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BattleTech Universe #26
Bred for War
Along with the throne of the Federated Commonwealth, Prince Victor Steiner-Davion inherited a number of problems. Foremost among them is the Clans' threat to the peace of the Inner Sphere - and a treacherous sister who wants to supplant him. The Expected demise of Joshua Marik - heir to the Free Worlds League, whose very presence maintained peace - also endangers harmony. Victor's idea is to use a double for Joshua, a deception that will prevent war.
But secret duplicity is a hard to maintain, and war erupts anyway, splitting the Inner Sphere and leaving the Federated Commonwealth defenseless. And when Victor thinks things can get no worse, word comes that the Clans, once again, have brought war to the Inner Sphere...
But secret duplicity is a hard to maintain, and war erupts anyway, splitting the Inner Sphere and leaving the Federated Commonwealth defenseless. And when Victor thinks things can get no worse, word comes that the Clans, once again, have brought war to the Inner Sphere...
384 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1995
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
October 22, 2023
Great story and some pretty neat twists thrown in, too! This one has all the feels and action.
March 15, 2021
Set at the beginning of the civil war story arc, this sees Katherine Steiner split the Lyran Alliance from the Federated Commonwealth, the Free Worlds league team up with the Draconis Combine to take back worlds lost in the fourth succession war, and the Clans attempting to break the truce of Tukkayid.
The first half of the book is politicking and maneuvering for position. There's quite a lot of threads being set up, but Stackpole knows his characters well enough to avoid this becoming boring.
The second half is all action, spread across multiple worlds as the Clans start in-fighting to determine if the truce can be broken and Free World forces work their way into lost territory.
One of the events in the Clan thread is slightly glossed over, but the full story can be read in "I am Jade Falcon" which runs in a concurrent time frame.
The first half of the book is politicking and maneuvering for position. There's quite a lot of threads being set up, but Stackpole knows his characters well enough to avoid this becoming boring.
The second half is all action, spread across multiple worlds as the Clans start in-fighting to determine if the truce can be broken and Free World forces work their way into lost territory.
One of the events in the Clan thread is slightly glossed over, but the full story can be read in "I am Jade Falcon" which runs in a concurrent time frame.
June 3, 2024
Reportedly, the author, Stackpole, has been known to use the tabletop game to flesh out the mech combat in his books. Based on Bred for War, I believe that this is his experiment in using BattleForce, or Strategic Operations, one of the mass combat rule sets, and then describing what happens. The book reads something like someone interviewing players of a Risk game between turns.
The problem begins in trying to summarize the plot. There is the Clan leadership plot, and the Inner Sphere leadership plot. There is also the insurgency plot, and the counter-insurgency plot. In both cases, the sides represent sides in two different wars, and do not fight against one another.
It is also 1995 so there is an epigram to start every chapter. Not a relevant epigram, mind you.
A substantial amount of the book is people talking to themselves. There is a stereotype about how these books are all action, but here the striking bit is how little action there is, choosing instead to favor two people talking about the action, or even one person thinking about the action. I am still unclear as to why some scenes were omitted.
The nice thing is that kinda anti-environmentalist gets to go along with the kinda racist. I do think that Sun Tzu Liao is a better portrayal, but particularly in getting to triangulate the inner monologues of Katrina Steiner, my feeling is more that Stackpole is confused by women and Asians, or afraid about how to write them, causing both of the characters to end up unpleasantly undefined.
The book also reveals that the author has some strange impressions on how espionage works.
But I liked it. Or the book does have several things going for it. While the plot is told as if a source book (seriously, this would have been much better as an epistolary novel), the plotting itself is worth following. These books do not suffer from the same problem of other shared universe books where nothing and no one can change, so things do in fact happen. Granted, some are ridiculous, but this is better than sit-com esque stasis. There are things that could be mistaken for character arcs, one even with Victor Steiner-Davion, that pay off prior events in satisfying ways. And the conclusion is a banger.
Basically, this book is sort of the conceptual opposite of a filler episode. It would have been better, I think, to turn into a duology, in order to flesh out the stories of what is happening better, and to cut out all the spy and Woodstock plots (or the Woodstock plot would be great as a true stand-alone, like without Acuff. I think that the spy plots were there for anyone who didn't understand what they read). So boring in itself, but fascinating in context.
The problem begins in trying to summarize the plot. There is the Clan leadership plot, and the Inner Sphere leadership plot. There is also the insurgency plot, and the counter-insurgency plot. In both cases, the sides represent sides in two different wars, and do not fight against one another.
It is also 1995 so there is an epigram to start every chapter. Not a relevant epigram, mind you.
A substantial amount of the book is people talking to themselves. There is a stereotype about how these books are all action, but here the striking bit is how little action there is, choosing instead to favor two people talking about the action, or even one person thinking about the action. I am still unclear as to why some scenes were omitted.
The nice thing is that kinda anti-environmentalist gets to go along with the kinda racist. I do think that Sun Tzu Liao is a better portrayal, but particularly in getting to triangulate the inner monologues of Katrina Steiner, my feeling is more that Stackpole is confused by women and Asians, or afraid about how to write them, causing both of the characters to end up unpleasantly undefined.
The book also reveals that the author has some strange impressions on how espionage works.
But I liked it. Or the book does have several things going for it. While the plot is told as if a source book (seriously, this would have been much better as an epistolary novel), the plotting itself is worth following. These books do not suffer from the same problem of other shared universe books where nothing and no one can change, so things do in fact happen. Granted, some are ridiculous, but this is better than sit-com esque stasis. There are things that could be mistaken for character arcs, one even with Victor Steiner-Davion, that pay off prior events in satisfying ways. And the conclusion is a banger.
Basically, this book is sort of the conceptual opposite of a filler episode. It would have been better, I think, to turn into a duology, in order to flesh out the stories of what is happening better, and to cut out all the spy and Woodstock plots (or the Woodstock plot would be great as a true stand-alone, like without Acuff. I think that the spy plots were there for anyone who didn't understand what they read). So boring in itself, but fascinating in context.
September 14, 2020
Solid pacing, interesting story, and enough action and suspense to keep you hooked even if the characters are a touch flat. Much better than Mr. Stackpole's earlier works. I suspect one of his own characters made a jab at his works within this story. The flat characters don't distract from a good yarn. I understand why some things were not covered in greater detail because some other authors had laid claim to those events. Another major event novel that cannot be skipped.
March 26, 2024
Whew! This one took a LONG time to read. There were way too many threads to track - Victor, Sun-Tzu, Thomas, Katherine/Katrina, the Refusal War between Clan Jade Falcon and Clan Wolf (also immortalized in the video game MechWarrior 2), Larry Acuff, Noble Thayer,.... For the longest time, I had no desire to read this book but found out it is really a transitional book that sets up multiple plot threads in literally the next 10 books.
The next book is Malicious Intent which tells the story of Vlad and his revenge against those who killed Ulric Kerensky. That story was told only as a news briefing from Phelan towards the end. The story of the warrior who killed Natasha is Joanna and you have to read Freebirth.
This is a typical Stackpole book where he has a hard time differentiating characters were all the male soldiers are clones of each other.
The next book is Malicious Intent which tells the story of Vlad and his revenge against those who killed Ulric Kerensky. That story was told only as a news briefing from Phelan towards the end. The story of the warrior who killed Natasha is Joanna and you have to read Freebirth.
This is a typical Stackpole book where he has a hard time differentiating characters were all the male soldiers are clones of each other.
September 14, 2014
Bred for War by Michael A. Stackpole continues the story of the movers and shakers of the inner sphere as they compete to out maneuver each other for power and control of various factions and regions. He is, IMO, one of the best writers to contribute to the battletech universe. His novels are fast paced containing political plots and threads involving multiple interesting personalities with plenty of action sequences throughout.
A great fun, faced paced story in the battletech universe.
A great fun, faced paced story in the battletech universe.
June 17, 2021
Book 25 of the BattleTech series. Ulric and Wolf Clan trial of refusal. Katrina breaks the Lyran Alliance (House Steiner) from the Federated Commonwealth. A lot of things going on in the Inner Sphere.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews