Pretty early on in his career, Miles Vorkosigan happened into a mercenary army (long story), and created the character of Admiral Miles Naismith to head that army. They ended up becoming covert operatives of the Barrayaran intelligence service (so covert that most of the army doesn’t know who their true employers are), but because of Miles’ unique congenital birth defects, there’s always been the danger that someone would figure out that the two Miles are one and the same.
The mercenary fleet is stuck on Earth, and Miles hits upon the brilliant idea of claiming that Naismith is a clone, created for some nefarious plot against his father (the prime minister of Barrayar) . Things get real when it turns out Miles does have a clone, and he’s on Earth, created for no good ends.
Reading this, it looks like the hokiest plot ever, but it’s not – it completely works. Example number five thousand and three of why I love these books- the author isn’t afraid to cover anything, and does it in such interesting ways.
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