Review: 5 out of 5
I don’t quite know how, but Ms Rusch’s stories drag me in. I wasn’t expecting to like this story falls as much as I did, and yet it turned out to be spectacularly good. Why? It’s space, it’s got the Fleet, it’s partly exploration, but most of all it is how these things come together in a mix that doesn’t overdo any part too much but builds a joint whole.
I’ve also really come to like Yash as a character during the development of the series so learning more about her back story (as well as Coop’s) made for some pretty good reading and perhaps one of the most revealing books of the series thus far, especially with regards to the history of the Fleet. The real subject of the story is how the team goes to figure out Sector Base E-2 and what this brings up from their past.
The characters have a lot of depth and complexity, and more so with regards to their original training that I would have thought originally (and much more so than many other science fiction authors manage to write in). Overall, both of the basic characters whose stories we explore in this title shine even without mentioning the really strong notes on the acquisition of correct and useful data that the author has made in all books thus far and which is again really important here.
I can’t wait to continue with this series!
