and Torin's whole life got changed, as did the life of the Confederation. So this book does follow the repercussions, but it's more about the lingering psychological effects and trying to put that stuff behind them. I was kind of expecting to meet some of the aliens again and find out what it was all about, you know, like the 'Truth' bit of the title. But it's a different truth entirely, which is fair. ... also, looking at the series, I'm not sure the titles have much to do with anything ever anyway.
I just re-read all the Valor books, and I'd happily recommend them to anyone likely to like super competent female NCO space marines kicking all the arse. Torin is awesome. The plots roll along and the action keeps coming and the characters are vivid and distinct enough to keep straight in your head. There's also a lot of vivid violence, nasty injuries, torture, people getting eaten, some pheromone encouraged non-con and quite a lot of character death. The settings involve war, creepy captured alien ships, prisoner of war camps, and space pirate ships and stations. ... they're also a lot funnier than that list of warnings looks, because having a range of moods makes them all stand out more. They do what they say on the tin, and are proper adventures.
Well written.
Will read more by the same author and read these again later.
The main character is Torin Kerr, a female human Gunnery Sergeant. I'd say ex Gunnery Sergeant but a recurring thing in this book is there's no such thing as an ex Gunnery Sergeant. So the theme in this book is that the end of the war is not the end of the fighting, and that quitting the Marine Corps doesn't install an off switch on all that violence. War has repercussions personal, social and political, even or especially after it ends.
All that gets explored by having Torin chasing after space pirates to rescue her male love interest when he gets captured. It's pretty awesome.
I like how her relationships progress, I like that she doesn't walk away from previous books unchanged, I like that she keeps all her competence but without the whole marine corps at her back the change in pressure and support both leave her off balance. And there's lots of running around fighting and blowing stuff up, but also stopping and wondering if this particular time there actually needs to be fighting or blowing stuff up. Is good.
The only teensy tiny thing about it was I was kind of expecting a slightly different book. The previous book ended with a big revelation, and Torin's whole life got changed, as did the life of the Confederation. So this book does follow the repercussions, but it's more about the lingering psychological effects and trying to put that stuff behind them. I was kind of expecting to meet some of the aliens again and find out what it was all about, you know, like the 'Truth' bit of the title. But it's a different truth entirely, which is fair. ... also, looking at the series, I'm not sure the titles have much to do with anything ever anyway.
I just re-read all the Valor books, and I'd happily recommend them to anyone likely to like super competent female NCO space marines kicking all the arse. Torin is awesome. The plots roll along and the action keeps coming and the characters are vivid and distinct enough to keep straight in your head. There's also a lot of vivid violence, nasty injuries, torture, people getting eaten, some pheromone encouraged non-con and quite a lot of character death. The settings involve war, creepy captured alien ships, prisoner of war camps, and space pirate ships and stations. ... they're also a lot funnier than that list of warnings looks, because having a range of moods makes them all stand out more. They do what they say on the tin, and are proper adventures.
Well written.
Will read more by the same author and read these again later.