pjonsson's review against another edition
4.0
It has been a long time since a new Kris Longnife book came out. This book series was one of the first I picked up when I restarted my book reading some years ago. It is a good book that fits well in the series and it is also a change of scenery from the last books. Going from fighting aliens on the edge of human space Kris has to stop a civil war in her former enemies, the Peterwalds, space.
This book is a mixture of action and diplomacy which is both quite well done. Even the diplomacy parts are quite action filled and there seems to be no end to the assassination attempts on Kris and her entourage. When diplomacy fails the big guns are brought out and this time it is Kris holding them. I quite liked the surprises this brought to the evil and half insane Empress. I also liked the newkindled relation between Kris and Vicky. I was less trilled by the unbelievable naivety and stupidity of the Emperor.
Plenty of the old characters are back although some of them are in fact leaving her service and returning back to Alwa. Kris also now has a newborn child which she drags along on her journey. I’m not sure that part was very well thought out. The thought of submitting a newborn child to a multi G environment seemed a bit insane to me.
I am also a bit scared of the path Kris took at the end of the book. It gave me the feeling that this was the last book in which we will see Kris in a active role or at least on the front lines. There seems to be a 15th book planned but it remains to see which direction the story takes.
Anyway, this was a quite enjoyable book and, as with the previous book, I enjoyed that Kris is actually in charge and not being pushed around once the mission starts (and that she holds the big guns of course).
This book is a mixture of action and diplomacy which is both quite well done. Even the diplomacy parts are quite action filled and there seems to be no end to the assassination attempts on Kris and her entourage. When diplomacy fails the big guns are brought out and this time it is Kris holding them. I quite liked the surprises this brought to the evil and half insane Empress. I also liked the newkindled relation between Kris and Vicky. I was less trilled by the unbelievable naivety and stupidity of the Emperor.
Plenty of the old characters are back although some of them are in fact leaving her service and returning back to Alwa. Kris also now has a newborn child which she drags along on her journey. I’m not sure that part was very well thought out. The thought of submitting a newborn child to a multi G environment seemed a bit insane to me.
I am also a bit scared of the path Kris took at the end of the book. It gave me the feeling that this was the last book in which we will see Kris in a active role or at least on the front lines. There seems to be a 15th book planned but it remains to see which direction the story takes.
Anyway, this was a quite enjoyable book and, as with the previous book, I enjoyed that Kris is actually in charge and not being pushed around once the mission starts (and that she holds the big guns of course).
felinity's review
5.0
Kris now manages to juggle the hats of princess, admiral, wife and mother with a certain amount of ease, but it doesn't mean she likes being ordered around or set up as a target and somehow she must negotiate a peaceful agreement between Imperial family members without killing any of them. It could be tricky...
It's filled with very personable central characters with realistic attitudes and problems, from Kris and Jack learning how to be a partnership in marriage as well as work to Vicky's family problems.
(The full story of Vicky's adventures, rather than the necessarily abbreviated version here, is in [b:Vicky Peterwald: Survivor|23398792|Survivor (Vicky Peterwald, #2)|Mike Shepherd|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1415585015s/23398792.jpg|42955334].) Unlike some settings where children shift on and off-stage as if they were chairs, Kris is obviously changed by having a baby, and the size of the babycare team was most entertaining for me. In addition, she not only learns from previous experiences but is somewhat haunted by them, rather than having the amazing ability to just discard all troubling occurrences like many characters do.
SF purists may not like the incredible flexibility of Nelly and the SmartMetal, which may seem a little too space opera, but I loved them! There's nothing like a smart alec computer to lighten the mood.
Disclaimer: I received a free ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
It's filled with very personable central characters with realistic attitudes and problems, from Kris and Jack learning how to be a partnership in marriage as well as work to Vicky's family problems.
(The full story of Vicky's adventures, rather than the necessarily abbreviated version here, is in [b:Vicky Peterwald: Survivor|23398792|Survivor (Vicky Peterwald, #2)|Mike Shepherd|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1415585015s/23398792.jpg|42955334].) Unlike some settings where children shift on and off-stage as if they were chairs, Kris is obviously changed by having a baby, and the size of the babycare team was most entertaining for me. In addition, she not only learns from previous experiences but is somewhat haunted by them, rather than having the amazing ability to just discard all troubling occurrences like many characters do.
SF purists may not like the incredible flexibility of Nelly and the SmartMetal, which may seem a little too space opera, but I loved them! There's nothing like a smart alec computer to lighten the mood.
Disclaimer: I received a free ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
felinity's review against another edition
4.0
Kris now manages to juggle the hats of princess, admiral, wife and mother with a certain amount of ease, but it doesn't mean she likes being ordered around or set up as a target and somehow she must negotiate a peaceful agreement between Imperial family members without killing any of them. It could be tricky...
It's filled with very personable central characters with realistic attitudes and problems, from Kris and Jack learning how to be a partnership in marriage as well as work to Vicky's family problems. (The full story of Vicky's adventures, rather than the necessarily abbreviated version here, is in "[b:Vicky Peterwald: Survivor|23398792|Survivor (Vicky Peterwald, #2)|Mike Shepherd|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1415585015s/23398792.jpg|42955334].") Unlike some settings where children shift on and off-stage as if they were chairs, Kris is obviously changed by having a baby, and the size of the babycare team was most entertaining for me. In addition, she not only learns from previous experiences but is somewhat haunted by them, rather than having the amazing ability to just discard all troubling occurrences like many characters do.
SF purists may not like the incredible flexibility of Nelly and the SmartMetal, which may seem a little too space opera, but I loved them! There's nothing like a smart alec computer to lighten the mood.
Disclaimer: I received a free copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
It's filled with very personable central characters with realistic attitudes and problems, from Kris and Jack learning how to be a partnership in marriage as well as work to Vicky's family problems. (The full story of Vicky's adventures, rather than the necessarily abbreviated version here, is in "[b:Vicky Peterwald: Survivor|23398792|Survivor (Vicky Peterwald, #2)|Mike Shepherd|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1415585015s/23398792.jpg|42955334].") Unlike some settings where children shift on and off-stage as if they were chairs, Kris is obviously changed by having a baby, and the size of the babycare team was most entertaining for me. In addition, she not only learns from previous experiences but is somewhat haunted by them, rather than having the amazing ability to just discard all troubling occurrences like many characters do.
SF purists may not like the incredible flexibility of Nelly and the SmartMetal, which may seem a little too space opera, but I loved them! There's nothing like a smart alec computer to lighten the mood.
Disclaimer: I received a free copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
lushr's review against another edition
4.0
Initially I was scared this would be a slow one, but actually it was a long over due romp with the Greenfeld Empire where Kris finally gets to give them a good taste of her mind. However there are a few mysterious trails for future stories that leave me wanting more so bring on book 15! (And I'm betting 10 months)
sbisson's review against another edition
4.0
Recent Reads: Kris Longknife Bold. The Ace-published arc of Mike Shepherd's milSF comes to an end with book 14. Back home, Kris is asked to negotiate an end to the schisms in the rival polity of Greenfeld. Diplomacy sometimes needs encouragement, fleet action style. The End.
brettt's review
4.0
In 2004, Mike Moscoe adopted the pen name Mike Shepherd and moved ahead a couple of generations in his "Society of Humanity" universe to start writing the adventures of Kris Longknife, a very young officer in her planet's Navy with a long family tradition of trouble, guts and glory. With 2016's Kris Longknife: Bold, Moscoe/Shepherd winds up the first main arc of Kris's life as he brings her to the negotiating table of her family's deadliest enemies.
Vicky Peterwald and her father, the Emperor of Greenfeld, are at odds -- mostly because the Emperor's new wife wants to kill her. Vicky has gathered several Greenfeld planets in support of her, but she does not want to completely break with her father to outright attack her stepmother. The Emperor has asked for a cease-fire and wants Kris to mediate it. Vicky and her father sincerely desire rapprochement. Her stepmother the empress sincerely desires Vicky's death and that of anyone who stands between her and power, which includes Kris Longknife. This won't turn out well for the empress.
Bold makes a few missteps -- the number of characters in the series who have been attacked in a motorcade should alert pretty much all of them to take the subway for the rest of their lives, and Shepherd drops another such incident here. He spends rather more time on the opulence of the meeting and conference room than the details warrant. The Greenfeld-focused action moves the main storyline away from the mysterious near-human race Kris has fought several times before in defense of her home star-kingdom.
But he keeps his heroes witty and brave without the suffocating level of sang-froid David Weber piles on in his "Honorverse." And by making Kris a mother -- it involved sabotage, so don't ask -- he's added a new layer to her character and new concerns for her as she tries to do the right thing and prevent others from doing the wrong ones. Shepherd says in an afterward that Bold brings Kris to a turning point in her life and adventures, and so the changing tone helps set the stage for the next chapters in the story.
Original available here.
Vicky Peterwald and her father, the Emperor of Greenfeld, are at odds -- mostly because the Emperor's new wife wants to kill her. Vicky has gathered several Greenfeld planets in support of her, but she does not want to completely break with her father to outright attack her stepmother. The Emperor has asked for a cease-fire and wants Kris to mediate it. Vicky and her father sincerely desire rapprochement. Her stepmother the empress sincerely desires Vicky's death and that of anyone who stands between her and power, which includes Kris Longknife. This won't turn out well for the empress.
Bold makes a few missteps -- the number of characters in the series who have been attacked in a motorcade should alert pretty much all of them to take the subway for the rest of their lives, and Shepherd drops another such incident here. He spends rather more time on the opulence of the meeting and conference room than the details warrant. The Greenfeld-focused action moves the main storyline away from the mysterious near-human race Kris has fought several times before in defense of her home star-kingdom.
But he keeps his heroes witty and brave without the suffocating level of sang-froid David Weber piles on in his "Honorverse." And by making Kris a mother -- it involved sabotage, so don't ask -- he's added a new layer to her character and new concerns for her as she tries to do the right thing and prevent others from doing the wrong ones. Shepherd says in an afterward that Bold brings Kris to a turning point in her life and adventures, and so the changing tone helps set the stage for the next chapters in the story.
Original available here.
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