Literature / Siobhan Dunmoore

"The corrupt and greedy direct this war, but men of honor, and women of honor, fight it."

Lt. Kathryn Kowalski: The Shrehari is hailing again, sir. He identifies himself as Commander Brakal of Tol Vakash.
Capt. Siobhan Dunmoore: Mister Kowalski, pass my compliments to Commander Brakal and tell him Captain Dunmoore is too busy right now to renew the acquaintance. I prefer to wait until it's time to discuss his surrender.

(cut to Brakal's bridge)

Commander Brakal: She said what? (busts out laughing)

— No Honor in Death

The Siobhan Dunmoore novels are a series of Military Science Fiction books by Canadian author Eric Thomson.

Captain Siobhan Dunmoore, Commonwealth Navy, is aggressive. Where other commanders would flee, she goes on the attack. She's gotten more ships shot from under her than any other commander in the fleet, and the fact she gave as good as she got never seemed to matter. After barely saving the battleship Victoria Regina from complete destruction after her captain was killed in a Shrehari ambush, she's on the verge of cracking from stress when she's sent to command Stingray, the last Type 203 missile frigate remaining in service... and considered the unluckiest ship in the fleet.

Faced with a ship in disrepair, a crew on the verge of mutiny, rampant political corruption, and nightmares plaguing her sleep, Siobhan Dunmoore is in a fight for her very career. She'll redeem Stingray or die trying, even if it means a rematch with Victoria Regina's killer, Commander Brakal of the cruiser Tol Vakash... who has quite a few problems of his own.

Books in the series:

1. No Honor in Death (2014)
2. The Path of Duty (2015)
3. Like Stars in Heaven (2016)
4. Victory's Bright Dawn (2017)
5. Without Mercy (2018)
6. When the Guns Roar (2019)
7. A Dark and Dirty War (2021)
8. On Stormy Seas (2022)

---

This book series provides examples of the following tropes:

• Actually Pretty Funny: Brakal hails Stingray in the first book, intending to demand Dunmoore's surrender (since he ostensibly has a superior ship). She declines the hail, saying she's busy and prefers not to speak with him until she's ready to discuss his surrender. Brakal finds this reply hilarious.
• Dirty Coward: It's eventually revealed that Stingray was within response range when Victoria Regina came under attack. Commander Helen Forenza refused to respond to the Distress Signal, which was finally enough to get her relieved and Court-martialed.
• Evil Regent: The Shrehari emperor's father died when he was an infant. The dowager empress is ostensibly the regent, but was manipulated by corrupt cabinet ministers into signing off on the war against the human Commonwealth.
• Fantasy Conflict Counterpart: In book 6, Dunmoore proposes to Admiral Petras that their task force adapt the tactics of German U-boat wolfpacks for their commerce-raiding mission against the Shrehari. They later duplicate the Doolittle Raid by blowing up several fuel stations in the Shrehari home system.
• Fiery Redhead: Dunmoore has bright red hair and never shies from a fight.
• Hero Antagonist: Brakal, the deuteragonist of the first six books, is an honorable, My Country, Right or Wrong sort who considers Dunmoore a Worthy Opponent and thinks the war as idiotic as she does. After losing to her one too many times, he's forced into retirement, only to organize an internal revolt against the Shrehari government that ends with him becoming the new regent and bringing the war to an end.
• Inappropriately Close Comrades: Oh yeah, Forenza was sleeping with her junior officers. One even tries to kill Dunmoore over it.
• Proud Warrior Race Guy: The Shrehari are basically TNG Klingons with the serial numbers filed off: beer-swilling, fight-loving, corrupted, but with a strong sense of honor nonetheless.
• Put on a Bus: Brakal disappears from the series after When the Guns Roar, having left the military to become the new Shrehari regent until the Emperor comes of age.
• Reassigned to Antarctica:
  • This is what Dunmoore's assignment to Stingray is made to look like. Actually, her patron Admiral Nagira is using her as a catspaw against a corrupt admiral.
  • After Stingray is finally decommissioned at the end of book three, Dunmoore is officially transferred to a desk job. Unofficially, she's actually been transferred to Special Operations Command and put in charge of a battlecruiser-strength Q-ship, Iolanthe.
• Shout-Out: When the Guns Roar has Urag quote a modified version of Captain Ahab's "I will chase him" speech from Moby-Dick (justified as being from a work of Shrehari literature). Lampshaded by Brakal:
  Brakal: It is the phantom. The same ship we saw threatening Kilia Station under the guise of a corsair. By the demons of the Underworld, do you know what that means, Urag?
  Urag: You will chase him around the Black Hole of Qax, and round the Demon Star, and round the Undying Ion Storm, and through the fires of the Ninth Hell before you give him up.
  Brakal: Hah! A literate flag captain. Will miracles never cease? So I am to be the accursed Captain Qahb and my ship is to become the Tol Ehqad is that it?
• Time Skip: Ten years pass between books 6 and 7 and another three between books 7 and 8.
• Truce Trickery: Downplayed in A Dark and Dirty War. Siobhan is selected to lead a flotilla into The Neutral Zone after Space Pirates hijack a passenger liner and hide out there. While this violates the letter of the treaty with the Shrehari Empire, neither she nor the Commonwealth actually wants to restart the war (which she helped end in book 6), and since she's on the outs with the Commonwealth military bureaucracy, it's expected they'll offer her up as a sacrifice if the Shrehari make an issue of it. The Shrehari turn out to be fine with making an exception for the incursion and nothing comes of it.
• Wolf in Sheep's Clothing: Iolanthe appears to be a bulk freighter, but is a Q-ship carrying concealed weaponry and defenses worthy of a battlecruiser.

---