Classic Book Review: David Weber's "Honor among Enemies" (Honorverse 6)

THE Q-SHIP BOOK!

The Q-ship - a merchant ship with a navy crew and hidden weapons, designed to ambush submarines which surfaced to sink the "helpless" ship with gunfire - was one of the more heroic and less successful ideas attempted by the Royal Navy during the course of two world wars in the attempt to stop German submarines preying on allied merchant ships.

For some reason many of the creators of science fiction space warfare games and authors of Space Opera novels seem obsessed with using this concept in their games and books. In real history, although the Q-ships did succeed in sinking a few German U-boats they also got plenty of our own brave men killed.

Perhaps the most realistic thing about this Q-ship novel is that the heroine is offered command of a squadron of Q-ships not by her friends but through the political machinations of her worst enemies, who have spotted a need for a force commanded by an officer who is both highly skilled in battle, and expendable.

They have put Honor Harrington for forward for the command on the calculation that whether she kills the pirates who are preying on Manticoran shipping, or they kill her, they come out ahead. Hence the ironic title of this book, "Honor among enemies."



 



















"Honor among enemies" begins about a year after the end of "Flag in exile" and about two thousand years in our future.

After losing her position as a captain in the Royal Manticoran Navy, Honor Harrington returned to Grayson, the system she rescued in the second book in the series, intending to take up her duties as a Steadholder, but was also offered a command as an Admiral in the Grayson navy. Accepting the position she saves Grayson again, and also frustrates another plot to assassinate the Grayson leadership.

Meanwhile, the pressure of the war against the People's Republic of Haven has drawn Manticoran units away from anti-piracy patrols in the chaotic Silesian confederation, and pirates have taken advantage of this to steal bucketloads of Manticoran and other cargoes, imposing dreadful costs in both monetary terms and in human life on Honor's home nation.

Desperate for a means of doing something about the problem, Manticore's First Lord of the Admiralty  suggests deploying Q-ships against the pirates. It is at this point that one of Honor's personal enemies, who nevertheless recognises that she s a superlative fighting commander, persuades the Manticoran opposition to withdraw their opposition to employing Honor Harrington if they give her the job of commanding the Q-ship force.

It's an assignment from hell, and only worth accepting because it's the one way to get back into Manticoran uniform.

But Honor Harrington has never been one to shy away from a challenge ...

One particularly exquisite Easter Egg moment in this novel is a tribute to C.S. Forester, whose "Hornblower" novels have been acknowledged by David Weber to be one of his inspirations for this series. Honor Harrington's father has sent her a copy of one of C.S. Forester's books, set in an era which by her time is truly ancient history, in one of her few quiet moments during this one she enjoys reading it and comments to herself that C.S. Forester really could write a great book.

You can buy "Honor among enemies" from Amazon at

Honor Among Enemies: Amazon.co.uk: Weber, David: 9780671877231: Books


More details of the series as a whole are given on this site at

Book Series overview: David Weber's "Honor Harrington" universe book reviews.

 I can strongly recommend "Honor Among Enemies" and indeed the whole series.


Mitth'raw'nuruodo

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