Confession of a Baen non-reader

[Murmur the Fallen]

So yeah, just what it says on the subject line: I do not read Baen-published books.
And that's just ridiculous. Sure, it's understandable that I not read a particular author, but to avoid an entire publisher? Simply ridiculous.
And yet, I avoid Baen books like the friggin' plague.
I do have reasons, though. And they may or may not be good reasons.
The first reason is that their covers, damn near all of their covers, are repellant. And I do mean that literally. When I catch sight of one of their photo-realistic covers, I am pushed away by my aesthetic sense.
I do not like photo covers on books. They are wrong.
(It doesn't help if one of those covers has a cat on it either. When a cat is in a genre book, it is doubly wrong.)
Secondly: I am a big-time, tax-and-spend, why the hell do we need A gun much less a military, people should be allowed to marry their pets (except cats because cats are wrong and deserve no love) and then abort the chimeric child if they choose in a government-run hospital, controlled economy, liberal.
I gather from things I have read about Baen Books that many of its authors hold much the opposite view.
And . . . um. That's about it. Bad covers and rumors about authorial political viewpoint. Like I said, they may not be good reasons.
So: given this, do you good people believe that I would indeed enjoy a Baen book, if I could just avert my eyes from the cover and ignore that nagging feeling that only writers born before 1940 get to write positively about crypto-facists? Because I would like to try some Baen books, if only to know what the heck the rest of you are talking about.
Honor-what? Miles-eh? 16-huh?
So: help?
-murmur

[ECSNorway]

Start with Eric Flint's books - '1632' should be the first for you. He's a die-hard lefty (the main heroes of 1632 are a union boss and his henchmen). And he works well with David Weber, who manages to skewer both sides in his own writing (and is pretty much Baen's star).
I'll also recommend the thoroughly non-political, as far as the present day is concerned, Miller & Lee 'Liaden' books, Bujold's 'Miles Vorkosigan' adventures, and Pat Hodgell's 'Kencyrath' novels, all now available from Baen.--
"I give you the beautiful... the talented... the tirelessly atomic-powered...
R!
DOROTHY!
WAYNERIGHT!
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.

[Evil Midnight Lurker]

Well, except for the cat thing, I'm pretty much where you are philosophically and politically. (While I don't like the fact that we need a military, I don't deny it. There's just no way that our way of life would survive the magical disappearance of our armed forces. I bear no love whatsoever for the current situation in the Middle East, though.) And I love the damn books. Some of them are more in the guilty-pleasure vein than others, of course.
As for 1632, well, you've got a bunch of liberal unionist West Virginia coal miners trying to destroy the imperial bastards in charge of Europe and bring democracy to the world a hundred and fifty years early. While there is a lot of war involved, considerably more than half the published material involves little people changing the world in nonviolent ways. It is absolutely wonderful stuff and one of my two favorite science fiction series for the past several years.
And the other favorite? That would be Miles Vorkosigan.
Barrayaran society is pretty spit-and-polish Imperial, but they're considered socially backward by the rest of humanspace... and frankly, they're right. Bujold takes pains to show us the problems with nobility as well as the good points, and it seems fairly certain that the Vor system is doomed to enlightenment from within thanks to certain... benign influences (coughCordeliacough). And if anyone in that series is cryptofascist, it's the extremely cryptic Cetagandans... the major antagonists. Brilliant characterization, some thoroughly vile villains (see Jackson's Whole), and side-splitting humor.
Honor Harrington... well, Honor in particular I consider to be the weakest by far of David Weber's works. I've read them, but they never grab me the way that Mutineer's Moon or Oath of Swords did. (Check out the latter in particular for one of the two best depictions of a paladin in fantasy fiction, and not a hint of cryptofascism anywhere.)
But then we come to John Ringo, a very guilty pleasure indeed. I loathe the man's politics, but he writes such damn good adventure novels that I just can't stop myself from reading them... Avoid, lest ye be lost as I have been...
ETA: Here's some links to The Baen Free Library to get you started.
The Mountains of Mourning (Miles Vorkosigan)
1632
Mutineer's Moon
Oath of Swords, book one of The Lay of Bahzell Bloody-Hand
Digital Knight by Ryk E. Spoor, a fanfic author who's hit the big time (the major villain of this work is taken from a Saint Seiya fic he wrote years ago )
--Sam
"This is graveness."

[ordnance11]

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Secondly: I am a big-time, tax-and-spend, why the hell do we need A gun much less a military, people should be allowed to marry their pets (except cats because cats are wrong and deserve no love) and then abort the chimeric child if they choose in a government-run hospital, controlled economy, liberal.

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Infidel! Blasphemer! Heresy! How dare you malign the feline kind! (Notice I didn't say anything about the rest )
__________________
Into terror!,  Into valour!
Charge ahead! No! Never turn
Yes, it's into the fire we fly
And the devil will burn!
- Scarlett Pimpernell

[Kokuten]

suck you down some Honorverse.
dude, just post me your snailmail address, and I'll blast you a DVD or three with enough Ebooks (baen and other) to choke the aforementioned horse.Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979

[Bob Schroeck]

Let me second the recommendations of Eric Flint's 1632 and sequels. After seeing it on store shelves for a couple years, I finally took the plunge around Memorial Day. Not only did I like it, I made Peggy read it, and she liked it, and now we're chowing through all the extant sequels and supplementary books. This is a very humanist series and even better, the downtimers, the natives of the 17th century, are not made out to be ignorant, hidebound, and/or medieval; this is not a series about the "21st century man's burden". It's really, really worth a look.

-- Bob
---------
The Internet Is For Norns.

[Rev Dark]

I will admit a fondness from most of John Ringo's work - I do not agree with him politically, but the man has a gift for making you turn pages.
One exception. Ghost. The follow-up was better; but Ghost is likely the greasiest book I have read in the last couple of years. Greasier than wrapping yourself in bacon and running a marathon. It is one long, sustained, military male fantasy run amok. No. It is does not run amok - it sprints amok. With a JATO.
I do enjoy his Fallen World (There will be dragons) series a great deal.
Honour Harrington - get thee the early books - ignore thee the later ones. The author let the technology run ahead of him to the point that it eclipses the tactics that made the earlier books interesting.
Miles - My lovely wife recently introduced me to the hyperactive, hyper-intelligent dwarf. Miles rules, and the series is worth checking out.
Shayne

[ECSNorway]

Yeah, I agree with you on Ghost.
It is - and Ringo openly admits this - revenge porn, written to work out his feelings after 9/11.
It's like James Bond for the year 2000.
Tom Kratman and Mike Williamson are both solid, if preachy, libertarians; it shows up fairly blatantly in their books. (Kratman's first, State of Disunion if I recall the title rightly, is about a second US civil war sparked off by an oppressive presidency of a very thinly-disguised Hillary Clinton...)--
"I give you the beautiful... the talented... the tirelessly atomic-powered...
R!
DOROTHY!
WAYNERIGHT!
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.

[Murmur the Fallen]

Thanks a lot for the enthusiastic recommendations! I will pick up 1632 and read it, absolutely. A bit dubious about the whole "spreading democracy" thing (pretty sure that wouldn't really work outside a work of fantasy), but I do like time travel stories and colonization stories.
Oh! Another reason why I avoided Baen books: naval culture and tactics applied in a pretty one-to-one basis in space. Surface of ocean: one-d. space: three-d. ocean depths: three-d but sound carries. Sound does not carry in space. No silent running (I'm looking at you, Wrath of Khan. You too, Wing Commander). Planets not fortified ports. etc.
Anyway: 1632 is the starting point for me. And we'll see where that takes me.
-murmur

[Kokuten]

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Surface of ocean: one-d. space: three-d. ocean depths: three-d but sound carries. Sound does not carry in space. No silent running

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yeah, you really need to read you some Honorverse.. Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979

[ECSNorway]

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Oh! Another reason why I avoided Baen books: naval culture and tactics applied in a pretty one-to-one basis in space. Surface of ocean: one-d. space: three-d. ocean depths: three-d but sound carries. Sound does not carry in space. No silent running (I'm looking at you, Wrath of Khan. You too, Wing Commander). Planets not fortified ports. etc.

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I have to agree with Kokuten. Weber addresses all of these very well.
The first two books are in the Free Library (On Basilisk Station and The Honor of the Queen) - and they're excellent reads. He delves very deeply into /why/ battles are fought the way they are in his universe, and answers a lot of the questions people have about space-combat strategies.--
"I give you the beautiful... the talented... the tirelessly atomic-powered...
R!
DOROTHY!
WAYNERIGHT!
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.

[Murmur the Fallen]

the naval culture thing? I guess I just never really wrapped my head around why there needs to be this carry-over from ships to space. Not just rank, but also the hats.
Like I said, it's a bit easier for writers who were born before 1940 but still . . .
Mote in God's Eye comes easily to mind. Good story, ripping yarn, though afterwards the plot holes come to mind and the sequel was unreadable, but . . .
And Star Trek . . . well, it carried over a lot from its origins in the 60s.
And you can't really argue with Heinlein, though come to that I can't really remember a particular instance of him having a Navy in Space. Space Cadet, maybe?
But still, it's a conceptual hurdle that I find hard to jump over. Does Weber address that as well? Or at least hang a lampshade on it?
-murmur

[M Fnord]

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But still, it's a conceptual hurdle that I find hard to jump over. Does Weber address that as well? Or at least hang a lampshade on it?

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Not really. Weber has a real hardon for the Age of Sail (not to mention monarchy in general), and it comes through pretty clear in the Harrington books. ---
Mr. Fnord
http://fnord.sandwich.net/
http://www.jihad.net/
Mr. Fnord interdimensional man of mystery

FenWiki - Your One-Stop Shop for Fenspace Information

"I. Drink. Your. NERDRAGE!"

[Evil Midnight Lurker]

Honestly, I've never had much of a problem with it. It seems obvious to me that wet navies will at least try to transfer their traditions to space-based militaries when such are developed. (The US Navy certainly tried like all hell to keep air combat under their control!) It's probably more efficient, in this (or that) day and age, than trying to develop a completely new set.
--Sam
"How the hell did I do that?"

[DHBirr]

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A bit dubious about the whole "spreading democracy" thing (pretty sure that wouldn't really work outside a work of fantasy)

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About three years ago, I read a review of 1632 by a fellow who was not merely dubious but opposed to the idea that 20th-Century-style American democracy was a better thing than the Thirty Years War. Of course, this "gentleman" then went on to say that what he'd like to see was a story of mid-21st-Century America in civil war and societal breakdown, with a time-displaced Waffen SS division "setting things to rights." I leave it to you to judge what sort of person thinks Nazis establishing "order" in a multi-racial nation is a good idea.
I enthusiastically second recommendations for the 1632 and Vorkosigan books, just in case you needed another vote. David Weber is a little more problematic for me -- I generally like the personalities of his heroes/heroines (especially in the series starting with Mutineers' Moon), but his royalism rubs this small-R republican the wrong way. Always remember: any king is either a smart and lucky murderer and robber, or the descendant of one.-----
Those who believed the laws of physics made things "possible" or "impossible" were mistaken. Time travel violated one of those laws. Physics took its *revenge*.
-----
Big Brother is watching you.  And damn, you are so bloody BORING.

[ECSNorway]

I think the legacy of Star Trek has a lot to do with it, too, with Kirk's Enterprise having a lot of naval organization to it (pish on Roddenberry's 'starfleet isn't military'). And since Trek was basically "Horatio Hornblower meets Wagon Train... IN SPACE!"...
Weber started off wanting to have his battles look like age of sail battles, so he invented a tech tree that would drive things to that point. Then he took the logical consequences of that tech and ran with them, and things are now (in-book time about 20 years later by the latest books) very very different.
Weber got his start from writing novels based on the Starfire game, which itself was inspired by Starfleet Battles, which goes back to the original Franz Joseph Trek fandom.
Right now, in the US, and for the last 40 years or so, there has been arguments in the halls of power over who should control America's space presence. I've alluded to this over in the Fenspace threads - NASA on the civilian side, the Air Force thinks they should have control of anything that flies, and the Navy insists that it's going to be "ships", so they should control it - and they do have the institutional infrastructure, tradition, and training to handle large crewed vehicles in a hostile environment, whereas the AF deals almost universally with much smaller craft (I think the largest crew for an AF plane is under 30, and that's for a radar bird with 2/3 of that as sensor crew.)
The naval tradition is also a highly romanticized one, which has a tendency to inspire writers all over the place.--
"I give you the beautiful... the talented... the tirelessly atomic-powered...
R!
DOROTHY!
WAYNERIGHT!
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.

[Norgarth]

RE: naval traditions
some bits are gonna carry over no matter what. On pretty much every ship or large aircraft going, civilian or military, the person in charge is called Captain.
Considering that in a lot of cases we're talking about military spacecraft, ranks are gonna be used, and hey, the navy has a readymade set.
As for hats, in the Honorverse at least the naval head gear are barrets, the only detail I recall offhand being that captain's barrets are white.
Speaking of the Honorverse; Murmur, I should warn you that Captain Harrington has a cat-like companion, since you expressed a dislike of felines.__________________
666-HELL The phone number of the Beast
___________________________
"I've always wanted to be somebody, but I should have been more specific." - George Carlin

[jpub]

If you can also read any of the Belesarius books, they're a gem.
Honor Harrington bores the crap out of me. I enjoy the Vorkosigan books. 1632-et al got boring after book 2. Haven't bothered with John Ringo.
Read Doc Sidhe and Sidhe Devil.--
Christopher Angel, aka JPublic
The Works of Christopher Angel
"Camaraderie, adventure, and steel on steel. The stuff of legend! Right, Boo?"

[NotDavies]

Let me just chime in with another voice encouraging you to check out the 1632-verse, the Belisarius novels, all of Lois McMaster Bujold's oeuvre, and Aaron Allston's Doc Sidhe books. Also, I'd point out that Baen has done a lot of reprinting of some classic science fiction that you really ought to check out. I'd particularly recommend their collection The World Turned Upside Down.
Chris Davies.

[Evil Midnight Lurker]

Thirding the Doc Sidhe novels, and Galatea in 2-D also by Alston if you can find it.
--Sam
"If that's art, then art is dirty and weird!"

[Foxboy]

I second the Galatea in 2-D... I'm trying to relocate my copy... Is it now or has it been on the Baen E-Books?
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''

-- James Nicoll

[Jeanne Hedge]

re: Barrayar
I never did try those books. What's the preferred reading order, by publication date? (hey, it's a valid question when it come to Lackey, so I tend to ask it of all series)
What are the first few books in the series? (no, I don't even know how many there are)

And as for Honor Harrington - I've got them all, I've read them all, I like them (earlier better than more recent)... and I like the so-called bad guys (Havenites) better than the so-called good guys (Manticorans).

Jeanne Hedge
www.jhedge.com

"Believe me, if I have to go the rest of my life without companionship, knowing myself won't be a problem."
-- Gabrielle of Potadeia

[ECSNorway]

Well, (spoilers):
Haven isn't the bad guys anymore.
As for the Vorkosigan books, I'd start with Cordelia's Honor, since that sets it all up. From there, The Warrior's Apprentice and The Vor Game get things started, Cetaganda gives us an interesting look into the enemy (and a setup for later).
After that, I'd read Brothers In Arms, Mirror Dance, Memory, Komarr, A Civil Affair, and Diplomatic Immunity in that order.
The 'Mountains of Mourning' anthology can be read at almost any point after Warrior's Apprentice, but the framing story is set after Brothers in Arms.--
"I give you the beautiful... the talented... the tirelessly atomic-powered...
R!
DOROTHY!
WAYNERIGHT!
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.

[Jeanne Hedge]

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The 'Mountains of Mourning' anthology can be read at almost any point after Warrior's Apprentice, but the framing story is set after Brothers in Arms.

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Thanks for the info!

Reading the above - that the anthology can be read at any point after this book, but the frame is set after that book - put me in mind of the ancient times of anime fansubs.
(here I go, dating myself again - does anyone besides me remember AA, and the rants that guy would do over the credits?) Travel with me now to those long lost days of yore, when a little North Carolina-based company named AnimEigo first released the KOR OAVs and movie (there was only one then) on media known as VHS tape and hybrid laserdisk (gasp)!
People would ask whether to watch the OAVs or the movie first, and the particularly fanatical segment of those who were lucky enough to have seen or have a copy of the TV fansubs (no commercial TV release was thought possible then because of the rights hell of the music - quite a coup AnimEigo pulled off there), or watched it in raw Japanese (with or without translation script in hand), told anyone who would listen that the preferred viewing order was to see the TV series first, because they couldn't possibly understand everything going on in the movie if they hadn't (and the OAVs could be seen any time)
No, I don't have my KOR TV fansubs any longer, but I *do* have my Maison Ikkoku fansubs. I've not been able to find a complete, in the correct order, unedited Region 1 release of it.

Jeanne Hedge
www.jhedge.com

"Believe me, if I have to go the rest of my life without companionship, knowing myself won't be a problem."
-- Gabrielle of Potadeia

[DHBirr]

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As for the Vorkosigan books, I'd start with Cordelia's Honor, since that sets it all up.

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Note to avoid confusion: Cordelia's Honor is the release in one volume of the books originally published as Shards of Honor and Barrayar.
"You're a Betan! You can't do--"
I still snicker every time I think about that line.
-----
Big Brother is watching you.  And damn, you are so bloody BORING.