The Vorkosigan Companion

(The copy I read had a signature---pages 26 to 51, IIRC---missing and what looks like the corresponding pages from War Games by Christopher Anvil in its place. Since the most interesting material was toward the beginning of the book, those missing pages might have bumped my rating up to 4 stars. Maybe.)

The Vorkosigan Companion includes a few interviews with Bujold, accounts by a childhood friend and her brother, the introductions (by fans) to four of the novels, essays about aspects of the series and its fandom, a pronunciation guide, a concordance (list of characters, places, and items with brief explanations and indications of which books include them), a map of the wormhole routes between systems described in the series, and the show more series chronology (book listing) included in every book in the series.

Of these, the interviews and friend-and-relation reminiscences were interesting and well worth reading; the book introductions were more or less the same, except that they were either essays I had already read with the books in question, or retreads of material I had read or gathered from elsewhere. The essays about the series were hit-or-miss, and except for the genealogical analysis at the end of the volume relied too much on plot summary. The essay on the Bujold fandom made me wish wistfully that I had time to start reading The List again. The map and its accompanying explanation were reasonably good, but I've seen better "Nexus maps" online, and from mentions of "maps" (plural) I had expected a map of Barrayar, Beta Colony, Komarr, or one of the other polities in the Nexus. Finally, the concordance and pronunciation guide are probably the best reason to keep the book around once we've got it, but are needlessly duplicative (why not just include pronunciations in the people's and places' entries in the concordance).

I recognized the names of several of the contributors from my years reading (lurking on) The List, but that also made me wonder why other prominent listees, whom I know to have written better scholarly analyses in similar veins, were not also represented.

So, all in all, The Vorkosigan Companion isn't by any means bad, but it doesn't meet my expectations. show less

For fans (and most definitely only for those who have already read the Vorkosigan Saga in full, to avoid massive spoilers) and rabid fanatics. I loved the plot summaries of all the books, I loved the analysis of [b:Falling Free|61915|Falling Free|Lois McMaster Bujold|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1170597889s/61915.jpg|2277408] by Bujold's engineer brother, I really appreciated the plot summary. The concordance was less compelling, but I think will be useful during a re-read. I love, love, loved the interviews with Bujold. In short, I'm moving from ordinary fan into the realm of rabid fanatic.

Somewhat dull but useful companion volume to Bujold's famous Miles series. The opening chapters where Bujold is interviewed and talk with her own prose are the most interesting. After that comes a series of book forwards by sort of famous people who enjoyed them, history of the universe, and spoilers (or synopsis) of all the plots - nowhere near as entertaining as re-reading them, but probably useful if you're trying to find something specific. It does make you realise just how madcap the adventures are. There's also a glossary of all the names, places and people - what book they appeared in and what backstory we know about them. Many are just one name, and a line or two. Again not really interesting, but a useful reference if you're show more trying to remember the details. I suspect its actually most useful for Bujold herself, who can keep all the backstory true when she's writing prequels.

I very much suspect that Bujold's own writing history is now not an amenable path for new authors looking to get published. Her first three novels were taken by Baen - a company she remains on good terms with today despite being a very much more major author name now. Only after her first seven books had been accepted did she recruit an agent to assist with the contract negotiations etc.

A useful bluffers guide if you're going to be interacting with the Bujold fanbase and don't have time to read all the books. Or a reference for those who've read them but can't quite remember the details when it comes to who was who. But for the average reader of Bujold, it doesn't hold anything of particular note. Published in 2008 so it doesn't have the latest stories in it. show less

http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/1256806.html

It feels a bit elegiac, and if anything belated, to look at a handbook to Bujold's Vorkosigan universe. It is five years since the latest story of the cycle was published, and the most recent novel came out in 2001. Bujold continues to publish, but has switched to fantasy these days.

The Companion is rather thin for its price. It starts with several interesting bits from Bujold herself, but then has some not very inspiring essays on various aspects of her works. The best by far is Marna Nightingale's description of Bujold fandom; I'll shout out also to Doug Muir for his introduction to The Warrior's Apprentice. But I couldn't really recommend the book to anyone who is not a Bujold completist.

This book is definitely for the true fan. I enjoyed Marna Nightingale's essay on Bujold fandom. All the forwards to various Vorkosigan books are a bit much all at once. The pronunciation guide would no doubt be useful to people who worry about that sort of thing and the novel summaries are handy. I was completely unable to follow the Barrayaran Genealogy, but I mostly read at the end of the day.