Reviews

All the time I was reading this I was thinking three stars, but in the end I'm giving two. Not because of the "oh, did you think there wouldn't be more volumes?" ending, just from a general feeling of dissatisfaction.

Early on I read "gunnery sergeant"and I thought "oh no, not another ridiculously capable female gunny" because there are so many such books out there, all military procedure and pompous officers. But to her credit, O'Keefe didn't go there. Sanda is good but credible.

Sanda's brother looked promising, but his sudden, unlikely promotion felt as if it only happened because the plot needed it to.

The slow unroll of what was going on with Bero was mostly well done. I didn't care for the chapter headers, which were more of an attempt to mislead than anything. Bero's personality issues were a good idea, if perhaps slightly overdrawn at times as he went from highly capable to toddler, but there was a bit of an explanation for that so OK.

The Nazca seem to have more leverage than I could accept. Tomas was not bad, but did we really need them to get it on? I wonder if the publisher insisted.

Enter Lavaux, who didn't quite twirl his mustache and go "nyah-hah-HAH" but certainly could have. In a group of fairly ordinary Keepers, he suddenly produces (from his cloak?) what appears to be the spaceship equivalent of a Bugatti Veyron, a ship in which is quite comfortable challenging an enemy general's ship. And as for what his story turned out to be, well, we haven't heard most of it but it feels like a "hey, you know what? What if we made Lavaux a (withheld)?"

So Lex did all this much earlier with two spinning rings, huh? That's short-cut worldbuilding. Has anyone used that one since the pulp era?

OK, let's talk irregular verbs. When writing it past tense, you can I suppose say "she sweat" and the like, but not if you later say "she gritted her teeth." And we can't have "spit" for "spat."

And don't get me started on "stepped foot," which appears so often it felt as if O'Keefe knew I hate it and was pulling my chain. Don't bother with the "writers have been using it for centuries," I know they have; it's still redundant, awkward and flow-stopping. Might as well say "touched hand to" instead of "touched."

At the end, just when I thought O'Keefe had made it without my least favourite SFF cliché, here it was. Sanda woke up from unconsciousness and immediately played the "how long?" card. I'm still waiting for an author to have someone ask, "What happened?" or "Where am I?" or "Can I have a bucket?" or "Did we win?" or "Is my brother OK?" or really ANYthing except "how long was I out?" It's only a step from that to steaming mugs and crisp white shirts.

And the punk thieves? Somehow I knew all along that they weren't going to matter, that they would be important in the next book.

Finally, here's Rainier. Not only is she a clone, but also ... well. let's just say that felt like another "hey, what if we made her a (withheld)?" Hint: not the same as the other (withheld).

I'll skip the next one, but I will go and look for #1 of her other series just to see.