The Vor Game by Lois McMaster Bujold

I've read and re-read the Vorkosigan saga over the years, but this is the first time, since encountering him in Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen, that I noticed Lieutenant Jole in Aral Vorkosigan's entourage. I had wondered a bit if Bujold had simply introduced him created out of whole cloth, and was reassured to find he had been there all along.
Note: He appears in Captain Vorpatril's Alliance, as well.


Anyway, that has nothing much to do with the plot of The Vor Game, but I found it interesting, at least.


The book begins with the inclusion of a novella detailing Miles' first assignment after completing military training when, instead of being given ship duty he is sent to be a weather technician at Kyril Base, amid a wasteland of frozen tundra. The base is commanded by an Old Army type who turns out in the end to be a homicidal lunatic, and Miles' trainer is a hopeless alcoholic. In the pursuit of his duties, Miles nearly dies when his ground car is submerged in a bog, discovers a body in a drainage ditch, and is arrested for mutiny. And that's just the first 10% of the book.


To keep Miles out of further trouble, Aral and Ilyan decide to keep him on a short leash, and he is assigned to Ilyan's ImpSec. Fat chance!


When Admiral Naismith's Dendarii Mercenaries turn up to enforce a blockage in a nearby solar system, Miles is escorted by some very unimaginative officers to the Hegen Hub, where his assignment is simply to once again assume the persona of the little admiral and to order the fleet out of the area, which is crucial to Barrayaran interests.


This simple mission manages to rapidly go off the rails when Miles is falls afoul of some arms dealers, ends up as indentured labor, and discovers that Emperor Gregor has run away from home, and landed in the Hegen Hub!


The story of how Miles rescues the Emperor, gains and loses and gains command again of the Dendarii, double-talks some psychotic murderers, and foils an invasion attempt by the Cetagandan fleet, is absolutely delightful, in the manner we've already come to love from Bujold and Miles Vorkosigan.

The Warrior's Apprentice by Lois McMaster Bujold

This is the book that introduced me to the world of Lois McMaster Bujold, and which has forced me to buy every sequel that she's published over the last few decades.

Son of Count and Regent Aral Vorkosigan and Cordelia nee Naismith Vorkosigan, Miles has some big shoes to fill, especially when you add in the riding boots of his Grandfather, Piotr. He has put everything he has into successfully passing the entrance exams for the Imperial Military academy, and the story begins with the tragedy of him washing out of the physical portion of the test after shattering his legs trying to leap tall buildings...or at least an obstacle course wall.

Mentally cut adrift, he determines to take a trip to Beta Colony for a visit with his maternal grandmother, dragging along his childhood friend, Elena, daughter of the dour and faithful Sergeant Bothari, his batman. He hopes that they'll be able to solve the mystery of who Elena's mother was by poking around in cemetery records there, since that knowledge is still classified burn before reading on Barrayar, tied up as it was with Prince Serg's disastrous armada and glorious death (Read Shards of Honor).

We learn very nearly all we need to know about Miles in the first hour or so on Beta Colony, when he pokes his nose into something that is most definitely none of his business, and ends up rescuing a pilot, Arde Mayhew, and buying a ship by mortgaging part of his inheritance - some radioactive swampland. From this point forward the tale skips from frying pan to fire and back - repeatedly. Along the way, he also picks up a Barrayaran deserter, Baz Jesek, who is stranded offworld, and to keep him from being arrested, swears him in as his personal armsman, tying up the diplomatic teams of both planets in a snarled mess.

In order to pay off the mortgage on the ship, Miles takes on a dubious cargo of "agricultural equipment", which is to be delivered to the losing side in a planetary war, past a blockade maintained by a mercenary fleet. Miles plays the role of a devil may care mercenary a bit too well, and we begin to wonder if his personality is splitting at the seams. When they encounter the blockade, all is going reasonably well, the cargo is well concealed, and the shakedown bearable, until the leader of the boarding party decides he needs to take a hostage, too - Elena.

When Miles and his companions reach their breaking point moments later, they overwhelm the bored and out of shape mercenaries, then turn the tables, boarding the mercenaries ship and taking command. When faced with the need to keep the mercenaries, who outnumber them, too busy to launch a counterattack, Admiral Naismith and the Dendarii Free Mercenaries are born!

Simply one of the best, most entertaining stories I have ever read...and re-read...and re-re-read.

Barrayar by Lois McMaster Bujold

Though this novel was actually published a number of years after The Warrior's Apprentice, where we meet Miles Vorkosigan for the first time, it precedes that book in the Vorkosiverse timeline. It picks up shortly after the end of Shards of Honor. Cordelia and Aral are married and living on Barrayar, expecting their first child. Emperor Ezar is dying, and needs Aral to act as Regent for the five year old boy, Gregor, until he reaches his majority. Aral definitely does not want the job, but Ezar points out to him the serious flaws in all of the other candidates for the position, and Aral is forced to do the task.

His appointment, followed shortly by the death of the Emperor, triggers plotting by those who wanted the power for themselves. One of those consequences is the soltoxin grenade attack on Aral's home, which leaves him and Cordelia briefly poisoned, while the antidote to the poison threatens to destroy the skeletal structure of the child in her womb. They take the drastic measure of placing their child in one of the recently acquired uterine replicators (which Aral fortuitously took charge of at the end of Shards), bombarding the baby with massive amounts of bone-enhancing therapies while he is growing.

When one of Aral's colleagues in the council of counts decides he must have the regency for himself, he takes Princess Kareen, Gregor's mother, hostage, claims that Aral has had the boy murdered, and begins to imprison and execute any of Aral's loyalists he can find. Ezar's old head of Security, Captain Negri, escapes the fighting with the boy emperor and in his last dying effort, delivers him to Aral for safekeeping. Aral's father and Cordelia and Sargent Bothari take the boy and escape into the mountains to hide, leading Vordarian's troops on a wild goose chase while they attempt to capture him.

When the man charged with fetus Miles' care shows up suddenly to tell Cordelia and Aral that Vordarian has seized the replicator and that it is being held hostage in the palace, Cordelia defies Aral and heads into the capitol to rescue her son.

This book is filled with ties to tons of the other events in the rest of the Vorkosigan series, and provides a number of in jokes later on for dedicated readers, as well as filling in some of the gaps in characters' backgrounds. Another one of the books that has grown on me with time.

Shards of Honor by Lois McMaster Bujold

It's hard to believe that I never got round to writing about some of the early books in the Vorkosigan saga, but it appears that Memory came out during the early days of this blog, and I never went full retro, as I did with Cole & Bunch's Sten novels. I recently finished Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen, and it led me to re-read Shards of Honor (and continue through to Barrayar) in a moment of temporary new novel drought, as I had copies on my tablet ready to hand.

There are certain stories which I cannot read without sentimental tears coming to my eyes at times, and Bujold has written a fair number of them. A Civil Campaign is the weepiest one for me, but Shards did a pretty good number on me, too, and as I mentioned before, I began grieving for Aral all over again while reading Gentleman Jole. Crazy thing is, Shards used to be my least favorite story in the series. But I began by reading The Warrior's Apprentice when I was in my twenties, and now I'm in Cordelia's demographic. Odd, that.

This is, at the moment, the true beginning of the story. Captain Naismith is in charge of a peaceful survey expedition on an uninhabited planet (later named Sergyar), which is attacked by a small Barrayaran force which has arrived to garrison the planet and prepare a stockpile for their invasion of Escobar (we find this out over the course of the first half of the book). Also caught up in the scuffle is Captain Aral Vorkosigan, a man of strong personal integrity who has run afoul of the secret political police, and who is assaulted by one of his own crew and assumed to be dead, though  it turns out the conspirators really didn't truly understand the motivations of the man they picked to murder him.

Cordelia is left with one crew member dead and another nerve-damaged, when Aral arrives on the scene to make her his prisoner, technically, though the relationship soon develops into something far different. Together they journey for a week or so, facing the dangers of an untamed planet, followed by the dangers of untamed Barrayaran soldiers. Aral retakes command of his ship, but is forced to fight against another round of mutineers, and Cordelia manages to flee to freedom in the confusion.

Intermission.

Cordelia is now the commander of a top secret mission to supply the Escobaran forces with a secret weapon, a force shield which will reflect the Barrayaran (space) navy's weapons straight back at their own ships. The mission is successful, but she and her crew are captured by the Barrayarans and she is taken aboard the flagship as a prisoner - again. The fleet is commanded by Admiral Vorrutyer and Prince Serg, heir to the Imperium. These two are well suited to partner up, as they are both sexual sadists, and Cordelia is dismayed to learn that Vorrutyer has taken a personal interest in her, but she is rescued in a surprising manner, and then encounters Aral again on the same ship.

I don't want to say too much more, cause there's plenty of spoilers, but I think we all know the end of the story, if we've been reading Bujold for a while.

One little note that made me laugh out loud was when Cordelia bamboozles a pilot officer into smuggling her off of Beta Colony, one step ahead of the authorities. The pilot officer's name will be very familiar to anyone who has read The Warrior's Apprentice, and we wonder why the man didn't run screaming the minute he heard the name, Naismith.




Great story. Barrayar to follow.

Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen

I needed my Vorkosigan fix way too much by the time this book came out. It had been long enough since the last one that I had completely forgotten the death of Aral Vorkosigan, Miles' father, and found myself grieving once again with Cordelia, three years later in book time. Cordelia, herself, and Aral's long time protege, Oliver Jole, now an admiral in his own right, and as we learn fairly early in the story, Aral's lover.

The menage a trois evidently worked quite well when Aral was alive, but Oliver and Cordelia were unable to kindle any fire between the two of them when Aral was gone, so they simply lapsed into being friends, and Jole ended up in charge of the Sergyar fleet, while Cordelia continued to serve as Vicereine of the colony.

These chapters of their lives are drawing to a close, as Oliver approaches his "twice-twenty" years of service to the Emperor in the fleet, and Cordelia considers turning over the reins of power to a younger person as the colony matures. She has also decided to quicken some of the fertilized eggs that she and Aral put in cryogenic storage back before Miles was born, and to raise a number of sisters for the new Count and his wife, Ekaterina's children to play with.

Always even-handed, she also gifts Oliver with some of the embryos, leaving the choice up to him of whether and when to start a family of his own, with the children of the man he loved.

So, this book isn't filled with all of the danger and frying pan to fire goodness that we've come to enjoy from our old friend Miles and his cousin Ivan (who doesn't even put in a cameo here), but at least we get to spend a bit of time with some old friends and to see the man whom Miles has become, now that he's not off derring and do-ing.

Captain Vorpatril's Alliance by Lois McMaster Bujold

I had a spot of bother obtaining this book. I first went to the publisher's site, and couldn't seem to find an electronic version, nor was I able to find it at Amazon. Bending with the wind, I headed to a nearby Hastings, and hunted for it on the new releases shelf without success, so I had to ask the manager to look it up - turned out they weren't ordering any copies in. What?? Back to the Baen web site, trying a different path, and found the ebook for sale - so I downloaded it before anything else could delay my gratification. I have been eagerly awaiting this book for soooo long, and Bujold did not disappoint me.

We (sorta) get away from the Vorkosigan saga here, in that the protagonist is actually a Vorpatril, Miles' cousin, Ivan Xav. We've seen this a couple of times before from Bujold, such as when Ellie Quinn or Cordelia told their tales, which wove into the overall history. I hope she's not done with Miles, though seeing him appear in this one as a peripheral character, leaning on his cane, dandling children on his knee, makes me wonder.

Ivan is on assignment with Barrayaran military's Operations department on Komarr, blithely going about his business, when he is visited abruptly by Byerly Vorrutyer, best known as a wastrel disowned heir of a noble house, but known by Ivan and his cousin to actually be an ImpSec agent. By enlists Ivan to keep an eye on (translation - attempt to seduce) a subject of one of his investigations, the lovely shop girl (looks can be deceiving) Tej. When Ivan's pickup attempt doesn't go as smoothly as he hopes - Tej's sister stuns him and ties him to a chair in their flat - he finds himself involved in something far more dangerous than a casual fling.

It seems that Tej and Rish are from Jackson's Whole, the daughters of a Baron and Baronne who have recently been removed from power and forced to flee for their lives. Somehow, the ladies have gotten separated from the rest of the family, and are being pursued by kidnappers hoping to return them to Jacksonian space for the bounty on their heads. Ivan helps them foil the plans of one set of kidnappers, then offers them sanctuary at his own apartment (a bit more upscale than the fugitives').

When the local cops and customs officials put in an appearance later, Ivan (whether out of genius or desperation - he's more like Miles than he likes to admit) offers Tej the protection of the Barrayaran Empire through becoming his wife - temporarily, of course. Heh.

The rest of the story goes some unexpected places, as well as our old familiar haunts. Though Bujold claims she writes all the stories in the Vorkosiverse to be stand-alone, the whole middle section of this book is just one long, huge inside joke for Miles' fans. Sure, there's just enough explanation of all the dramatis personae to keep the newbie from choking, but there are far more "in" references for the illuminati.

You can imagine the scene when Ivan's mother, Lady Alys, gets to meet his new bride, and the amusing competitive intrigue that develops between his step-father, Simon Ilyan, and his new father-in-law, Baron Cordonah. We get to drop in on Miles and Ekaterin, briefly, catch a bit of family gossip about clone-brother Mark, and devour a couple of meals prepared by the marvelous Ma Kosti, including some maple ambrosia for dessert which is definitely an insider's joy.

This one is worth whatever you have to endure to grab a copy.

Cryoburn by Lois McMaster Bujold

In her Miles Vorkosigan series, Bujold has often explored - in the Campbellian tradition - the effects of a particular piece of future technology or political philosophy on the human race. In Ethan of Athos, she shows us the societal effects of uterine replicator technology on a planet populated entirely by males. In Komarr, we see folks adapting to life in domes on a planet that is slowly being terraformed. In Cetaganda, we see the effects of long term genetic manipulation on the human race. In Diplomatic Immunity (and Falling Free, which is not part of this series, per se)  we see the how humans who have been adapted to free fall live, love and entertain themselves.

In Brothers in Arms, we find out how people on Earth have built tidal barriers to survive the slow rising of the seas. In Mirror Dance, on Jackson's Whole, we see what might happen on a world run entirely by unfettered corporate greed and criminal "Barons". In Memory, we explore the possibilities of human brain enhancement through cybernetic implants. And now, in Cryoburn, we look at what might happen when an entire society on the planet Kibou-daini takes advantage of cryogenic technology to postpone death.

Things start out innocently enough when Miles is sent by Gregor to a conference on cryogenic technology to investigate what the expansion of the cryo-corporations into the Empire might mean. As one might expect from all that has gone before, Miles just can't stay out of trouble, and is first kidnapped by a half-assed terrorist organization that wants to tear down the cryo corps hold on power, and, when he starts pursuing the threads of corruption after one of the cryo executives attempts to bribe him, he really stirs things up.

I'm afraid, after all of my eager anticipation of this book, that it's a little disappointing. First, this just doesn't seem to have the old "magic" that Bujold has always brought to Miles' madcap mishaps. There's really no sense of "out of the frying pan" in this book, and the people that Miles gathers around him in this book don't have that fully fleshed out feel of earlier sidekicks. Roic is still around, of course, and Lord Mark makes an appearance about two thirds of the way through, with Kareen in tow, but even the most developed characters in the book, like the waif Jin who rescues Miles and is rescued in return, are just missing that certain something. If you're a Vorkosigan fan, you're going to have to read it, because it is, after all, Bujold writing about Miles, and there are some key events, but don't expect too much, ok?

Maybe someone can clue me in if there's a short story I missed, but I always thought we'd see something thoroughly describing the passing of Sargent Taura in this latest novel, and Miles and Roic merely muse about the funeral, in passing.

SPOILERS BELOW!

Ethan of Athos by Lois McMaster Bujold

After turning a friend of mine on to the rest of the Vorkosigan saga, I decided to re-read them all, myself. After finishing the "core" novels, I figured I ought to read the peripheral ones, as well. Ethan of Athos is sort of a sidelight to the main storyline, about Dr. Ethan Urqhart, director of a reproductive center for a planet populated entirely by men.

We've all seen a number of SF novels about planets populated solely by women, and somehow are more comfortable with that concept than the all-male variety. Of course, the only way this works is because of the Galactic technology base of the uterine replicator. The replicators figure so prominently in Cordelia and Miles' stories, and Bujold seems to have explored the "what if?" implications of this technology on society, in the spirit of John W. Campbell's editorial tenure.

Bujold has previously explored the difference between cultures, such as Beta Colony, which heavily use replicators, and Barrayar, which didn't, as well as the cultural revolution occurring through the introduction of replicator technology after it's introduction on Barrayar. The replicators figure heavily in the life extension techniques available on Jackson's Whole (creating a clone and having your brain transplanted into it). In Ethan of Athos, she explores the idea of a monosexual culture which is allowed to survive over the long haul because of the availability of uterine replicators and cultured ovaries.

However, when our story begins, the viability of Athos is threatened by the slow deterioration of the ovarian cultures upon which the planet depends. The Council had ordered, from House Bharaputra on Jackson's Whole, 50 new ovarian cultures to replace the ones that were dying, but when the package arrives, it's filled with non-viable ovaries, from various sources, human and animal. Dr. Urquart - Ethan - is sent to investigate and to negotiate with some other commercial firm to buy more cultures, and to ensure their safe delivery this time.

Ethan, of course, has never been off planet (Athos is quite isolated, intentionally), and in the early part of the story is quite terrified by Galactic culture and the unknown, especially women, who are held to be the source of all evil in the Athosian religion. When he arrives on Kline Station he makes the acquaintance of Ellie Quinn, presently detached on leave from the Dendarii Mercenaries, or so she claims. There's a plot afoot, involving Cetagandan agents, and he lands right smack dab in the middle of things.

He's picked up for interrogation by Ghem Colonel Millisore and Ghem Captain Rau, and when they find he has no useful knowledge for them after a seven hour chemical interrogation, they decide to dispose of him. Quinn intervenes at the last moment, killing their agent, and then uses Ethan as a stalking goat to draw out Millisore and his minions.

It seems that the Cetagandans were having some human genetic research done on Jackson's Whole. One of the results of that experiment, Terrance Cee, revolted against his "masters" and stashed the gene complexes in the shipment of ovaries bound for Athos.

The action and intrigue revolve around Ethan's, Quinn's, Terrance's and Millisore's search for the missing gene complexes.

The overall effect of the book is to round out some aspects of Galactic culture, flesh out some facets of Ellie Quinn's character, and bounce a few new cultural and philosophical ideas off of Bujold's reading audience. Bujold raises some interesting points about the hidden costs of childbearing and child rearing, that most Earthly cultures "write off" through the "free" labor of women and wives, but which must be strictly accounted for and paid for in a totally male society. Interesting and entertaining reading all the way round.


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Diplomatic Immunity, by Lois McMaster Bujold

It may just be a reaction to finishing Bujold's best book in the series, A Civil Campaign, but Diplomatic Immunity just falls flat in some way. A happily-married Miles is a good thing, but he's lost some of the frenetic energy and forward momentum at all costs that made the earlier novels so fun. I suspect Bujold felt the same way after writing this one, leading to her long hiatus from Miles' milieu, which hasn't necessarily been a bad thing, she's written some awesome fantasy novels in that time.
Miles and Ekaterin are at the end of their honeymoon tour, about to become parents when their children are "hatched" out of their uterine replicators when they return to Barrayar. Miles gets a message from the Emperor, directing him to get his Auditorial presence to an out of the way space habitat where a Komarran merchant fleet, escorted by Barrayaran military ships, has run into a bit of trouble with the local authorities.
We end up with a reprising return to QuaddieSpace, from Bujold's earlier novel, Falling Free. On arriving there, Miles is surprised to find an old friend, the hermaphrodite Bel Thorne, serving as Portmaster, and an old rescuee, Nicole the quaddie (human genetically altered for free fall conditions with all four limbs being arms) dulcimer player whom Miles and Bel stole out from under Baron Ryoval in an earlier adventure on Jackson's Whole.
One of the Barrayaran security officers has disappeared under suspicious circumstances while in port, and a near riot caused when another man goes AWOL and the security squad sent to return him to the ship gets a little carried away has landed the squad in the quaddies' brig. It will take what diplomatic skills Miles possesses to get them released without costing the Empire too much, and his tenacious investigative skills to figure out the case of the missing officer. All of this turns out to be much more than he expects, but not, perhaps what we've come to expect from a Vorkosigan adventure.
It's a must read from a completeness point of view, but just not as good as most of the rest of the series.

A Civil Campaign, by Lois McMaster Bujold

Bujold's recent novel in the Miles Vorkosigan saga has just about everything a man could ask for: laugh-out-loud comedy, minor tragedy, high drama and low punning. If you haven't been keeping up with the Vorkosigan adventures, you better get with the program. I recommend this entire series highly. While they're not strictly science fiction in some senses - some are military fiction, spy novels or political intrigue - each and every one will provide hours of entertainment.

In A Civil Campaign, Miles has returned from his latest mission to Komarr as an Imperial Auditor with a major crush on a young Vor widow, Ekatarin Vorsoisson. His clone brother, Mark has returned home to Barrayar from his Betan studies for a while, with love affair problems of his own and a new business partner. And, in the immediate environs of Barrayar, Emperor Greg's wedding is rapidly approaching and the Council of Counts is filled with cutthroat political games.

In matters of war, Miles has known few masters, but in matters of love, he proves to be a little out of his depth. His best-laid plans to court the widow Vorsoisson go curiously awry, and there's a climactic dinner party scene which could have been written by James Thurber on one of his better days.

In some ways, this novel is like a big family reunion. All of the characters we've come to know and love are present. Aral and Cordelia, Simon Illyan, Ivan and Lady Alys, Emperor Greg, Kou and Drou, Mark and the Koudelka sisters, Armsman Pym (think of Jeeves with a pulse cannon)... and the list goes on.

I must confess, I broke one of my cardinal rules and bought this one in hardback, and it was definitely worth the price. Enjoy.

Komarr, by Lois McMasters Bujold

Having been confirmed by Emperor Gregor, and sworn in as Imperial Auditor in front of the Council of Counts, Miles goes offplanet to observe another auditor, Vorthys (an esteeemed engineering professor) in investigating the cause of a collision which has caused damage to the soletta array on Komarr. This array is essential to the cause of terraforming the planet, which appears to be Mars-like, from the descriptions. Komorrans have been living under domes on the planet for a century or so, and hope to be able to move to the surface without wearing breath masks sometime in the next millenium.

Auditors Vorthys and Vorkosigan set up shop in the home of Vorthys' niece, Ekaterin, and her husband Tien Vorsoisson. Tien is an administrator in one of the districts of the terraforming project. We get to learn quite a bit about the state of the project when we tag along with the auditors on a dog and pony show arranged by Tien and the people working with him, and later we get to go on a shopping expedition with Miles and Ekaterin and learn a bit more about life in Komarr.

As it turns out, Tien has been involved in a bit of shady business with the Komarran "resistance", accepting bribes out of funds embezzled from the terraforming project. Ekaterin discovers his part in this, and it's the last straw for her in an unhappy marriage. When she tells Tien she's leaving him, he panics and tries to get Miles to declare him an Imperial Witness (immune from prosecution) if he'll reveal the Komarran's plot. Miles and Tien pay a surprise visit at one of the terraforming stations, get surprised themselves, and Tien dies accidentally and stupidly. At this point, the plot threads begin to come together, and the damage to the soletta array appears to be a part of something larger and much more deadly.

What's perhaps more important, however, is that Miles falls hopelessly in love with Ekaterin Vorsoisson, even before her husband is dead, we get to watch him navigate the maze between his Vorish sense of propriety and his usual disregard for anything remotely resembling rules and utter lack of social inhibitions.

There's a great "in" joke here when Ekaterin offers to take Miles shopping, and he quips "That's not something one offers a son of my mother lightly" (paraphrase). There's also a marvelous moment near the end of the book when Miles absolutely knows he must have this woman as his wife, and she quizzes him about his ex-girlfriends. She drags it out of him that one of them has become an admiral of a mercenary fleet, another the head of a cryogenic clinic, another has become one of Cetaganda's Empresses, and she begins to realize that Miles is one of those rare people who encourage others to dream big and accomplish even bigger.

Just another great book in the plot and character development for Lord Auditor Miles Vorkosigan.

Memory, by Lois McMaster Bujold

In anticipation of Bujold's new novel in the Vorkosigan saga, I've been re-reading some of the old ones in my library. Memory is the novel in the series that marks a real turning point in Miles' life. He's been working for ImpSec's Galactic Affairs office undercover as the wily and unpredictable Admiral Naismith of the Dendarii Free Mercenaries for a number of years, quite successfully, and now a new assignment goes horribly wrong. While rescuing a Barrayaran courier from kidnappers, Miles suffers a seizure caused by some lasting effects of his cryo-revival the previous year, and while he's seizing, his plasma arc locks on and severs the legs of the courier (fortunately, the medical people can put Humpty back together again).
This will not look well in his report to Simon Illyan, chief of ImpSec, and Miles makes the crucial error of deciding to falsify the report, making it seem as if it was a weapons malfunction that caused the mishap. He knows that if Simon knew that he was having seizures, he'd pull him off of duty with the Dendarii and put him on a desk job. As one would expect, Simon discovers the deception, and Miles is forced to resign from ImpSec for "medical reasons", rather than face a court martial for his deceptions. So much of Miles' self-image is caught up in his success in ImpSec and in playing Admiral Naismith that he is absolutely lost, rudderless, and near suicidal at this point.
Fortunately for him, there are other plots afoot. Simon Illyan has had an eiditic memory chip in his brain for most of his life - and all of his ImpSec career - that has made him a formidable weapon in the Emperor's arsenal. Someone finds a way to destroy the memory chip, and nearly destroy Simon in the process. Despite their recent contretemps, Miles feels a great deal of affection for Simon, and a duty to him as well, as a loyal satellite of the Vorkosigan clan, a sort of adopted uncle, and tries to visit him in the secure hospital where he's being held, slowly going insane due to the misfiring and deterioration of the memory chip. Frustrated when he can't get in to see Ivan, Miles plays his trump card by visiting his foster brother Gregor, Emperor of Barrayar, and wangling an Imperial Auditor's position, to investigate the attack on Simon.
This story has a great mystery as its heart, with Miles deftly unraveling the strings, and some fantastic growing moments, as he finally puts away "childish things" and reconciles himself to his Barrayaran destiny.