Trading in danger by elizabeth moon

In Trading in Danger, Elizabeth Moon
introduces readers to Kylar “Ky” Vatta as she’s
being discharged from the military. Ky,
fortunately, is a member of the Vatta family,
owners of Vatta Transport Ltd a powerful space
trading corporation based on the rich planet
Slotter, so she can fall back on her family’s
company as a means to an end. However, her
heart was in the military and in the first
chapter, Moon’s depiction of the Ky’s
discharge is one of the strongest novel
openings which immediately generates empathy
and sympathy for the protagonist. It may seem
a simple thing and with little introduction to
or knowledge of Ky, but a great sense of
emotional turmoil and shock is conveyed
through what Ky experiences and how she
deals with it through her internal dialogue. I
immediately began rooting for Ky to succeed
and felt that way over the course of the novel.
I think I like the character of Ky Vatta even
more than Moon's more famous character
Paks.
Throughout the remainder of the novel, Ky’s
plight does not get any easier. She is given a
derelict of a ship Glennys Jones to run one last
job/mission, which of course does not turn
into “one last job.” Along the way of this last
job, Ky takes on another job in her name,
rather than in the name of her father’s
company. Ky wants to branch out on her own,
make a name for herself. When her father,
Gerard, set her on the task of “one last job”
for the ship, he suspected she might get
herself some more contracts and go a little
rogue. What he, nor Ky, expected was that the
major communication ansible at the spaceport
would be destroyed, one of those jobs she
takes would lead to a contract with a
Mercenary crew – the Mackensee Military
Assistance Corporation – and that job would
involve holding on to some passengers for a
time. What everybody involved didn’t expect
was that some of those passengers would be
pirates who are connected with messing with
the ansibles, attempt mutiny on Ky’s ship.
Fortunately, Ky’s military training kicks in
which allows her to handle the situation
amazingly well.
I am a fan of Elizabeth Moon ’s writing,
although I’ve only read her fantasy output . Not
surprisingly, her storytelling, writing and hand
at character just as strong when she shifts to
Science Fiction. Like her fantasy, there’s a
strong military flavor to the novel which,
considering her experience as a Marine, is only
natural. In that sense, the novel feels quite
natural and plausible. Overall, I enjoyed the
novel a great deal and plan on reading through
the remaining books in the series sooner
rather than late, which I define as ‘within the
next year.’
There came a point near the end of the novel
when one of the characters – a mentor
character by the name of Quincy Robin – was
giving Ky some advice. Good advice from a
place of love and respect. It was a great scene,
and I came to a realization. This character was/
is a woman whose first name is Quincy and
often is referred to by that first name. From
my experience, and this is probably flavored
by the television show Quincy starring Jack
Klugman, I was both reading this character as
a man and a woman. Maybe a better way to
say that is with gender blinders? All I know is
that I wasn’t placing a value on the character
because of her gender. Multiple times in the
narrative, Moon refers to Quincy as “she” or
“her” but my preconceived notion of the
character as a man because of the name was in
conflict with that. I wasn’t placing a value
judgment on the character of Quincy or her
gender, but it was a conflict (of sorts) in my
own head. As a result, I realized the gender of
the character didn’t factor negatively or
positively into my respect and admiration of
the character, Quincy was simply a well-
wrought character who happened to be a
woman.
This “gender blindness” or “zero value gender
judgment” came at a time when I’d read a few
novels in a row by women and just prior to
Trading in Danger, I read (and enjoyed)
Ascension by Jacqueline Koyanagi. Both novels
feature women protagonists in novels most
often associated with male writers which would
most often feature male protagonists. With
both of these novels and the protagonists, I
felt a connection to their plight, felt invested
in their emotions and rooted for them to
succeed.
I’d like to think I’ve always read gender in
characters this way, not as a value in a positive
or negative, but as an element of the
character. There’s ever more talk, at least in
the twitter circles that I follow, about gender
in genre. So this is just my little two cents on
the subject. At least for now.