World Famous Comics: The Short Victorious War (Honor Harrington)
The Short Victorious War (Honor Harrington)
By: David Weber Publisher: Baen Average Rating: Binding: Mass Market Paperback Label: Baen Number of Items: 1 Number of Pages: 416 Publication Date: July 30, 2002
Product Description: The Peeps Have Bitten Off More Than They Can Chew. . . . The rulers of the People's Republic of Haven are in trouble and revolt is brewing, so it's high time for a short victorious war. But Honor Harrington is going to give them a war that's neither short nor victorious.
Still Swinging For The Fences The third book in the series, this book keeps up the tradition set by the first two. Although it does have some points where it drops off, it is an all around good read.
Honor continues to be one of the strongest and most interesting female characters I have read in a long time. With the addition of a love interest (from a rather unexpected location), they have fleshed her out from more then just a futuristic warrior into something more human. Most of the characters who have been kept are equally as interesting to read about.
One of the problems this series has is the incompetent ally/enemy. There are times when characters like, like Young and several others, make un-believable actions. It is hard to believe that these people would be this foolish and petty. Not that I am being naive, I do know how petty people can be, but these people make near fatal and equally obvious mistakes. Weber has a problem making his black hats a bit to blatantly evil, and way to dumb.
It was nice to see the Haven political intrigue. A marvelous updating of "the tennis court" plot, Weber continues to use interesting pieces of our history to punch up his story. I still think this is one of the strengths of this series.
The two major Weber problems both creep into this book as well. Characters spend long periods of time explaining things to each other, and there is a tremendous amount of background, digressions, and explanations in technical areas of combat that are better skimmed then read.
All that being said, this is an excellent book and both it and the series are well worth the read.
The second chapter in the saga Honor Harrington is sent to aide Manicore ally Grayson and finds herself in the middle of what comes down to a religious struggle. Harrington is also in a situation where she has to address cultural differences between Grayson and Manticore in order to fight the "Peeps" and win.
Weber did not disappoint with this addition to the Harrington saga. I found it a page-turner from beginning to end!
Not Free SF Reader Perhaps a little too much unsubtle political commentary in this book. One side of the conflict, Haven, needs to expand and take over planets rich in resources to supply their population in a style to which they have become accustomed. This is done by fighting cheap wars against rich planets with inferior military forces.
The only rich planet left is Manticorne, and its equally absurd royalist/militarist political structure. They, of course, are not an easy target.
Cue explosions and HH shooting at stuff.
Third in the excellent Honor Harrington series: all-out war begins
"The Short Victorious War" is the third book in a wonderful space opera series set some three thousand years in the future and featuring David Weber's best fictional heroine, "Honor Harrington." The books are best read in sequence and I strongly recommend that you start with "On Basilisk Station" which is the first one.
The title is, of course, highly ironic. Weber explains at the start of the book that it comes from a comment from the Russian Minister of the Interior to their Minister of War in 1903, "What this country needs is a short victorious war to stem the tide of revolution."
So the Russians attacked Japan, got their backsides well and truly kicked by the Japanese Navy, and set off the 1905 Russian Revolution.
However, the main parallels in this book are not with the Russo-Japanese war, but with those of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars. In particular, the Royal Manticoran Navy in which the heroine services is clearly based on the Royal Navy at the time of Nelson.
The technology of space travel and naval warfare in the Honor Harrington stories has been written so as to impose tactical and strategic constraints on space navy officers similar to those which the technology of fighting sail imposed on wet navy officers two hundred years ago. Similarly the galactic situation in the novels contains many similarities to the strategic and political situation in European history in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
This seems to be quite deliberate: many thinly veiled (and amusing) hints in the books indicate that they are to some extent a tribute to C.S. Forester, while the main heroine of the books, Honor Harrington, appears to owe more than just her initials to C.S. Forester's character "Horatio Hornblower."
During the first two books in the series it was made clear that Honor Harrington and most of the other sympathetic characters in Manticore expect within their lifetimes to have to fight a war against the People's Republic of Haven or "Peeps" - an agressive superpower which has been gradually conquering the small nations on it's borders in bitesize chunks. In the first chapter of this book, the Peep government decides it's time to launch that war.
Meanwhile Honor Harrington is given command of the Battlecruiser HMS Nike and made Flag Captain to an admiral who is second in command of the fleet at Hancock, one of the most important points in Manticore's defensive alliance. So when the war starts she is bound to be in the thick of the action. This is also one of the few books when she finds a little time for a romance.
A few more important characters are also introduced in this book. One of the early Havenite attacks is commanded by an Admiral Pierre, whose father, Rob S. Pierre is to be an important figure in future books. Another is directed against a convoy whose escort is commanded by Captain Helen Zilwicki. Her husband Anton and four year old daughter, also called Helen, are on board one of the ships of the convoy and also play important roles in future Honorverse books.
Another great story with strong and believable characters, brilliantly described space battles, and good explanations of how the tactical situations in which the characters find themselves relate both to the technology their ships use and the political dynamics which set up the conflicts between them.
Many people read Weber for the space battles, and most of the battles in "The short victorious war" are excellent. Dave Weber sometimes writes a bit too much like the wargame designer he once was, and this book starts to demonstrate that problem, but in general the battles are grippingly described and plausible.
One other feature in this book is a 16 page annex at the end with a lot of technical detail about how the assumed space travel and technology works in the series, with such details as how big a battlecruiser as opposed to a superdreadnaught is. Space warfare anoraks, or anyone interested in understanding how, for example, a single dreadnaught wipes out four battlecruisers in a quarter of a second during the course of the book, can read it: those who are not particularly interested in that sort of detail can give it a miss.
At the time of writing there are thirteen full length novels and four short story collections in the "Honorverse" as the fictional galaxy in which these stories are set is sometimes known. The main series which tells the story of Honor Harrington herself currently runs to eleven novels; in order these are
On Basilisk Station The Honor of the Queen The Short Victorious War Field of Dishonour Flag in Exile Honor among Enemies In Enemy Hands Echoes of Honor Ashes of Victory War of Honor At All Costs
The four collections of short stories set in the same universe, not all of which feature Honor Harrington herself, are
More Than Honor Worlds of Honor Worlds of Honor III: Changer of Worlds Worlds of Honor IV: The Service of the Sword
The two spin-off novels are "Crown of Slaves" (with Eric Flint) which is a story of espionage and intrigue featuring a number of characters, including Anton and Helen Zilwicki, first introduced in earlier Honor Harrington books such as this one, and "The Shadow of Saganami" which is a kind of "next generation" novel featuring a number of younger officers in the navies of Manticore and her ally Grayson.
For amusement, if you want to try to look for the parallels to nations and individuals from the French revolutionary period and the Hornblower books, one possible translation would be:
People's Republic of Haven = France Star Kingdom of Manticore = Great Britain Gryphon = Scotland Grayson = Portugal
Prime Minister Alan Summervale = Pitt the Younger Hamish Alexander, later Earl White Haven = Admiral Edward Pellew Honor Harrington = Horatio Hornblower Alistair McKeon = William Bush
Crown loyalists and Centrists = Tory supporters of Pitt Conservative Association = isolationist/hardline High Tories New Kiev Liberals = Whig Oligarchists Progressives and traditional liberals = Whig radicals
Legislaturist rulers of Haven = Bourbon monarchy and nobles in France Rob S. Pierre = Robespierre Committee of Public Safety = Committee of Public Safety
Anderman Empire = Kingdom of Prussia Silesia = Poland Solarian republic = United States of America
Wall of Battle = Line of Battle Ship of the Wall = Ship of the Line Battleship = "4th rate" sailing warship (in each case too small to form part of the main force in a fleet action, but powerful enough to defeat anything else.) Battlecruiser = frigate (5th rate) Cruisers and destroyers = 6th rate and smaller warships.
Another Great Honor Harrington Book The Short Victorious War is another great piece of the honor Harrington Pie. It is the strongest of the first three plot wise, I think, and the best at developing Honor's character. A great battle and personal conflict only add to the universe that Weber is so gifted at creating.
Anything Goes Trivia
Megaton Man
Tailipoe
Trevor
