The point of view characters include women (Cordelia in Shards of Honor, Barrayar, and Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen; Ekaterin in Komarr, A Civil Campaign, and The Flowers of Vashnoi), a gay man (Ethan of Athos), a pair of brothers, one of whom is physically disabled and the other a clone (Miles and Mark Vorkosigan), and their cousin (Ivan Vorpatril), together with some minor characters (e.g., Miles's bodyguard Roic, family friend Kareen Koudelka, and the runaway Jin).

Due to apparent nuclear warfare that has left large areas too radioactive to inhabit, low genetic diversity on Barrayar during the time of isolation, as well as the effects of mutagenic compounds found in native Barrayaran plants, a cultural phobia about mutation developed that leads to a high level of xenophobia.

As a tool to simplify the writing process, Bujold devises a standard system of timekeeping universal to all planets regardless of the length of their day and year.

Biomedical advances such as cloning, artificial wombs (named "uterine replicators") and cryochambers to preserve and revive recently deceased people are featured heavily in the series.

Two jump pilots with obsolete navigational brain implants and a number of characters created by genetic manipulation are psychologically stranded by the termination of the programs for which they were designed.

The Cetagandan haut go beyond gene cleaning, deliberately engineering the human genome in an attempt to produce a post-human species (Cetaganda, Diplomatic Immunity).

[4] A good-looking woman, whether a four-armed quaddie, a Cetagandan haut-lady glimpsed in her floating bubble, or a Barrayaran damsel, has skin comparable to ivory or milk.

For example, because of the isolation of Barrayar, located with a single wormhole to connect it with the rest of the galaxy, and its people having to defend a broadly habitable planet, Barrayarans both need and can afford a militaristic society.

The Betans, on a hostile planet where they must live in domes, rely on industrial export and limit not only childbearing but also every kind of behavior that might be considered "antisocial".

[6] In the lifetime of Miles Vorkosigan, Barrayar uses spaceships, computers, and other high technology, but its culture remembers dueling, celebrates the Emperor's birthday by handing him bags of gold, and provides liveried life-sworn servants to carry love letters sealed with the writer's blood.

During the following centuries, the "Time of Isolation", the colony regresses socially and technologically, eventually developing a feudal form of government, in which the Emperor of Barrayar is supported by sixty regional counts and other minor aristocrats, identified by the honorific prefix Vor- in their names.

Despite a significant technological advantage, the Cetagandans are finally expelled at great cost after many years of occupation and guerrilla warfare, in large part due to the leadership of General Count Piotr Vorkosigan, Miles' paternal grandfather.

Desperate experimental medical procedures are required to save the unborn baby, and the side effects of the antidote threaten to kill Cordelia.

It was published in the book of the same name, which is a collection of short stories and essays by Bujold that had been previously unpublished and that she gathered together prior to her appearance at a NESFA convention.

Miles is shipped off-planet to the Hegen Hub after refusing to obey what he considers to be a criminal order at a training camp and being accused of treason (again).

Miles helps defeat the plot, which would have greatly amplified the Cetagandan threat to Barrayar and other systems, and in the process collects a piece of information that causes him to dispatch Elli Quinn on her mission in Ethan of Athos.

This novel does not feature Miles except indirectly; his eventual girlfriend, Commander Elli Quinn of the Dendarii Free Mercenary Fleet, plays a leading role.

Miles travels to Jackson's Whole, ostensibly to buy weapons, but in reality to help geneticist Dr. Hugh Canaba leave his current employer to go to work for Barrayar.

In the course of their hasty departure from the Jackson system, Miles sows confusion by telling different lies (and a couple of vital truths) to Ryoval and his rival half-brother, weapons dealer Baron Fell.

Miles goes undercover and allows himself to be captured by the Cetagandans, who have invaded and occupied the planet Marilac, in order to infiltrate a maximum-security POW camp on Dagoola IV.

With help from Suegar, an apparent religious fanatic, and Tris, the leader of the female prisoners, he instills order and hope in the apathetic, distrustful inmates and makes them rehearse for quick embarkation (disguised as a food distribution procedure).

By quoting Suegar's "scripture" (half a page torn from The Pilgrim's Progress),[32] Miles covertly signals his fleet to attack and rescue them.

Miles is captured, and his clone, trained as an assassin by Komarrans bent on exacting a measure of revenge for the conquest and annexation of their planet, is successfully substituted for him.

The novellas "The Mountains of Mourning", "Labyrinth", and "The Borders of Infinity" were reprinted with an untitled framing story in which Miles reports to Simon Illyan, head of Barrayaran Imperial Security ("ImpSec").

This volume is short-novel length; the three-novella anthology with its framing story was reprinted in the book sales club omnibus Vorkosigan's Game (1990).

There, he manages to defeat plotters who seek to seal off the only wormhole to Barrayar, and falls in love with his hostess, Ekaterin Vorsoisson, who is trapped in an unhappy marriage.

As Barrayar prepares for Emperor Gregor Vorbarra's wedding to a Komarran heiress, Miles attempts to court Ekaterin Vorsoisson without her knowledge.

However, their blossoming romantic relationship is shattered when he makes a careless remark about "hideous, bioengineered mutants" —referring to the 'butter bugs' in Mark's latest commercial venture.

When Ekaterin is taken ill, Taura traces the cause to a string of pearls that had apparently been sent by current Dendarii Admiral (and Miles's ex-lover) Elli Quinn, and which do not look right to her augmented vision.

Still new to her duties as Lady Vorkosigan, Ekaterin is working together with an expatriate scientist on a radical scheme to recover the lands of the Vashnoi exclusion zone, the lingering radioactive legacy of the Cetagandan invasion of the planet Barrayar.