The Honor of the Queen by David Weber

The Honor of the Queen is the second installment of the Honor Harrington series, by David Weber. In this book, Honor is a newly promoted Naval captain commanding her first heavy cruiser which is a far cry from the gutted light cruiser from the first book. Her new ship may be much more powerful than her last, but her main challenge in this book is diplomacy, not space combat.

She is tasked to lead a squadron of cruisers to escort a royal ambassador to the planet Grayson to try and convince them to join into the newly forming anti-Haven alliance that Manticore is building to stem the tide of the the expansion of Haven. Grayson lies directly in the path between the two larger political entities so their cooperation is of great strategic importance to Manticore.

Honor Harrington is a very capable, if not brilliant, strategist and tactician and is an experience martial artist. She is capable of handling any foe, but she is not the most diplomatic person. She does not like diplomacy, nor does she understand it, but for this mission it is vital. There is one other problem though, the Grayson culture is dominated by males. Women are not allowed to vote, own property, etc, so the fact that Honor is a woman confuses and scares the Graysons, and presents and obstacle for her to overcome.

This is probably my favorite book of the entire Honor Harrington series. Grayson becomes a very important aspect of the entire series after this book, and the introduction of them in The Honor of the Queen is outstanding. Weber portrays the Grayson people not as monsters, but as people who question their beliefs and strive to survive what life throws at them. There are some very powerful and emotional scenes in this book that help set the tone of how ugly war can be and how horrible people can act towards each other.

Some of the memorable characters from On Basilisk Station make appearances in this book and have their characters flushed out a bit more. Many of then appear as prominent figures throughout the series and Weber does a fantastic job of making them feel alive and more than just 2D characters on the page.

For introducing strong and engaging characters as well as strong emotional scenes The Honor of the Queen receives a prestigious 10 on the It’s Geektime d10 of approval.

The Honor of the Queen by David Weber