Totally excellent as always from Bujold. FWIW, this is my favorite entry point for a reread of the series - Memory, Komarr, A Civil Campaign all flow well as a trilogy. ( )

Another Hit For Miles: After the superlative "Mirror dance", "Memory" was almost bound to light up a little, but happily, it didn't :)

Miles has returned to active duty, working as Admiral Naismith, the ImpSec identity - but his crio-revival wasn't so succesful as formerly believed, and he bungles a mission... Illyan finds out about it - and about the lies in the report Miles presented - and gives our Lord Vorkosigan the boot. Unemployed, depressed - almost suicidal -, and going 30, Miles has to turn to other horizons for his hyper-active personality.
The only thing is, there is no need for his special talents, and the salvation, when it comes, is actually a huge problem: Illyan's eidetic chip has been sabotaged and Miles' former chief is about to lose his mind or die... So Gregor gives Miles the prop he needs - the Imperial Auditor rank - to solve the problem, and he does solve it, Miles-like: quick, neat, completely.

The story is action-packed, the characters well-developed, the rhythm flows...

A superb writing, another extraordinary Vorkosigan adventure!!
Highly recommended.

Link to a review on my personal website. ( )

Magnificent as usual. I haven't read Memory in quite a while, and as usual remembered the plot without remembering all the little things that make it so good. Some of Ivan and Miles' exchanges, for instance; the fishing scene; the Koudelka sisters, foreshadowing A Civil Campaign; Cordelia arriving home; Miles' reaction(s) to his home when it isn't full of his parents...lots of lovely bits. In many ways, this book tells the most about Vor society - in Miles recovering himself within Vor, in the Komarran (Duv and Laisa) and non-Vor (Illyan, Allegre, Haroche...) reactions to things - a lot of the assumptions underlying the Vor come out very strongly and clearly here.
There's a song that tells the story of this book - I actually heard the song before I ever read it. It's called Two Falls Out of Three, by Cat Faber of Echo's Children. It's a total spoiler - tells the villain's name, what he offered Miles, even the inspiration that Miles uses to catch him - and it didn't spoil the book for me at all. Of course it helps that the guy's name isn't spelled like it sounds at all, so I didn't recognize it when I read it. But still. Mirrors and smoke. ( )

This book is incredible. I read it in Miles-chronological order, so I'd been following him and adoring him for some time when I read it and--wow.

Just...wow. Miles outgrowing the admiral? Moving on and finding something to which he is so ideally suited? I want to write a book this good. (preferably more than one, but...) ( )