Testimony of Mute Things: A Penric & Desdemona Novella

Penric and Desdemona (Publication order) #15

by Lois McMaster Bujold, Grover Gardner (Narrator)

A contentious Temple conclave brings sorcerer Learned Penric and his demon Desdemona, in support of his superior Princess-Archdivine Llewen of Martensbridge, to the disputed Carpagamon border town of Occo. There, the uncanny pair will tangle with dangerous new intrigues and old histories, that will test their magical skills, their wits, and their hearts.

Genres: Fantasy, Novella, Audiobook, Mystery, Fiction, Short Stories, Magic

Audible Audio

First published October 23, 2025

About the author

Lois McMaster Bujold was born in 1949, the daughter of an engineering professor at Ohio State University, from whom she picked up her early interest in science fiction. She now lives in Minneapolis, and has two grown children.

Her fantasy from HarperCollins includes the award-winning Chalion series and the Sharing Knife tetralogy; her science fiction from Baen Books features the perennially bestselling Vorkosigan Saga. Her work has been translated into over twenty languages.

Questions regarding foreign rights, film/tv subrights, and other business matters should be directed to Spectrum Literary Agency, spectrumliteraryagency.com

A listing of her awards and nominations may be seen here:

http://www.sfadb.com/Lois_McMaster_Bu...

A listing of her interviews is here:

http://vorkosigan.wikia.com/wiki/Auth...

An older fan-run site devoted to her work, The Bujold Nexus, is here:

http://www.dendarii.com/

Reviews

[K.J. Charles]

I glommed this entire novella sequence in a few days earlier this autumn. I glommed this. I will glom anything Bujold wishes to write in this series. That is all.

(Please do not recommend that I should start other Bujold series, as I actually need to earn money, eat etc rather than spending all day going through her books like a cartoon chipmunk.)

(I have Paladin of Souls queued for the holidays)

[carol.]

With more than sixteen Penric & Desdemona novellas, you'd expect a certain predictability. While they certainly share themes of kindness, duty, and quiet competence, Bujold rarely repeats herself structurally. Just when I think I've settled into a cozy mystery, she'll veer into an adventure or remind me that this world can still be unexpectedly cruel. I've been trying to read the cozy ones, cozy being a relative term. This one has about the same level of cozy as the village of St. Mary Mead, the perfect mix of dastardly and mundane. 

However, instead of staying in his much-beloved hometown, Penric & Des have been on the road, conscripted into Princess-Archdivine Llewen's retinue. The Archdivine is to settle a religious dispute for a temple impacted by ongoing border changes. At the first ceremonial gathering, a temple acolyte discreetly approaches Pen without revealing her concerns. Unfortunately, she is found dead the next morning, and it doesn't take Miss Marple to smell a potential murder.

Penric and Des do their thing with the aid of the dogged Constable Dena (there's always a stalwart constable in the best mysteries, and it's a treat to have this one be a female). Along the way, they also deal with a young thief who is lacking options and a couple of orphans. The trip also brings them into contact with someone who had loved one of Desdemona's previous personalities.

It's a fascinating, gentle story with all sorts of emotional touchpoints. Leave it to Bujold to write a murder mystery and then thread it with elements of aging, memory, compassion, and choice. I appreciate this one for leaving the bloodshed offstage. I skimmed some of the Archdivine politics and the duchy relationships that weren't particularly necessary, but I appreciate Bujold's attention to world-building. This was one of the better ones for me; a mystery with humanity.

[Phrynne]

This is book 15 in the publication order of this series but it is book 4 in the chronological order.

So the author takes us back to a time when Penric is still single and living in Martensbridge using his talents as a sorcerer for Princess-Archdivine Llewen. He goes with her to a church conclave where he ends up pursuing a murderer with Desdemona's excellent assistance.

I loved going back to Pen's younger days and really enjoyed seeing so much of Desdemona as well as Pen using his gifts so comfortably. Not a book for someone new to these books, rather it is like a treat for those of us who already know and love the series. I hope the author gives us more of the same! I for one am still not ready to give up Penric and Desdemona!

[William Schlesinger]

Yet again

The author's compassion comes through the details and texture of her words, with strays woven into her tales along with rich and evolving characters hinting at greater depths possibly to come.

[Barb in Maryland]

Bujold goes back in time to give us an earlier Penric adventure. Penric and Desdemona have been together for 8 or 9 years and Penric is still in Martensbridge, in the household of Princess-Archdivine Llewen. They accompany the Princess-Archdivine to a church conclave, which has been convened in the border town of Occo.
Penric and Des expect a boring meeting; they get involved in a murder instead. Not only do they need to solve the crime, they need to find out why the victim was trying to see Llewen. What follows is a lovely, twisty, mystery involving financial shennanigans, and a surprise visitor from Desdemona's past.

I loved this, of course. There's humor, wisdom, and charity, all wrapped in Bujold's warm prose. A true comfort read. I am so happy that Bujold is not through with Penric and Desdemona; I hope for many more stories to come.


















































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[aimee]

Always great to spend time in this universe with these characters.

Would still love some more stories with Llewellyn, there was simply not enough of her.

Thank you 👑 McMaster Bujold

[Brok3n]

Young Penric solves a murder mystery

Testimony of Mute Things is the 15th and (as of 6-Nov-2025) last novella in Lois McMaster Bujold's Penric and Desdemona series by publication order. By internal chronology, though, it is Number Four. What we have here is a relatively young Penric, who has not yet settled down with his wife-to-be Nikys. He has also not yet crashed catastrophically out of medical practice. In fact, he is serving as personal sorcerer -physician to princess-archdivine of Martensbridge, Llewen kin Stagthorne.

Princess Llewen has been called to the city of Carpagamo for a conclave. A war (one gets the impression more of a series of skirmishes than an all-out war) has just finished (more-or-less), and territories have changed hands between the Duchies of Carpagamo and Adria. This has left the inhabitants of several towns in those parts under new religious leadership. The purpose of the conclave is to settle arising disputes like civilized folk. Llewen is to be the chief judge. Pen is a kind of high-level factotum (Latin "do-everything").

During the night after Llewen's party arrives in Carpagamo, a woman dies. That day this woman had approached Penric desiring private speech with Llewen. Because Llewen was busy, Penric had put her off until the next morning, and she died before that interview could take place. Penric and Des investigate and quickly determine that she was murdered. So we have a fun little murder mystery.

The title, Testimony of Mute Things manages to sound mysterious but is not really that. In fact, almost every mystery you have ever read involves the testimony of mute things -- footprints, cigar ash (Sherlock Holmes loved this), possessions of the victims and murderers, etc. They are usually just called "clues." You might get the impression from the title that Pen and Des's solution of this mystery involves such clues particularly prominently, but this is not the case. Pen makes use of the testimony of many humans and even of not-mute inanimate things such as written documents.

If, like me, you're always eager to hear more about Pen and Des, you will read this and enjoy it. It is not, however, in the top ranks of the series.

Blog review.

[Roslyn]

Apart from being unable to keep up with the many names and titles - which is very much on me - I really enjoyed this instalment, in which we return to a younger Penric, who gets involved in a murder mystery with both subtle and larger implications.

[Oleksandr Zholud]

This is the fourth volume in Penric and Desdemona (Chronological order) Series (and the 15th in the publication order). I read it as part of the multi-month reading challenge for this series in August 2026 at Hugo & Nebula Awards: Best Novels group.

Penric and his chief employer, the princess-archdivine of Martensbridge, Llewen kin Stagthorne, arrive in the fortified town Occo. The archdivine should take part in negotiations that should establish new ducal and Temple borders after a prolonged conflict in such a way that no new war starts all over again. Because local representatives of Temple are biased, to arbitrate the new border, a representative of the neutral neighbor Martensbridge was called for.

On the first day, Penric is approached by an older woman in the robes of the Father’s Order, who presents herself as Learned Consua, of the Occo chancery and asks for a private audience with Her Grace. They finally agreed to meet tomorrow, but Consua dies at night. It turns out that her death was not of a natural cause, but after a bite of a poisonous snake, which was in her night chamber pot.

Of course, Penric starts an investigation, which quite likely is connected to the princess-archdivine’s mission. During the investigation, we meet with a person who was a lover of one of Desdemona’s carrier before Penric, a junior delinquent, who is an orphan, and therefore Penric tries to take him from the life of crime, and a few constables. Another solid story.

[Clinton (offline for a couple of weeks)]

Comfort read for Clinton and a low key mystery

Bujold is a treasure. She writes genre SF/fantasy, but it is delightful, enjoyable, entertaining and clever, with wonderful world building, believable and loveable characters, and cunning plots, usually on the cosy side rather than propulsive action. She also takes her characters across their whole lives in the series. Testimony of Mute Things, although no.15 in the series, returns to the youth of the main character Penric.

One thing I love about the series: The fabulous theology, which shapes the society and the reality of the world. There are five gods - The first four are fairly standard: The Father of Winter, The Mother of Summer, The Daughter of Spring and the Son of Autumn, but the last one, The Bastard is a delight. His purview is balance, accidents, and anything not wanted by any of the other Gods, which includes prostitutes and thieves, but also orphans, illegitimate children and LGBTQ (though not by that name). This simple theology, its linked ontology, and how it works out in day to day life leads to many amusing and engaging plot points.

★★★☆☆ This novella on its own
★★★★☆ The whole series

I don’t give the whole series five stars because Bujold’s Vorkosigan series is even better.

[Krista]

I love this series and LMB is a wordsmith. For some reason this one was hard for me to follow with all the titles and reasons for the big meeting. Conclave? What’s the word. Anyway, interesting backstory with Ruchias past and ‘shudders’ the murder weapon. Ick.

Pen’s life summed up here:

“Well,” said Penric diffidently, “some Someone might have sent me.”

Dena stopped and wheeled to stare at him a moment while she worked this out. “Does that happen? To you?”

“It’s happened before. And not necessarily just on behalf of my own god. They’ve been known to share me around the Family. Granted it’s hard to sort out the nudge of a god’s hand from random chance when one’s Patron is the god of chance.”

[Tracy]

A story of young Penric and Desdemona. A murder has taken place at a conclave of divines. He accompanies Lewen the Princess Archdivine as her sorcerer/secretay/ medic. These are always fun to read and Desdemona is delightful.

[Yev]

And so, with this, we fall back through time. Testimony of Mute things is the 15th published book and 4th chronologically. This is the odd series where it may be better to read it in internal chronological order rather than by publication. Going from Penric being 44 to 27 was a bit jarring, considering how much has happened over the course of those 17 years. Even so, this was a comfortable read and is more in line with the recent books than those published at the time, so there's also the argument to be made it's better to read them in the published order. Aside from this book, I've read this series by its internal chronological order and I don't regret it.

This time it's a murder mystery, which is more in line with the earlier entries as well. As seen on the cover, someone put an asp in their chamber pot. A terrible and unexpected way to die. The question as usual is, who and why? As a mystery it's not all that much. What mattered more to me was the character interactions, which has been the case the entire time. There's the usual elaboration of the backstory for one of Desdemona's aspects and the helping of someone to set them on a better path.

One of the benefits in going back in time is that the future has already been written, so it's far easier to include foreshadowing of what's to come in the chronologically later books. There's a good bit of that here, which I appreciated, despite the next book chronologically being the one I've liked the least in the series.

This isn't anything that would win someone over into reading the series, but it doesn't have to be. It's a fine supplement to a wonderful series and that's all it needs to be for me.

Rating: 3.5/5

[Mitchell Friedman]

Forensic Accounting and murder. This had kind of a Vorkosigan flare to it. I love that this author keeps on writing these. Penric and Desdemona are perhaps the coziest series I continue to read. And it needs to be a lot better known than it is at this point. It is kind of like a secret favorite. So what's to like? The writing is breezy and interesting. The use of magic is knowledgable and surprising. The world is vivid. And the books are short but there are a lot of them. Sure it is fantasy rather than science fiction. And these are not high art. But they are also not starring teenagers.

[Ann Schwader]

Any new Penric novella is a treat for Bujold fans, but this one may be particularly welcome -- at least, to those of us who have longed for a bit more action / intrigue than her more recent family-oriented offerings have had. (Those are excellent, too, of course -- but in different ways.) Set between the action of Penric's Fox & Masquerade In Lodi, this adventure revolves around a murder case during a difficult Temple conclave.

Young Penric is attending as an assistant to his superior, Princess-Archdivine Llewen of Martensbridge. He's expecting a mundane, even dull few days -- but when he becomes entangled in the bizarre murder of a corrupt Temple official, it will take all his & his demon Desdemona's skills to find the solution. This one offers a deep dive into Bujold's Five Gods magic system, as well as plenty of focus on Desdemona herself.

As with most of the Penric novellas, it's best to begin at the beginning of the series. Testimony is decidedly not for first-timers, & relies at least a little on the reader's familiarity with past adventures. At 151 pp, it is also good value for a novella.

[Stephen Richter]

This newest installment of the Penric & Desdemona takes place in the past and changes the reading order of the series. But if you are caught up with the series it will not matter much. A murder mystery at its heart, Penric becomes a detective, along with 5 other duties. Makes for a great new installment. It fits in chronologically after Penric’s Fox if you have not started this fabulous series.

[Huck]

3.5 stars

[Jester]

Really enjoying this whole series. Gotta think the best so far is a 4.5*, and the worst so far has also been a 4.5* so my rankings of them go back and forth between 4 and 5* based more upon my mood while reading/listening and less about the contents of the books. These quick little mysteries are just divine.

[Moira Mackinnon]

Excellent, as always. Lois McMaster Bujold has long been one of my favourite authors. I came late to her fantasy novels, having originally been drawn to the science-fiction Vorkosigan saga, but have come to treasure them equally, particularly the Penric and Desdemona novellas and stories, and the Sharing Knife tetralogy.

[Jonathan Palfrey]

In which Penric in his mid-20s accompanies Llewen kin Staghorne, the elderly princess-archdivine of Martensbridge, who has been asked to adjudicate a Temple dispute in Occo, a town in the neighbouring duchy of Carpagamo. He uncovers a plot involving embezzlement and murder.

This is not one of my favourite Penric stories, as it’s relatively short of engaging characters; but nevertheless it’s a substantial and quite interesting story, and it’s good to fill in some extra details of Penric’s past life. There are still no stories about his time as a university student, which was surely not uniformly boring.

On second reading, I realized that the name Stobrek, mentioned just once here, recurs near the end of Mira’s Last Dance, when Stobrek recognizes Penric from their brief meeting in this story.

[Olga Godim]

3.5 stars
While this novella is #15 in the publication order, in the chronology of Penric's life, it would be #4, right after Penric’s Fox but before Penric’s Mission. Penric is still single, still at Martensbride, serving Princess-Archdivine Llewen. In her train, he and his demon Desdemona arrive in the town of Occo, discover a murder, and play detective.
The story is not as light as most Penric's stories. There are grim undertones here. The darkness seems encroaching, while the plot explores human ruthlessness and greed.
Overall: a solid murder mystery, with magic in the background, but it made me sad.

[Promiscuous Bookworm]

4.5/5
Это будет не самая моя любимая повесть про Пенрика и Дездемону, но объективно она ничуть не хуже остальных.

[Regine]

I had worried that Penric’s character arc was ending, and that soon the series would either switch to the next generation or end. So I was delighted to find that the latest novella is set much earlier chronologically.

The young Penric is still in the service of Princess-Archdivine Llewen of Martensbridge, an accomplished administrator and appealing character who had disappeared from the series too soon for my taste. At a conclave to resolve the jurisdictional claims of temples affected by war, Penric and Desdemona solve a murder, sniff out financial chicanery, and rescue a recalcitrant orphan from a life in the streets. And a lover of Desdemona’s previous rider, Ruchia, finds solace in meeting Desdemona again.

Bujold’s humane, sometimes tender treatment of her characters is one of the pleasures of reading or - in this case - listening to her work.

[Lisa Feld]

Bujold is known for weaving different genres into her long-running science fiction or fantasy series; this one is primarily a mystery, set at a conclave.

It’s fun to see a younger Penric who is still struggling to get people to take him seriously, and to see more of his relationship with the Princess Archdivine who we’ve been told served as a mentor and surrogate mother but who died off fairly early in the series. Also always interesting to see people whom Des had her own relationship with before Pen, or whom she relates to differently than Pen.

But I’m just not wild about how Bujold does locked-room mysteries. We don’t know the victim or care about her. We’re told the mystery can impact the conclave, but we’re not really invested in the conclave’s results beyond “a good result hopefully means peace.” Chasing down the solution to the mystery takes Pen and Des away from any political intrigue (something Bujold famously does well) and there’s very little action or physical jeopardy or character/relationship development. Not my favorite addition to the series.

[Howard]

Another great entry in this series

While only just published, this is chronologically the 4th in the series. The book is an interesting combination of mystery and fantasy. While it's possible to enjoy as a stand alone, it is much richer if at a minimum you have read the first in the series in order to fully appreciate the world building and fantastical elements if the religion.

[Rachel]

An earlier adventure

Penric (during his healer days) goes with the princess-divine to help with some peace settlements, and gets caught up in a murder mystery. I have a feeling some of the folks here will show up again later…..

[Meggie]

3.5 stars

Set much earlier than the more recent stories, back when Penric worked for the Princess-Archdivine in Martensbridge. Not a murder mystery per se, because Pen and Des are pretty sure they know who the culprits are, but more about the why of the murder. I liked getting to see younger Penric again but this one felt slighter than some of the other stories.

[Emily VA]

While in general I prefer the stories that move Penric forward in time, this one is a lovely exception for its dive into Penric’s relationship with his first Archdivine. And also for its satisfying plot, and the other characters we meet on the way.

[Danielle]

Another excellent addition to the adventures of Penric and Desdemona

[Michelle]

So delightful, as usual. If you love high fantasy, these are for you. This one involves a temple conclave in the city of Occa and a murder by asp.