A
Title: Scout's Progress
Author: Sharon, Steve Lee, Miller
Publication Info: Ace 2000
ISBN: 0-441-00927-1
Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy
Scout’s Progress is a science fiction romance which takes place in a universe of complex social manners and roles. If Jane Austen wrote epic space opera, this is what it would look like.
Scout’s Progress is the second book in the Liaden Universe series. In this story, Aelliana is desperate to escape from her abusive brother. She wins a ship in a card game (she’s an expert mathematician) but she doesn’t have a pilot’s license. Aelliana has one year to become fluent in Terran language and customs (she hopes to escape to Terra, where people live without the protection of a Clan) and get a pilot’s license (so she can not only get to Terra but make a living once she’s there).
Meanwhile Daav, who is in a leadership position in his clan, is about to enter a marriage contract with Samiv. It’s clear that Daav and Samiv are not terribly compatible – she doesn’t understand his sense of humor, and she’s very formal and conventional whereas he is not. But it’s an arranged, temporary marriage contract, one in which the expectation is that they will make a baby and then go their separate ways. Although it is temporary, it’s still very serious, and Daav is deeply saddened by the realization that he will probably never marry for love, as his own brother did.
To work off some of his angst, Daav, who is an accomplished pilot, starts doing some odd jobs at the spaceport where his former flight master works. When he meets Aelliana at the spaceport, he quickly develops a respect for her mathematical and piloting talents. Daav and his comrades take an interest in mentoring Aelliana and helping her achieve her goals. Daav’s friends can tell immediately that Aelliana is abused, and they can also tell that direct confrontation will scare her away. So they giver her the opportunity to learn the skills she needs to learn, including hand to hand combat, while also providing her with friendship and community, something she’s never experienced before.
This book is very romance-based but it’s not intended to be purely a romance novel, and it’s paced differently than most romances. Daav and Aelliana don’t meet until almost a hundred pages into the book, and when they do, instead of the rest of the book involving them getting together and having a relationship, it involves them becoming able to accept even the faintest chance that they could deserve and have a relationship. It’s almost a prologue to a romance. And yet the Daav/Aelliana relationship is fully thought out and has become one of my favorites. Once I realized what was going on and surrendered to the flow of the novel, I loved, loved loved seeing a book take its time to let people grow.
What I loved most about this book is that Aelliana saves herself. Daav, as well as several other characters, give her opportunity, but it’s up to Aelliana to take those opportunities and make the most of them. I can picture some readers getting frustrated by Aelliana because she cringes a lot, but I admired Aelliana because she pushes through the cringing. She may have trouble lifting her head but she keeps walking anyway. It’s a much more realistic portrayal of a person who is trying to escape and recover from a lifetime of abuse than that more standard portrayal of a straight-up badass. Aelliana is a total badass, and watching her learn that is a long, painful, but exciting process.
The title of the book says it all. This is a novel about people making progress – slow, torturous progress. It’s not the kind of romance in which people fall madly into each other’s arms, and it requires a lot of patience as the characters take hundreds of pages to figure out what is immediately obvious to the reader: 1. Aelliana deserves respect and autonomy 2. Daav deserves happiness and he clearly won’t find it with Samiv 3. Aelliana and Daav belong together. Luckily, while we’re waiting for our heroes to figure this out, we have plenty to enjoy – great character interactions, political intrigue, starships flying around, and sentient trees.
This book doesn’t fit the template of a standard romance but I loved it, and I suspect I’d love it even more on a second reading when I knew what to expect in terms of the pacing. As science fiction goes, it’s glorious – well thought out, complex, layered. The moment when Daav feeds Aelliana something from a trading post called Pecha is delightful (see if you can guess what it is). The humor is dry and the dialogue is by turns sharp, gentle, and poignant. One thing I liked about the book is its refusal to demonize Samiv, who has her own reasons for being nervous about marrying Daav. The villains are pretty one-dimensional, but the supporting characters fit the trope of “Family by Choice” which is one of my major catnip tropes and they all get their due.
If you want space opera romance in a complex setting of rigid manners and social expectations, I highly recommend Scout’s Progress. (For a more laugh-out-loud experience, I recommend A Civil Campaign, by Lois McMaster Bujold, a simply glories book which the author herself describes as a Regency romance set in space.)
This book is available from Goodreads | Amazon | BN | Your Local Library (US)
I love this book. This was my entry into the Liaden Universe books, which I love and highly recommend. The “main arc” story centers on the next generation (1st in that arc is Agent of Change. Heroine is a former bodyguard and mercenary on the run. Hero is an agent beginning to realize and resist mind programming by sinister organization.). Mouse and Dragon gives us Aelliana and Daav making a life together (and lucky you for not having to wait years for it!) but readers should be aware that this is not primarily romance-genre so Bad Things not expected in romance may happen.
I am restraining myself from gushing about these books…
As a plus, Baen Books does not use DRM.
What Maria F said! I love this book and the whole Liaden series. It’s an SF space opera series with a lot of well-done romantic sub-plots, but as she said romance isn’t the primary genre and there’s the occasional bad thing. But the primary intent of the authors (a husband-wife team) is to satisfactorily entertain which means plots work towards happy resolutions.
I’d love to see Carrie review more of the series!
Forgot to add: DRM-free ebooks of Agent of Change and Fledgling (another storyline) are available for FREE at Baen Books and amazon and possibly other places.
Read the Liaden Universe series of books if you can. They have an interesting and well constructed books (though I did fall of the wagon ages ago. So many books, so little time). Unfortunately the covers are a bit…Baen (if you are reader of SF you know exactly what I mean). I really like Local Custom, another book in this series. It actually comes in a combo with Scout’s Progress (The Dragon Variation). It has some of my favorite troupes.
And I always recommend that people read A Civil Campaign. It is literally one of my favorite books ever (first read it fifteen years ago and it’s still great). Though if you do read it I recommend reading Komarr first. These are later books in the Vorkosigan Saga but I think that they make a pretty good introduction (that’s how I read them anyway), though I am loathed to read a book series out of order these days.
I’m not 100% sure, but I’m pretty sure that you can’t buy I Dare as a solo ebook at the moment. It’s included in a couple of bundles, though, one straight from Baen (http://www.baenebooks.com/p-630-phase-change-collection.aspx) for $25 with several other Liaden Universe books and the other called The Dragon Variation (http://www.amazon.com/Dragon-Variation-Liaden-Universe-volumes-ebook/dp/B00APA4LBO/ref=la_B000APHWO2_1_14?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1410442174&sr=1-14) which includes two other titles for $8.99. <—All of them great and that averages $3/book so a total deal!
This was one of my favorite series for a long time. I own the original paperback version, plus the first bundled version. And the great news for anyone who hasn’t started reading yet is that there are loads of books set in this universe, plus even more short stories! Don’t let the covers dissuade you—the stories are wonderful.
Sarah, I can see I Dare available at Baen as a solo book. And a wave from someone else who found the original paperbacks so long ago.
I wrote a long post to go with this then realized it was nothing but me squeeing and hop-clapping about my favorite authors. So I’ll spare everyone that and just say give them a try. With two free books in the Baen Library they are easy to try.
jumping up and down and screeching with joy Such a great series of books and I am so glad to see this review here. Some really interesting and thoughtful world building in this series as a whole and this is a good entry point. One particularly cool aspect to the series is the extreme formality of the Liaden culture and language, which plays a significant role in how the characters relate to each other and develop. I think there may be a recommended reading order on the authors’ website which may be worth it for folks starting out—I jumped into the series at the tail end with Necessity’s Child and it took me a while to figure everything out. Also agree about the covers, although nothing will ever be worse than the original cover for A Civil Campaign. Fortunately for ebook readers the digital covers are much better! This is a great follow up to the SF/Alien Romance thread—thank you!
Oh, I am so happy you are getting to these books. Scout’s Progress is one of my favorites. Just love it, love, love it.
I read the series in publication order—-the first three (Agent of Change, etc) long ago, and then as they came out when series picked back up, with Plan B, I Dare and so on. So I already knew the Bad Thing . The only one of the earlier books that I’m not really fond of is Local Custom—but that’s just me.
The world building is excellent, the main characters are well-rounded. And the prose is delightful.
The aliens! Carrie—we have sentient giant space-faring turtles!! Who can do fabulous things with their songs!!! How can you go wrong?!?!! Read “Agent of Change” immediately. Heck—this series is worth a binge-read. Go for it!
I loved “Fledgling”, which I would call YA sci-fi. The protagonists are young. I need to read this book!
oh, this is one of my favorite books and i love it more every time i read it. the rest of the series is pretty awesome too, and something like 20 years later a direct sequel to this one came out (Mouse & Dragon), giving us more Aelliana and Daav!
I adore the Liaden books, and I’m not shy about joining the chorus of squees. The books are fun reading, and several of them have romantic subplots. Scout’s Probress and Conflict of Honors are my favorites among the Liaden books, and both of them can be found in the Dragon Variation omnibus http://www.baenebooks.com/p-1188-the-dragon-variation.aspx
*baits hook and throws it into the pond full of hungry fishies*
Ooooh yes, time for a re-read I think. And maybe to finally get round to some of the other Liaden universe books.
Sci-fi/fantasy is my other go to genre to read but it’s been awhile since I tried a new author or series, so it’s exciting to hear so many comments backing up a positive review. I will have to check this out. 🙂
Hmmm. It’s not showing up on Amazon as an ebook and isn’t free on the Baen site, but I may buy it from them for $5. No rush, though, since I have a pile of research reading to do.
So it’s safe to assume that I don’t need to read the first book in the series before this one?
And speaking of Baen, I recently gave my paperback copy of Cordelia’s Honor to a friend, assuming I would be able to get the e-book from Baen, since I can’t be without it. But it’s unavailable there, does anybody know the reason why?
I have loved, loved, LOVED all of Lee & Miller’s Liaden books ever since I found Conflict of Honors in the library as a brand-new paperback! In the 80s.
Regarding Bujold and Cordelia’s Honor, that was an omnibus edition from Baen combining Shards of Honor and Barrayar. I notice that many many of Bujold’s Vorkosigan ebooks, everything except the most recent ones, are no longer offered by Baen, they are offered by “Spectrum Literary Agency”. I would speculate the e-rights for these books reverted to Bujold. I notice that, at least on iBooks, Barrayar is offered but Shards of Honor is not. You could at least get half….
Scout’s Progress is a simply wonderful book, and a great gateway into the Liaden universe. Daav is one of my favorite heroes ever. I’m so glad that you reviewed it here!
@Pooks, I think Scout’s Progress stands well on its own and that you need not read Local Custom first (if by “first in the series” you mean Local Custom). I happen to adore Local Custom, and Daav is a supporting character in it, but you can always pick it up later if you wish.
I love the Liaden Universe. Love! Love love love! And I want Theo 5 so bad I itch…
For the confused (don’t forget, I was among you a few months ago…*wink*), this is what the authors have to say about the Liaden Universe reading order: http://korval.com/publication-list/correct-reading-order/
I’m in the middle of Yet Another Re-Read of parts of the Liaden Universe, sparked by a grab of Scout’s Progress from my audiobook list. It’s the entry book to Liad that I give to romance readers—Local Custom will work, especially for the Regency reader who is open to something new, but Scout’s Progress is just lovely.
It was the book that hooked me. Coming from the science fiction side, I read Agent of Change, then bounced off Conflict of Honors because it wasn’t the sequel I expected. (Though I love it now…) A few years later someone handed me Scout’s Progress, and now I buy the eARCs of each new volume to get ‘em as soon as possible.
I don’t seem to see anyone else mentioning this, but if you’d like to see the story of Daav and Aelliana continue, it picks up in “Mouse and Dragon”. I add my voice to the chorus suggesting you should read the series as a whole (I suggest publication order overall, though since there are so many different individual stories in the setting it has a multitude of great entry points—including, as you discovered, Scout’s Progress.)
The publication history of the Liaden Universe is really interesting. Lee and Miller were an early casualty of the midlist squeeze—their original publisher decided the books didn’t sell well enough to want more after the first three. But they were also an early victor of the Internet era, as their books built so much buzz on the fledgling Internet in the early ‘90s that by the time they found their way online, they discovered so much built-up demand that the fans had even already decided on the title of their next book for them!
They started self-publishing short stories in chapbooks (and were, hence, also early beneficiaries of the self-publishing era) and eventually were able to put out more books in the series via Meisha Merlin, then when that company unfortunately folded were picked up by Baen. They also experimented, successfully, with funding a couple of books via Storyteller’s Bowl-style crowdfunding projects before Kickstarter was even a thing.
And we fans are delighted they’re writing more stuff for Baen, and the series is getting ever longer. So much exciting new story to discover! The next one is set to come out in June of next year.
I’m in the middle of reading the Liaden Constellation books (available from Amazon as ebooks) – collections of short Liaden stories. and now I want to go back and re-read the whole series. I’ve got them all in audio, too.
Another squee here. I missed the series the first time around, but picked it up with Conflict of Honors when the “Partners in Necessity” omnibus came out. For about the first 25 pages I wasn’t’ sure I was going to like it. But then I turned the corner and loved it, as I have all the rest in this series. (Well, for some reason I don’t like Local Custom very much. But I love the rest enough to make up for it.) And the duo of Scout’s Progress / Mouse and Dragon are probably my very favorites.
And while I’m squeeing, I also highly recommend Sharon Lee’s solo-written fantasy series that begins with Carousel Tides. It’s not quite like anything else. Contemporary small-town Maine, a carousel with a magical aspect (and not nearly as sparkly as that makes it sound), spirits of land and sea, connections with other universes that are neither traditional Faerie nor parallel universes, and a heroine who would never have come home to Archer’s Beach and the carousel if her grandmother hadn’t gone missing.