This book was recommended to me by my mother. Several years ago, I had read a few books by Ms. Bujold and enjoyed them.

This book was a little slow to get started and I did not like the inherent mid-30's man relationship with the 19 year old girl. It seemed odd to me, even though it was explained why that was normal and not odd in the book.

Once the story got underway and the world was set-up, it was a fun read. Some things you saw coming from a mile off, but other things surprised you -- spoiler: I was surprised by the trashing of the menagerie and the death of Teidez, as well as who Danni turned out to be. I liked that Caz told tales of what had happened to him in the past, some of which were just good stories for the moment and some of which held meaning and value later in the novel. When all the early stories have meaning later in the novel, one becomes adept at figuring out the twist and turns early, but when some stories are just character building with no later repercussions, the ones with later value become a surprise.

This was a nice distraction and a good break of my 4 month fast of no fun reading books while I worked on an encompassing project for work.