Mirror Dance by Lois McMaster Bujold

Hello, Stranger.

Let's talk about Lois McMaster Bujold's Mirror Dance.

The Short of It

Plot: Hiding out on Earth seems like a good way to avoid the Cetagandans, but Miles ends up embroiled in more politics.

Page Count: 392

Award: 1995 Hugo, 1995 Locus SF

Worth a read: Yup
Primary Driver: (Plot, World, or Character)
Bechdel Test: Pass
Technobabble: Moderate
Review: The first Vorkosigan book that has multiple POV characters. A significant improvement from its predecessor regarding plotting and pacing: things move fast. Character work is good and favorites from early books help make new characters more palatable. De-emphasized world-building gives this a very different flavor from other Vorkosigan books.

The Medium of It

Spoiler Free! 

It feels silly to keep reviewing this series - at this point, either you're invested or you're not. This is the ninth Vorkosigan review. Who will I convince now? But when you fail at a task you set for yourself... well, that's just disappointing.

I do not particularly like Mark. I find a lot of stories involving him less engaging than those with Miles and I'm usually miffed when he appears in a book. It is incredibly challenging to write a character who is irritating in-universe without being irritating to readers - and Mark is not one of them. He is just grating.

All that said... this is probably a highlight of the series. Mark and Miles are both used expertly and the reader is shown under what conditions each is superior. Interesting questions come up with identity: who are we made to be, who do we choose to be, who do we want to be? These are open ended, and different characters have different takes. It is meant to be a dialogue, not a sermon. Some character aspects are handled in a heavy-handed pop-psychology fashion, which might be a bit simplistic, but works in context. In an earlier review I noted that, once you've read all the books, it can be hard to separate out which books made you care about whom, and why - everything blurs together. Mirror Dance is an exception - there are important and clear character moments that are vital to the whole series.

Most of the Vorkosigan books are heavily invested in world building. That is less the case here. While we do gain a more nuanced understanding of certain places and groups, for the most part this feels like a garnish as opposed to something more meaningful. If you were describing an ice cream sundae, describing whether it has hot fudge or caramel sauce adds detail... but does not change a lot for my mental picture of the ice cream. [It's about 27C/80F here today, and I'm trying to eat healthy. Ice cream sounds good, though.] The decision to throttle down world building pays off here, as it gives much more time for developing plot and characters.

Plot is a tough one to discuss. Bujold is a big fan of having a whole lot of book in each of her books, and this one is a pretty extreme example of that. The important takeaway is that it is fast paced and consistently gripping. It's also deeply focused on action and consequence, of which I'm a fan - it's nice to see moments when good intentions are not enough, or when things catch up to people. This tends not to happen in action/SF - we get used to a whole lot of casualties being incidental in science fiction, as long as our heroes win. I get a fuzzy feeling when things go wrong.

The Long of It

Spoilers Ahead!

The presence of Cordelia is what makes Mark a palatable character. Cordelia is great, all the time, and once she gives Mark her blessing, it's hard to keep disliking him. The first real back and forth between Cordelia and Mark is a near-perfect scene:

"Now, what's between you and me has nothing to do with what's between you and Barrayar. That's Aral's department, and he'll have to speak for his own views. It's all so undecided, except for one thing. While you are here, you are yourself, Mark, Miles's six-years-younger twin brother. And not an imitation or a substitute for Miles. So the more you can establish yourself as distinct from Miles, from the very beginning, the better."

"Oh," he breathed, "please, yes."

"I suspected you'd already grasped that. Good, we agree. But just not-being-Miles is no more than the inverse of being an imitation Miles. I want to know, who is Mark?"

"Lady . . . I don't know."

And his his awkwardness when first meeting Aral:

The silence stretched for excruciating seconds.

Mark blurted out, "The first thing I was supposed to do when I met you was try to kill you."

"Yes. I know." Count Vorkosigan settled back on the sofa, eyes on Mark's face at last.

"They made me practice about twenty different back-up methods, till I could do them in my sleep, but the primary was to have been a skin patch with a paralyzing toxin that left evidence on autopsy pointing to heart failure. I was to get alone with you, touch it to any part of your body I could reach. It was strangely slow, for an assassination drug. I was to wait, in your sight, for twenty minutes while you died, and never let on that I was not Miles."

The Count smiled grimly. "I see. A good revenge. Very artistic. It would have worked."

"As the new Count Vorkosigan, I was then to go on and spearhead a drive for the Imperium."

"That would have failed. Ser Galen expected it to. It was merely the chaos of its failure, during which Komarr was supposed to rise, that he desired. You were to be another Vorkosigan sacrifice then." He actually seemed to grow more at ease, professional, discussing these grotesque plots.

"Killing you was the entire reason for my existence. Two years ago I was all primed to do it. I endured all those years of Galen for no other purpose."

"Take heart," advised the Countess. "Most people exist for no reason at all." 

I still don't like him. But I do feel for him. 

There are so many plot twists and turns that it's hard to say what the main story beats are, exactly. Easily the most shocking is the early death of Miles. That was truly shocking. Miles tends not to fail, or when he does, he fails in a beneficial fashion. Dude got shot. This was not beneficial for him.

If you're still reading this, with spoilers, you've already read the book, and you're already invested in the series. That's about it for this review. Once we get to the very end of the Vorkosigan reviews... time for some more comprehensive and spoiler-filled reflection!

Don't pretend to be someone you're not, Stranger.

And don't forget to read a book!