Science Fiction

Okay, I picked it up and blitzed through Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen, and it was a deep disappointment. The personal and romantic stakes and themes of the earlier books with Cordelia Naismith were coupled with other adventures or plots, and the combination of the personal and the galactic plots was part of what made them work. I felt like Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen utterly lost the broader plot, and it was just a book about two people getting together and retiring. Which, to be fair, is a perfectly fine plot and there are multiple genres and sub-genres built around that plot, but in the context of the Vorkossigan Saga, it was a nothing-burger of a story. There are some revelations about things long-past, which I think Bujold did to try to flesh out the story, but hardly anything happens. Seriously, the stakes are so low. What a baffling addition to this series.