The Vor Game by Lois McMaster Bujold (American, 1991)

Summary:
Miles Vorkosigan is the only son of Aral Vorkosigan, Prime Minister and former regent of the planet Barrayar. Miles is a quick thinker and somehow always manages to achieve his goals. The only problem is his body: he is of short stature and his bones tend to break easily; his shortcomings are the result of an assassination attempt on his mother Cordelia when he still was in the womb. Barrayaran society is unkind to people with physical defects, their prejudices leads them to question if Miles actually has any military talent or even his own existence. Once Miles finishes his military education he is posted at Kyril Island as a weather officer. Once in the training base, Miles finds himself under the command of General Stanis Metzov, a cruel man that, at some point during Miles’s early days at the base, forces the workers of the base to stand naked in the freezing cold as punishment for not obeying his illogical orders. When tensions grow high, Miles sides with the workers in order to stop Metzov from shooting them. Metzov is discharged, but Miles is held prisoner back at Barrayar under charges of treason. He is finally released, free of all charges, when Barrayaran intelligence catches sight of a group of mercenaries who owe Miles their allegiance helping Barrayaran archenemies, the Cetagandans. Miles is given the mission of impeding any bellical ability. For him to succeed, Miles retakes command of the mercenary fleet, the Dendarii, and leads them to rescue Barrayaran emperor while fighting off the Cetagandan fleet attacking a planet currently under Barrayar’s protection. In the end Miles avoids the conflict to escalate, but is deemed unfit to serve in the military due to his inability to follow orders, yet, he is made an Admiral responsible for the Dendarii, now made a rogue force serving the Barrayaran Empire.

Another summary:
The story is set on the planet Barrayar. After graduating from the Imperial Academy, Miles Vorkosigan and his colleagues are sent to work in different Imperial Services. Miles sees advantages in the different jobs that his friends have been assigned, but can't help but be disappointed on the one that he has been given. He has no enthusiasm for being assigned as Chief Meteorology Officer in Lazkowski Base, a winter training base for infantry often called “Camp Permafrost,” located on Kyril Island, near the arctic circle. Major Cecille explains that he assigned him that service because Miles needs to learn to command ordinary men and to be commanded by them, he needs to work on his discipline and his attitude towards his superiors; it is a test that, if passed, will allow him to be assigned to another service. Miles accepts his assignment, however, as soon as he arrives at the base, he gets into trouble and ends up being arrested when he ignores the orders of the base commander, a high Vor, since Miles does not consider appropriate the orders that he gives him. After being released, Miles is sent back to the capital and his father, Aral Vorkosigan, being aware that Miles probably cannot return to work at any Imperial Service, convinces his friend Simon Illyan to allow Miles to be transferred to ImpSec (Imperial Security), although neither Simon nor Miles himself agree with it. Things get more complicated when, on his first mission in the evaluation of the Hegen Hub, he is accused of the murder of one Sydney Liga and is arrested again. During his arrest, he finds that Emperor Gregor is also detained. The emperor tells him that he has been arrested for vagrancy after escaping from Komarr and then having boarded an outbound ship where he worked and was not paid. Miles, in an attempt to help the Emperor escape, proposes to exchange clothes and ID’s with each other to make it easier to escape. In his attempt, Miles meets Admiral Oser and manages to establish contact with Elena Bothari, a woman that he once loved passionately and who has enough power to help him and the Emperor. Miles meets the ruthless Cavilo, who is willing to destroy the Emperor and informs Miles that Gregor's protection is in his hands and tells him directly that he must return to the Oseran Mercenaries and retake them. Miles is reunited with the Dendarii mercenaries and has to join them to keep the Emperor safe. This is how Miles becomes Admiral Naismith of the Tau Verde Ring war. Miles and his companions realize that Cavilo is cheating both the Hegen Hub planets and the Cetagandans, creating a conflict between them that ends with an invasion by Cetaganda to the other planets, with her as the only beneficiary of the confrontation between them, and under the protection of the Barrayaran Empire. Miles, along with his companions, the Admiral Oser, Illyan, and his father, builds an alliance between the Hegen Hub planets and Barrayar, capable of avoiding the Cetagandan invasion. After accomplishing that mission and keeping the Emperor safe, Miles and the Dendarii receive recognition from the Vervani government and go back to Barrayar, where he meets Gregor at the Imperial Residence and later meets with Illyan, who assigns him his new place in ImpSec under his orders.

Another summary:
The story starts with Miles Vorkosigan and his graduated friends from the military school as they are assigned to new training bases. Miles is sent to Kyril Island, a cold and very distant place. Not happy with his placement, he asks why he was assigned there and they answer him that it is a good place in which he can prove that he can follow orders, have discipline and follow the military routine. However, once in there Miles cannot stop getting into trouble. At one point he refuses to follow an order by his superior and is arrested for mutiny and treason. He is sent back home, and in there he meets with the chief of the imperial security and his father, who tells him that he is not going to be accepted by any other branch of the imperial system, except perhaps in the impsec. But first, he has to go through a test in Hegen Hub, another planet in which the Imperium cannot get into, and discovers what it is going on there, in there, he is accused of murderer and gets arrested. Once in prison, he faces Emperor Gregor, who explains that he had to run away from a political visit and was jailed by vagrancy. Miles tries by all means that they both remain together for as long as possible, but they get caught. Not only that, but now Miles has to face his old Dendarii mercenary fleet: Cavilo, which is a sneaky femme fatale and Admiral Oser, his ex-superior and the reason why he was arrested. Gregor is captured by Cavilo, who is now convinced that she is going to be the future empress and is going to create a war between planets where at the end she is the true savior. Now Miles has to assume the command of the Dendarii fleet as Admiral Naismith in order to save Gregor and stop any upcoming war. Miles saves Gregor and any attack is stopped from happening. Afterward, Gregor and the Impsec declare the Dendarii fleet as a permanent secret retainer for covert missions under the orders of Lieutenant Miles Naismith.

World view: Describes in a variety of aspects and with some consistency an imaginary state or society which is regarded as better, in some respects at least, than the one in which its author lives.
Future projections: Sees the future as potential to reform a reality that once seemed unchangeable.
Ideology: Portrays the enforcement of justice in a positive manner and has faith in human capacity to build a better future.
Characters, plot and writing style: The story features a rebellion against the adverse circumstances (revolutionaries may exploit newer technologies for these ends).
Classification: Dystopia