Rating: 
Summary: Contrived Millitary Sci-Fi
Review: I only read the first five chapters and, in frustration, skipped ahead to the ending, so maybe I'm not doing this book justice. Perfect Honor got dishonored for reasons outside of her control, fine, life isn't fair. But it just seemed a little too set-up for me how her defamation managed to get her at an important military post just in time to save her nation from invaders. Now if she coped with her unjustly lowered status by swallowing it, working hard, and gradually winning back the respect of her peers, this would have been a very different book. However I did read one more Honor Harrington book, Flag in Exile, which I like much better, so consider this review as two-and-a-half stars instead of just two.
Rating: 
Summary: Bubblegum for the mind
Review: As someone who works full-time and is a near full-time student, I don't have a lot of free time. So I actually like schlocky pleasure books. And this is one of those. It is a book award winner? certainly not. The characters are one-dimensional and the plot is quite predictable-- Honor Harrington (the main character of this book, and the following series) is essentially hung out to dry by her superior officers by being placed in this no-man's land corner of space. she surprises everyone by actually suceeding in the task she was set to do. Of course, it goes way deeper than that, and she's forced into a dangerous engame. (you will not be shocked by the ending) I enjoyed it, however. Sometimes, that's just the kind of book you need.
Rating: 
Summary: Pretty decent book
Review: I had heard all about the "Honor Harrington" series, and have seen tons of them on the bookshelves. The cover's of these books never really appealed to me, looked kinda "hokey"...and the fact it was a woman military "hero" seemed to turn me off. I dunno if it was because I'm just a male chauvinist pig at heart and still haven't come to grips with women in military roles, or that it seemed to be an author's attempt at "political correctness." However, I finally broke down and bought the first in the series, and I'm glad I did. There is not a lot of "set-up", and it gets right into the the story...I like that. From the book cover, I thought this would another book about an infalable hero who takes on the universe with unbeleivable odds, but always manages to beat the odds and come out the hero. Well...it is, but I enjoyed it anyway :-) It wasn't over indulgent, and our hero, Honor Harrington is a beleivable character. She aint no super-hero, but she is damned good. She has found herself in some unenviable positions and accepts them. She does her best (which is pretty good) with the cards she is dealt. Her sense of "duty" overrides any pettyness she could harbor and just deals with each situation. The politics in this book center around "monarchy" types of interstellar govt's. Queens, dukes, etc. With all the political ramifications of "blood lines" and family hierarchy's to deal with. Honor's govt., the "Manticorians" are pitted against the "People's republic of Haven". Haven's govt is on an expansionist agenda and is trying to move in on some of the Manticoran's territory, unbeknownst to the Manticoran's. Honor is sent to an out-of-the-way Manticoran outpost, Basilisk Station, which is seen as a punishment duty for lousy officers, because she upset some higher-ups...an injustice to her. But, she knuckles down and sets out to do her best and her duty. Well, as it turns out, this is exactly where the Republic of Haven plans to do some military expansion. The Manticoran govt. has no clue that this is about to happen. Honor finds herself abandoned in this area, by a petty commander who is trying to set her up to fail. She understands what he's trying to do, but decides to do her damned best anyway. Because of the incompetence of this commander, no one see's what the Republic of Haven has been doing there. Honor arrives on scene, starts doing her job, and slowly discovers what is happening. Then, things start to really heat up. I almost set this book down, near the beginning of the book, as it started to delve into the mind-numbing politics of the Manticoran Govt and its myriad factions. But, it only lasted a coupla pages (which I re-read 3 times and still didn't get it), and once past it, things got better, a lot better :-) I recommend this book. It's a fun read, pure escapism. I finished it in 2 days. I have the second in the series and am looking forward to getting started...which I will do as soon as I finish editing my lousy spelling. SF
Rating: 
Summary: The Ghost of Hornblower
Review: I would like to start this review by stating that I loathe science fiction. To me, it encompasses all that's lazy and annoying about fiction: weak characters, lame plots, and whenever the protagonist is cornered, well the author can conjure some gizmo to get him out of trouble, something you've never seen before, though of course the characters act as if it's completely reasonable and normal. I also don't like pastiches much. There's a science fiction/fantasy series that's pretty directly a rip-off of Nero Wolfe, for instance, and for my money readers should stick with the original. All of that leads up to David Weber's Honor Harrington series having a very good reputation. It's obvious that these books are a concious pastiche of the Horatio Hornblower series (the first book is dedicated to Hornblower author C.S.Forester) but for some reason I didn't mind. Instead, I found myself staying up to finish the story. Honor Harrington has been given her second command. It's an antique light cruiser, rearmed with experimental weaponry that leaves it conventionally vulnerable, but potentially lethal if it can surprise the enemy. Harrington is first to maneuver the ship in exercises, and in those she contrives to upset or humiliate just about everyone. The result of that is being sent into virtual exile at Basilisk Station, where her senior officer immediately decamps, leaving her in charge. This is only the start of her problems: the crew is unhappy with her because they think she caused the exile, the planet she's guarding has a band of fanatic drug addicts on it, one of the oldest merchant clans is mad at her for thwarting their efforts to smuggle illegal furs, and of course a neighboring space empire covets Basilisk station, and its nearby wormhole (very important for interplanetary commerce). Honor takes each challenge in stride, and expects no less from her crew. There are cute touches to the story. Honor is from a planet where many of the natives bond empathically with six-legged cats called treecats, and Honor's pet is named Nimitz (presumably after the U.S. WWII admiral). One of her crewmen is named Sam Houston Webster. Apparently, the history of Earth isn't completely lost, as is the case in some Sci Fi books. I thoroughly enjoyed this book, and would recommend it to others. I'm going to go looking for the next one in the series soon.
Rating:
Summary: Military SF for the technology-minded readers
Review: Disclaimer: I am a reader who heavily prefers her SF to focus on humans over hardware(this is simply a reflection of my status as an impoverished low-techie who can't afford good stuff in this universe, either, and so would rather not pine for otherworldly stuff in her reading). I have come to understand in the last few years that a third broadly generalized type of SF fan exists, who loves the military/space battle aspect of SF -- which I am also not, due to ignorance of military matters in this century. So, you are now well-equipped to see where my point of view is coming from in my rating here. On Basilisk Station is the first in the Honor Harrington series, of which I have currently read three. Honor is a newly promoted captain, beautiful, athletic and talented, whose first posting on the ship HMS Fearless at the disreputable Basilisk Station is a punishment for causing a high-ranking officer to lose face. The punishment is really in the impossible situation, in which the Fearless is to be responsible for singlehandedly guarding the entire system there, where there should be several such ships to do that job. In a nutshell, Honor rises to the challenge and makes the best of a bad situation by some innovative patrol scheduling. Her deft handling of other tricky problems and unexpectedly saving the Manticoran fleet from losing a war gains her honor and respect among her crew and her far-off superiors. I have heard the Honor Harrington series compared to other SF series dealing with space battles, but the reason I picked up On Basilisk Station is that Weber's books were often recommended for those who like Bujold's Vorkosigan novels. Not likely. The main character (Honor Harrington) is far too perfect on every level (except, naturally, that she has a negative self-image)to be believable or sympathetic, unlike Miles Vorkosigan. The author really has created a superwoman version of the typical male SF superhero, which is exactly the kind of thing that loses me. The battle scenes are good, the world-building is interesting and well-thought-out; but the characters are a bit stereotyped and/or unexplored. If you really like military- and hardware-oriented SF, this is just the book for you. But as a fan of character-driven fiction, I just could not muster the necessary enthusiasm, especially when my expectations were falsely raised by comparisons with some of my favorite authors.
Rating:
Summary: Grit and Determination
Review: I enjoy reading stories of grit and determination and especially the above traits overcoming resistance all the way from the top. David Weber creates a believable and respectable character who manages to do all that. Weber keeps himself in the world he has created, using the science-fiction aspects to set the stage and conditions for his book, but then following through with the story of human decision making which really gives "On Basilisk Station" it's appeal.
Rating:
Summary: Ah, Neo-British Space Combat...
Review: One thing I will say for David Weber is that he certainly has no compunctions about throwing the reader in in the middle of his main character's career. In the process of reading "On Basilisk Station" I had to go back and check two or three times to make sure that this wasn't the third or fourth book in the series. Not that this is a bad thing - he gives us a character in this book that is fully realized and has a well fleshed-out past. It also leads to many pages of plot exposition, but I'd rather have more characterization in most cases than less. "On Basilisk Station" is the beginning of his "Honor Harrington" series and it owes a big debt to Imperial Britain for virtually every aspect of the main character's navy (and universe) - with the exception, of course, of technology. Using some rather tried-and-true aspects of military writing - the surly, resentful crew, the mission of exile and the evil empire next door, Weber creates a very readable universe with characters that are, while not exactly inspired, certainly fun to read about. If I have any one complaint about the book, it's that he loves his characters so much, he's afraid to really get in a torture them on a psychological level - unlike writers like George R.R. Martin or Lois McMaster Bujold - but he certainly knows how to write good space battles and that makes up for a lot. This book makes for great summer or diversionary reading. but it misses greatness by a hair. Nonetheless, I'm definitely pushing on to book two, "The Honor of the Queen" and I encourage anyone looking for good, old-fashioned Imperial-style science fiction to give this a go. It's a lot of fun.
Rating:
Summary: Too much technobabble
Review: The characterization was terrible. Only Honor and her executive officer had a little depth. Almost all the other characters had no distinguishing features except their physical description and their job duties.
Too much time was spent in the battle descriptions at the end, particularly in the dialogue. Once you strip away the little characterization there is, you're left with spaceship velocity descriptions. I had much more fun reading Bujold's Miles Vorkosigan series.
Rating:
Summary: Great set of books
Review: i have read most of David Weber's books and like most of them. On Basilisk Station is the first book in the Honor Harrington series. Honour is a commander in the Manticoran Navy. The kingdom of Manticore is under threat from the People's republic of Haven (the peeps) and Honor finds herself on the front line. As captain of a light cruiser (Fearless) she is sent to Basilisk Station as punishment for embarassing an admiral, (She blew said admiral's ship away in a wargame scenario) and finds herself in conflict with a disillusioned crew and an old enemy from her past. Honor struggles agianst her crew's dislike and tries to perform her duties but then she discovers a plot to annexe the system she has been set to guard. Now at times this serise get a little too bogged down in formality and a whole lot of Mantorian Navy red tape. At times such as this when you are tempted to put the book back on the self for good just hang on untill you hit the battle sceans.
Rating:
Summary: A Great Start for a Great Space Opera Saga
Review: David Weber has created science fiction's equivalent of C.S. Forrestor's Horatio Hornblower saga with his ongoing saga of his heroine, Honor Harrington. With her faithful, and empathic, treecat Nimitz, this series is a true delight. This is swashbuckling, space opera sci-fi at its best, with excellent characters, a vibrant universe, complete with an intriguing socio-political plot which drives the overall plot of the background of this fascinating universe. "On Basilisk Station", is the first book in the Honor Harrington Saga, and introduces us to both Commander Honor Harrington, Mr. Weber's memorable heroine, and the wider universe which will play a prominent role in this saga. The book opens with the leaders of the bloated welfare state of the People's Republic of Haven plotting further plans of conquest, concerned about the only obstacle in their way: The Star Kingdom of Manticore. Meanwhile in Manticore, Commander Honor Harrington is on her way to her first cruiser command, the aging light cruiser "Fearless." She arrives to find that her new command has been stripped of most of its weaponary to make room for an experimental weapon, a weapon which works well in theory, but realistically is unusable in battle, especially on something as small as a light cruiser. Despite this, Honor is able to make the weapon's test a successful one. . . but only the first time. After numerous failures, due to the weapon's limitations, the head of the weapon's project is displeased, and Honor's dispirited crew finds themselves banished to Basilisk Station, the place where the navy has been sending its screwups and disgraces. Basilisk Station has been used to incompetence from its Naval picket forces, as have other interested parties. The present commander of the station, Lord Pavel Young (remember that name) has an axe to grind with Honor, and abandons her to picket the system by herself, as he takes his ship home for a refit. One ship to patrol an entire system, a populated planet, and a wormhole junction. All with a ship whose crew has had their morale hit rock-bottom. With years of slacking by incompetent commanders, what might happen when a competent commander finds herself in charge of Basilisk Station? With action, derring-do, intrigue and political machinations, this is space opera at its best. This is a fun read and a great series.
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