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From: Tony Nance <tnusenet17@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written
Subject: Re: Highlights and Lowlights - June 2024
Date: Wed, 3 Jul 2024 14:25:18 -0400
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On 7/3/24 11:27 AM, Paul S Person wrote:
> On Tue, 2 Jul 2024 12:56:50 -0400, Tony Nance <tnusenet17@gmail.com>
> wrote:
> 
>> On 7/2/24 1:54 AM, Titus G wrote:
>>> On 2/07/24 07:56, Tony Nance wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Highlights and Lowlights - June 2024
>>>>
>>>> Books are listed in reverse chronological order from how I read them,
>>>> using a very primitive rating system:
>>>> “+” are good, and more “+” are better
>>>> “-“ are not good, and more “-“ are worse
>>> snip
>>>>
>>>> ( +++ - )  Fleet Elements - Williams [Praxis #5]
>>>> Good! Lots of intrigue, lots of space action, some unexpected events. An
>>>> incident near the end is handled in a very puzzling way (imho), and the
>>>> way it’s handled will influence book #6 greatly, where the Terran forces
>>>> vs the Zanshaa forces will surely come to a head.
>>>>
>>>
>>> Isn't Fleet Elements Praxis #2 ?
>>>
>>
>> The three Dread Empire's Fall books are generally considered to be
>> Praxis #1 to #3 - consider that #1 is titled "The Praxis".
>>
>>
>>> My favourite William's was the Metropolitan series and I also enjoyed
>>> Dread Empire's Fall which even improved with book three but though I
>>> enjoyed The Accidental War (Praxis #1), I thought it too implausible
>>
>> I remember thinking The Accidental War was a tough go, and for all the
>> plot advancement it achieved could have been a pamphlet instead of a
>> book. Gratefully -- some years later -- I found myself enjoying Fleet
>> Elements.
>>
>>
>>> and I did not finish Fleet Elements because there was too much
>>> redundancy or repetition and it was too similar to Dread Empires Fall
>>> which I had just reread prior to beginning the Praxis series. So I am
>>> not familiar with the puzzling incident.
>>>
>>
>> I'll put a spoiler for the incident after my sign-off.
>> - Tony
>>
>> Big spoiler for Fleet Elements below...
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> No, really, it's a big spoiler...
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Well okay, you've been warned...
>>
>>
>>
>> Throughout the book, Lamey has been struggling to line up investors for
>> his financial scheming and has been more and more overtly threatening
>> Sula (definitely blackmail, and also hinting at physical violence) if
>> she doesn't come through for him.
>>
>> Toward the end of the book, Lamey meets with Sula alone, and as the
>> conversation doesn't go the way Lamey wants, he sucker-punches her in
>> the gut and reaches for her face/jaw as she's bent over. She shoots him,
>> he dies, and Martinez is the first one to enter in the immediate aftermath.
>>
>> Ok, fine...Lamey has been threatening her, he assaulted her, it wasn't
>> clear the assault would stop, and she killed him. Here's the puzzling part:
>>
>> Both Martinez and Sula act like she's done the most heinous thing
>> imaginable, they immediately contrive to hide/destroy the body and all
>> of the evidence, and of course since she now has the worst cooties ever,
>> Martinez decides she needs to be assigned to an extremely distant part
>> of the fleet, certainly nowhere near him, and now he never wants to see
>> her again.
>>
>> What? Did I miss something plausible?
> 
> I have no idea.
> 
> Perhaps their culture is very strict about killing people for personal
> reasons and does not recognize an ongoing assault as an excuse. Is
> Lamey, by any chance, her superior officer in a military organization?
> Or is the "fleet" some non-military entity? Are there other factors
> (is the culture sexist, with males in charge, for example)?

Not in this case - this book being #5 in this series, we (the readers) 
know that Lamey is a devious civilian with a sketchy past, and Sula is a 
military hero[1] with a sketchy almost-buried past - Lamey being 
probably the only character that knows Sula's past, hence the threat of 
blackmail.

Tony
[1] Possibly the only military person more heroic and esteemed than Sula 
is Martinez.