Rules of Engagement - Hardcover

Elizabeth Moon

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0671577778 ISBN 13: 9780671577773

Publisher: Baen, 1998

Synopsis

Esmay Suiza and Brun Meager should be friends -- they're both bright, brave, likeable and adventurous. But true friendship doesn't run any smoother than true love. Brun thinks Esmay's a stuck-up prig, and Esmay thinks Brun's a spoiled rich brat who's making a play for Barin Serrano, Esmay's first love. So when Brun fails into the hands of a repressive religious militia movement, Esmay finds herself in disgrace, suspected of conniving at the capture. Even Barin has turned against her, and Brun's powerful family doesn't want Esmay anywhere near the rescue attempt. Meanwhile, Brun has to figure out how to survive on a planet where female captives are surgically muted to keep them from contaminating others. Her luck may have run out, but her courage hasn't -- she's determined to free not only herself, but other, younger captives. This burst of initiative imperils her own rescue, and it will take double her own luck to save her.

About this title

Review

"The Serrano Legacy," an entertaining SF sequence with strong female leads and a realistic space-military flavor, began with Hunting Party. Young lieutenant Esmay Suiza came to center stage in book 4: Rules of Engagement is book 5, continuing her story.

Suiza may be a fine leader and tactician, but she doesn't know how to handle falling for Ensign Barin Serrano, a man she outranks. Frictions in command training school worsen when well-born beauty Brun makes a play for Serrano: Suiza's explosion of temper blights her career. Then Brun falls into the hands of the series' most plausibly nasty villains to date, a murderous, Bible-thumping militia that controls several planets where women are kept down and--if they protest--are surgically deprived of their voices. Moon remarks:

... it would be not only useless but dishonest to pretend that the New Texas Godfearing Militia did not derive its nature from elements all too close to home, in Waco, Fort Davis, and even Oklahoma City.

The "Nutex" have also grabbed a nuclear arms cache for Oklahoma-style terrorist bombing in Familias space, home of the Fleet in which Suiza and Serrano are officers. Multiple story lines cover Suiza's wrestle with her public and private life, Brun's sufferings and determination, Serrano's ups and downs with unwritten rules of command, and eventually a risky rescue mission into a Nutex solar system. Things work out excitingly and as they should. This is enjoyable interstellar adventure that is more harrowing than previous episodes. The next and final volume is Change of Command. --David Langford, Amazon.co.uk

About the Author

Elizabeth Moon joined the US Marine Corps in 1968, reaching the rank of 1st Lieutenant during active duty. She has also earned degrees in history and biology, run for public office and been a columnist on her local newspaper. She lives near Austin, Texas with her husband and their son.

About this edition

• Publisher: Baen
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0671577778
• ISBN 13: 9780671577773
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 400