At All Costs [Mass Market Paperback]

The Star Kingdom of Manticore and the People's Republic of Haven are still in the bloodiest war ever known. In a previous novel, readers learned that the Havenites believed the Manties, during a cease-fire, altered documents. Therefore, the Havenites fired the first shot, ending the cease-fire without even bothering to notify the Manties. Now the Havenites have reason to believe that the Manties never altered anything. In fact, it appears that one of their own did the altering, hoping to cause the war to continue ... and succeeded.

Haven President Eloise Pritchart wants nothing more than for the war to end. She releases a POW, who happens to be close to Honor Harrington, with a message for Queen Elizabeth. Eloise wants to meet and discuss terms for peace. Elizabeth is given the choice of when and where. Eloise asks that Honor be included, as well as, the treecats.

Honor Harrington is still close to Hamish and Emily (of White Haven). As Honor begins her return to the front, she learns that she is pregnant. Though all know, in the back of their minds anyway, who the father is, no one dares state it aloud. Since being killed in battle is always a possibility, Honor has her unborn child removed from herself and placed in a tube to mature. (Totally safe.) Those on Manticore and Grayson, depending on how they feel about Honor, are either thrilled to learn about an heir or furious and wanting to use the child as a weapon against the mother.

***** First off let me state that I hope the author creates a whole new series about Torch, its teenaged queen, and its Amazonian people. Such potential exists there. Queen Berry Zilwicki came across much better than Queen Amidala could ever hope to have done.

Honor Harrington is something of "a personal bogeyman" for the Havenites. As always, Honor's reputation for unusual strategies grows, with great reason. If a student is only as good as his or her teacher, then the author, David Weber, is down right scary! The planning, tactical details, and battle executions are unnerving to me. I totally believe Weber to be a genius in this regard.

As my husband or I read ANY book by Weber, we lose a lot of sleep. We no longer bother to inform the other of WHY we look so tired and exhausted. We simply look into the eyes of the other and say, with a voice of pure disgust, " Weber Evil." Those two words say it all. This series has my highest possible recommendation! *****

(...)

I've been a fan of David Weber's for many years and I've been growing increasingly disappointed with his Honor Harrington series. Weber developed a very real-feeling universe for his character to live in but over the last several books he appears more interested in talking about the universe than in developing the characters, plot, or story. In SHADOW OF SAGANAMI, Weber got back closer to his roots, but AT ALL COSTS feels too much like a wandering text and not enough like a story. His characters move around like pieces on a board and don't have the same emotional impact they once did.

For example, part of this book is supposed to be a love story--a love between Harrington and White Haven. I don't feel it like I did Honor and Paul's story. I don't feel the dramatic impact of a main character's death, because that character barely had two lines in the whole novel. If it were a TV series, I'd assume the actor had wanted out of his contract.

No, David Weber is still a good writer, but he has to get back to basics with this series. Cut down on the breadth and go for the depth, Mr. Weber; you can make it work again.

It pains me to admit it, but despite my own longtime love of Honor Harrington books, I waited a long time on this one, and only read it because my local library had a copy. You see, I found "War of Honor", the previous installment, to be almost agonizingly boring. Honor never commanded a single vessel up until the very end when she just happened to have her Elysian Space Navy on maneuvers at the right place at the right time. Nearly the entire book was spent on such things as Honor's "battle" with the smear campaign involving her, Emily, and Hamish; the Saganami Island students she was befriending; and the new efforts to communicate with treecats through sign. "War of Honor" was probably the most boring military sci-fi book I have ever read. I pretty much decided when it was over that David Weber must have forgotten how to tell an exciting story, and if I ever bothered to read "At All Costs" it would only be if I could get it free and felt like I didn't have anything better to read.

So having gone into sufficient detail how much I hated "War of Honor", "At All Costs" was absolutely gripping fiction at its very best.

For the first time, both Haven and Manticore are led by honest politicians. The war, by rights, ought to be ended. Republic of Haven's President Eloise Pritchart learns early in the story that it was her own Secretary of State that had been the one to alter the diplomatic dispatches with Manticore, resulting in her decision to launch her surprise attack. Now she desperately wants to bring a diplomatic end to the war. Unfortunately, the mysterious organization "Manpower" introduced in "Shadow of Saganami" has other plans for the two Star Nations.

Honor Harrington has been newly installed as Eighth Fleet's commander - the primary offensive fleet for the Royal Manticoran Navy. Her job is to find a way to convince the Havenites to cover their rear areas and reduce their fleet strength available for offensive operations. Unfortunately, she faces an opponent with an almost two to one advantage in hulls that not even superior Manticoran technology is sufficient to offset. Not only that, but they enjoy an advantage in ongoing construction, meaning their superiority is only going to increase. Her job won't be an easy one.

Tom Theisman, the Havenite Secretary of War, wants the war to end just as badly as President Eloise Pritchart. His dilemma is that while he too knows about the way his Star Nation was manipulated into going into war, the war itself enjoys too much popularity at home. Congress won't allow their forces to simply surrender and bring the fighting to a close. And if Manpower is going to sabotage any chance for a peaceful settlement, then the only other option is to end the war through an all-out military victory. And while he prays it won't come to that, Tom Theisman knows he's got the strength to make it happen.

"At All Costs" is not a book to be read if you can only devote a few hours to it here and there. From nearly the first chapter, David Weber weaves his most masterful and exciting plot ever, and putting the book down, even for a minute, can be almost agonizing. I know some will find it frustrating, and particularly the end might be unsatisfying for some. But I will enthusiastically recommend this book to anyone who likes military sci-fi. This is absolutely the best I've ever come across within that genre, and certainly the best book in this series.

One last thing... David Weber's recently released "Shadow of Saganami" takes place in parallel with "At All Costs", and provides additional background on the workings of Manpower. You may want to read that one first, even though it isn't technically an Honor Harrington book.

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