Recent reading

[luzula]

Shards of Honor by Lois McMaster Bujold (1986)
I fell for the peer pressure (the peers in question being garonne and sanguinity) and re-read this book, or rather, re-listened to it. And yes, still very enjoyable! I'm undecided about whether the science fiction elements are essential, or whether this could also have been written as, say, a time travel romance with someone from a modern culture traveling to a past culture. (ETA: I mean, not that the SF elements have to justify their presence.) Also, there are definitely elements which speak to me as a Flight of the Heron fan! This is the sort of enemies to lovers I like, and also I was so relieved when Cordelia remembered to withdraw her parole before escaping…

Forbidden Harbour by Teresa Radice and Stefano Turconi (2015)
An Age of Sail graphic novel which solidly passes the Bechdel test, but sadly not the sanguinity Bechdel test. It's a ghost story of sorts, and I liked the story and characters well enough, but what really blew me away was the art, which is done as pencil drawings (I think). OMG, the beautiful and detailed ships! And when we get to land we see that it's not just the ships: the historical setting is so beautifully rendered.

I am also reading (but not for pleasure) sixty student essays on mathematical modeling of population dynamics. Worst student quote so far: "the logistical model is of limited use when it comes to populations in nature since they, unlike humans, don't exist in a vacuum, but depend on and affect each other".

Augh. /o\ Does he really think humans do not affect, and are not affected by, other species in the ecosystem?? This is an otherwise bright student who did well on his math exams…

Comments

[falkner]

I'll admit, that student quote made me immediately wonder if the person in question does not believe in climate change. It just gives off that feeling.

[sanguinity]

Perhaps they mean that human populations are so ecologically dominant that you don't get, say, predator-prey cycling in tandem with other species? But yes, anything that suggests that humans -- or really, anything -- can be usefully modelled as if they live in a vacuum has to be justified. And validated.

Time-travel romance: Barrayar less pings me as a 'past' culture and more as an emerging economy (if that's even the term). Has adopted modern technology (although the infrastructure is still on the thin side), developing international (interplanetary) trade and foreign policy (although their influence is still mostly local). If you were to set it outside of science fiction, I would have doubts about readers' ability to put aside their own "Betan" prejudices about "Barrayar" to effectively read that story.

I wouldn't say that the series as a whole can be removed from an SF context, however, if only because of the uterine replicators. (Which are more a thing in the second Cordelia novel than in the first.)

[china_shop]

Omg, that student quote!! /o\

[sovay]

Worst student quote so far: "the logistical model is of limited use when it comes to populations in nature since they, unlike humans, don't exist in a vacuum, but depend on and affect each other".

Nix on the Puritan exceptionalism!

[chestnut_pod]

Oh, a salute to you and your sixty student essays.

[yhlee]

For me, Barrayar-the-setting reads as sf despite what could be Ruritanian trappings (sp?) because of the whole fear of/awareness of "muties," which in turn reads as inflected by WWII and the nuclear bomb and science fictional extrapolations therefrom, whether or not Vorkosigan Saga is explicitly in dialogue with science fiction like e.g. Kate Wilhelm's Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang or the story I especially think of here, Judith Merrill's "That Only a Mother." But that may be an idiosyncratic overreading of the influencing zeitgeist!

I've never listened to the Vorkosigan books in audiobook - recommended?

Meanwhile, that is the most hilariously depressing take I've ever seen on the logistics equation...

I have only taught middle and high school math but I remember one of the most enlightening exercises I ran on DW years ago was asking people to come up with a word problem/scenario for which the "correct" answer was setting up 20 divided by 1/2. I think only one person who was NOT a mathematician came up with something logical ("You have 20 cupcakes, each person gets half a cupcake as a serving, how many people can you serve?" or similar). Everyone else flatlined when they hit "divide by 1/2, a fraction" and connecting it to a real-world scenario; in teacher ed the notorious anecdote was students being asked to determine, given that buses had a capacity of M students per bus, how many buses were needed to transport a total of N students, and someone gave the answer "10 remainder 3 buses" or similar. It's just tough when real-world context apparently flies out the window.

[nnozomi]

whether this could also have been written as, say, a time travel romance with someone from a modern culture traveling to a past culture
I never thought about that, what a neat idea. How would it affect the initial context in which Cordelia and Aral are both in an unfamiliar context, for instance?

Does he really think humans do not affect, and are not affected by, other species in the ecosystem?? This is an otherwise bright student who did well on his math exams…
Does he, um, not eat anything? Ever?

[luzula]

Hmm, I don't think I would draw that conclusion? I think it's just unexamined human exceptionalism.

[luzula]

I don't think the student really thought about it--since he didn't justify it, it was probably just his unexamined assumptions.

Yeah, you're right that Barrayar and Beta are complicated (and I haven't read most of the series, having bounced off the Miles books previously). I was just struck by the romance between someone from an honor culture and someone from one where that isn't a prominent element, and was trying to think of different ways you could achieve that.

[luzula]

Sigh, yes.

[luzula]

Do you think it's a particularly Puritan thing, then?

[luzula]

Only six to go now! \o/ I shall prevail.

[sanguinity]

Ah! I misunderstood what you were going for!

For someone not nominally from an honour culture, Cordelia seems to understand the foundations very well. Certainly she grasps it quickly and fluidly, witness her extending Aral's word for him on the basis of being the future Lady Vorkosigan. And Aral's statement at the end that she is a 'fountain' of honour, keeping none for herself. I really do need to finish my read/re-read of the Cordelia books.

[luzula]

For me, Barrayar-the-setting reads as sf despite what could be Ruritanian trappings (sp?) because of the whole fear of/awareness of "muties," which in turn reads as inflected by WWII and the nuclear bomb and science fictional extrapolations therefrom
Oh interesting--I hadn't thought of that.

The audiobook of Shards of Honor was a little jarring to me at first, because one voice actor did the narration and all the female dialogue, and another one all the male dialogue. But I got used to it after a while, and I really liked both narrators. I can't speak for the audiobooks of the rest of the series.

I'm very aware of the “different interpretations of fractions” thing, because I was examiner to a student doing a thesis on that very thing. For 20 divided by ½, I'd probably spontaneously go for: a road crew can build half a kilometer of road per day. How long does it take them to build 20 kilometers of road?

[luzula]

I saw from another comment that I was maybe not entirely clear in what I was going for. I was just struck by the romance between someone from an honor culture and someone from one where that isn't a prominent element, and was trying to think of different ways you could achieve that. Hmm, perhaps in the beginning they would be in a different country?

Does he, um, not eat anything? Ever?
Indeed. I think it was just an unexamined assumption and the student wasn't really thinking.

[luzula]

witness her extending Aral's word for him on the basis of being the future Lady Vorkosigan
In this case I kind of winced, since she was flying by the seat of her pants and I wasn't sure how Aral was going to react to that. But in general, it starts out being culture clash, but gets over that pretty quickly.

Hmm, perhaps I should go on and re-listen to Barrayar as well...

[sanguinity]

Heh. I figured that whatever discomfort he might feel about having his word given for him was tempered by 1) having that stand-off solved with essentially no bloodshed, and 2) her implicitly saying yes to his proposal.

Also, if you don't like this kind of thing, Aral, maybe you shouldn't propose marriage after knowing someone for four days.

(He likes this kind of thing. That's why he proposed after four days. For all that he keeps ending up in positions of heavy responsibility and authority -- or maybe because of it! -- he really really likes it when someone trustworthy matter-of-factly takes the reins from him. I honestly think he proposed as much because of her willingness to boss him around while they were stranded as anything else.)

[luzula]

I enjoy your characterization notes! Now I want fic where she bosses him around in bed...I guess I read some fic long ago, but it's been a while.

[sanguinity]

jadelennox's Parade Rest is a lovely entry in that genre, imo.

I should also point out the thing... someone(?) Cordelia?... says about him in canon, about Cordelia solving a dilemma for him, in her being both military and female. Implicitly, that she fulfills his military kink while being an acceptable object of desire/life partner for a Barrayaran male. After all, he never stops referring to her as "his dear captain", even decades into her civilian life.

[luzula]

Ooh, thanks for the rec!