There are new-ish omnibus reissues that put the books chronological by story, not by order of writing. I vote those. Cordelia's Honor is about Cordelia, Miles's mother, and then his stories start with Young Miles.

So which omnibus thingamie should I start with?

Cordelia's Honor consists of two novels, Shards of Honor and Barrayar. I also think you should start with the two Cordelia books.

I read the young Miles stuff first, which was fine, but if you want strict chronology, start with Cordelia.

Jude Law gets cast in almost every book I read. He's gifted like that.

I just finished the omnibus Cordelia's Honor and both books are immensely trilling to read. (I liked Barraya more, but that's because I'm a bloodthirstry wench.) They are fast-faced, melodramatic, full of angst and carnage and adventure.

I loved both SoH and Barrayar, but they have very little Sci-Fi elements to them. With the exception of few technical advances (admittedly key to the plot), these books could have set in Europe somewhere in 18th century or thereabout.

"Warrior's Apprentice", which I'm reading now, has more of a space-opera-ish vent, it looks like.

It's the one with Earth, and they describe London as 'nearly two millennia' old, so what does that make the time-frame, o people who know how old London is now?

So, they're set around nowish, then? Huh. Did not know that.

[link] sez Londonium was built by those danged Romans about 50 AD. So, almost 2 millennia ago. Yeah.

So, they're set around nowish, then?

No. They are set many hundreds of years in the future, after humanity has expanded into the galaxy by way of travel through stable wormholes. Dozens of planets have been settled long enough for them to evolve widely divergent societies, some of which are in conflict with one another.

Barrayar, the planet of our hero, was settled by Russian, Greek, and possibly French persons, and then something happened with the wormhole and they were completely isolated from galactic society for a couple hundred years. They developed into a fierce, strong, but rather xenophobic people, very conservative and frightened of strangers. This was compounded by the radiation levels on Barrayar, which often resulted in dangerous mutations in children and livestock.

When the wormhole finally reopened, the Barrayarans had long since lost the ability to travel in space, and thus were unprepared for the Cetagandan invasion. They fought the Cetagandans in a desperate and bloody war for many years, and eventually drove them off, but not before taking ferocious damage, including the nuking of the historic seat of the Vorkosigan family. (Vorkosigan Surleau is the summer home, traditionally.)

In response to the Cetagandan invasion, Barrayar industrialized as quickly as possible, built an army, and went out to secure its defense. The planet of Komarr is at the other end of the wormhole from Barrayar, and the Komarrans had let the Cetagandans through. So Barrayaran forces, led by Admiral Aral Vorkosigan, took Komarr as both punishment and protection. That's the situation shortly before the beginning of Shards of Honor, which tells the story of the Escobaran-Barrayaran war, and the involvement of Beta Colony.

Very nice summary, Consuela!

Can someone give me a summary of the short story Apt Pupil by Stephen King? Mainly I'm interested in how it differs from the movie.

Young boy becomes fascinated with elderly German neighbor man. Kid is the snoopy sort and begins doing some research and discovers neighbor was a Nazi (don't remember if he was a camp guard or not). Kid confronts neighbor and threatens to expose him if he doesn't tell stories about the war. Stories lead to actions as the boy takes the old man for a role model in various things, and the old man is pleased to have someone to teach. I don't remember the ending, and I didn't see the movie because the story is pretty grim and disturbing.