Customer Reviews

Dreamweaver's Dilemma

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Lois McMaster Bujold has a deservedly large following for her award-winning fiction, including "The Mountains of Mourning" novella in this collection. However, most of the short stories printed in this book have the unique ideas LMB fans expect from her fiction but are lacking the polish more recent books exhibit. Whatever this aggregate lacks in technical skill, it delivers entertainment with a quirky wit and a wide range of world building that readers of only the "Vorkosigan" universe would miss.</P> As a avid reader of LMB, I enjoy having this book in my collection but do not use it for "prosethelitizing" since I believe it suitable mostly for the LMB "fanatic". Would that I had spent this little ($12) for my copy! ;)

Bujold doesn't do much short-format stuff, so if you like something under novel length and you have any taste at all--meaning you love Bujold--you need to pick up this book. If you're a Miles Vorkosigan fan--and we already posited your good taste--the book is essential. Strictly speaking, there's only one Vorkosigan story--"The Mountains of Mourning"--and you'll have that anyway in another Miles Vorkosigan collection, but there's invaluable material by Bujold on the writing of the early Vorkosigans, and some supplemental material--charts of the Wormhole Nexus, timelines, geneologies and such. That's not all by Bujold, but it is all intersting and helpful. Warning: this book is NOT the place to start. If you're not familiar with the estimable--and hyperactive--Miles Naismith Vorkosigan, buy the book anyway, but read the early Vorkosigans--SHARDS OF HONOR and WARRIOR'S APPRENTICE at least--before you read this one.

This book is for the Bujold fanatic, and those who like short fiction. Interesting as the stories are, i think the essays by Lois are the best part.

Up until now I thought I loved everything Lois McMaster Bujold has written (well, there was _Spirit Ring_ that didn't quite fall into that category), but I didn't love this. But being a completist, I'm glad I read it and own it. I liked some of the essays about how she came to write, or why readers should read speculative fiction. I enjoyed "Mountains of Mourning" again, but no surprise there, some years I have taught it, I like it that much and think it's that important. Also this week I read the Afterward to _Miles in Love_, a new reprint of _Komarr_, _A Civil Campaign_ and "Winterfair Gifts." It is about the varying structures and themes of those novels, it also fits in nicely with the essays and short stories in this volume. And it's more recent work.
So, if you've read the entire Vorkoverse numerous times and you've read all of Bujold's fantasy, then perhaps you will enjoy(or get enough out of) this book.

This book combines some early short stories, interviews about Bujold's writing, and a chronology of the building of her writing career. Only one Miles' story is included: Mountains of Mourning.
Interesting and informative