Cordelia's Honor

Full review:
http://fantasycafe.blogspot.com/2008/04/review-of-cordelias-honor.html

Cordelia's Honor contains the first two chronological novels in Lois McMaster Bujold's Miles Vorkosigan series, Shards of Honor and Barrayar. These books could also be viewed as prequels to the series since they are not actually about the life of Miles but instead tell the story of how his parents met and how Miles came to be disfigured before birth. Shards of Honor is Bujold's first published novel while Barrayar was released 5 years later after other books in the series had been written. The latter is a direct sequel to the former and completes the story begun in the first book, some parts of which Bujold had originally wanted to include in Shards of Honor before she realized it was too long. While the first half of the story was certainly enjoyable, it did lack polish and Bujold's extra writing experience shows in Barrayar, which is a much tighter novel and the winner of the 1992 Hugo Award.