Barrayar is an outstanding work in the universe of the now well known Miles Naismith Vorkosigan. Most of the events take place before Miles' birth centering around his mother's adjustment to becoming the wife of the new regent to the Emperor Gregory. Barrayar is a planet with a history of political violence, intrigue, assassination, and sheer chicanery that rivals any of the medieval governments of Earth. Aral Vorkosigan, Miles' father, survives a couple of assassination attempts, one an attack with poisonous gas that affects Cordelia while she is pregnant with Miles. The antidote to the poison gas severely damages the fetus but Cordelia refuses to abort the pregnancy. Cordelia recruits a research driven expert in the field of military poisons and the planet's best obstetrician to place Mile's in an "uterine replicator". The replicator is used extensively on Beta, Cordelia's homeworld, as a replacement for natural childbirth. The zygote is placed in the replicator and it acts as an artificial womb freeing women of the inconvenience and pain of natural childbirth. It also allows the application of treatments to Miles' fetus to keep it viable. Cordelia wants to save her child, despite that it will be deformed and stunted in growth. While Miles is incubating at the Imperial Military Hospital, a rebellion occurs which pits Aral Vorkosigan against an arch conservative "pretender" to the throne. The pretender, Vordarian, takes possession of the capital city and the uterine replicator. This launches Cordelia into a plot, along with her closest companions, to rescue young Miles. Cordelia's daring evasion of her own husband's military personnel (he has forbidden her to make such an attempt) and her rescue of Miles is the highlight of the novel.

Barrayar is a masterpiece in character development. The reader feels an intimate knowledge of the main characters and their relationship to each other by the end of the novel. Aral Vorkosigan is an enlightened man in a world of backward thinking politicians. In a militaristic, xenophobic world where women are second class and babies with the slightest defects are aborted or let die by exposure, Aral attempts to avoid wars and conflict, marries an off-world, strong willed woman whose advice he seeks out, and genuinely loves his unborn child despite his known defects. Cordelia is that strong willed woman who stands up not only to Piotr, Aral's conservative father who cannot bear the thought of having a deformed heir, but also launches a daring scheme to rescue her son from the clutches of Vordarian. For anyone who has never read a Miles Vorkosigan novel, the final eight pages are a must read. In just those eight pages one gets a humorously painted personality sketch of young Miles and what we can expect from him in the future. Bujold also manages to maintain the drama of Cordelia's rescue of Miles, despite our knowledge of its success given previous works of Miles' adventures as a young adult.

The only real criticism I have of Barrayar is the writing of the action scenes. Fighting or other quick paced activity tends to unfold too slowly taking the excitement out of the scene. This drawback is definitely overshadowed by the overall quality of the entire work.