Salute, Mother.

Many of Lois Bujold's Vorkosigan books have "how much is a person worth/" (be they a mutant, a genetically engineered person, a woman in a male-dominated society, a commoner in an aristocratic society) angles to them. Others look into the question of "How much do we care for our children? How much do we care to want our children?"

The bare-bones answers to these questions are "a lot". In the actual practice and the telling of the story, the simple statement grows to be something for more complex and nuanced, little lines and small speeches showing without telling how important these answers are.

Ethan of Athos, to a certain degree, deals with both of these questions. The book tells the story of a Doctor in an only-male planet whose specialty is obstetrics. When the ovarian tissue they have been using for two centuries to develop blastocysts finally run down and stop producing viable eggs, he is sent out into the big wide galaxy contaminated by women to find and bring back suitable replacements.

A fascinating part of the book which I felt was too soon over was the development of social order in the planet over two centuries. Athos was established by patriarchs (truly founding fathers) who seized mechanical reproductive technology as a method to create a world free from the taint of females. Two centuries later, this has lead to a society with - obviously- no designated male and female roles, but which still has kids to take care of. Child raising labor - women's work, as Elli Quinn calls it with a quirk of her lips - is considered labor, and specialized, highly skilled labor at that. You better be qualified- certifiably qualified to have a child and have someone to help you take care of the child because it is not (as the Athosian government mandates) one-person work. And as for prejudice against homosexuality? Good luck with that in a planet of people who are still mostly (I presume) allosexual.

Athos still has an OMG DRAGONS!!! view of women, but their society is, in contrast, hilariously gender neutral. (I'm pretty sure the founding fathers would be rolling around in their grave and that thought gives me SO much pleasure). It's only mentioned in passing, eclipsed by the larger story arc of Ethan venturing out into the rest of the Galaxy, but good god it gave me world-building orgasms.

Once away from his planet to the space station nexus, Ethan encounters Elli Quinn, whose exquisite reconstructed face and mercenary-trained body fails to arouse any feeling except naked terror in him. (Ethan you see, is as gay as they come; although this is hardly a plot point. For a person from Athos, it's heterosexuality that's madness.) Elli, whose primary trait is probably resourcefulness, uses him as bait for her quarry. Multiple times. Ethan eventually replaces his terror of her and her corrupting ways with sheer exasperation, and it is delightful to watch.

Elli is after a rogue Cetagendan. The rogue Cetagandan is after a biological experiment. The biological experiment is interested in Athos. Plot points collide, things happen. Like anyone who's ever spent time with the actual people of the segment of society their culture and upbringing say are damned, Ethan starts to change his worldview.

Or maybe it's just the goon trying to kill him which did it. Who can tell?

Much like all of Bujold's books, this is a fascinating study in social commentary and SOCIAL whatifs, masked in an adventure filled with mercenaries and renegades. It also does that thing where women are seen unmistakably as people, more for their flaws than for their pure and good hearts.

Go read it. It's a good book.