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prototim's review against another edition
1.0
All over the map. Ostensibly a Suiza/Serrano story but they ultimately come off as minor characters. Actually there are no major characters in this mishmash of a story. Very disappointing follow-up to the wonderful Rules of Engagement.
brookenger's review against another edition
2.0
Rather than being a single storyline, this book hopped around in a way that I didn't particularly like. It still followed characters introduced earlier in the series and furthered the series plot, but it didn't have the same continuity that the other books had. It wasn't as tightly focused, and came through as a bit of a "tying up the loose ends" sort of book.
telerit's review
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.25
celiaedf12's review
3.0
Lord, I'm annoyed that the library didn't have the fifth book in this series, because jumping from the fourth book to this, the sixth, made things very difficult indeed. There were some dramatic things that occurred in book five, and it's a little difficult to catch up with everything that's happened in the character's lives. However, people discuss this often enough that it soon falls into place.
Esmay Suiza's relationship with Barin Serrano has progessed to the point where they're discussing marriage. However, Esmay isn't really the focal point of this book - or rather, she shares that focus with Brun, who has returned as a major character, as she gets heavily involved in the growing political struggle between Rejuvenants and Agists.
This book jumped around a bit too much for my liking - rather than staying mostly with one or two characters' viewpoints as previous books have done, this leapt around all over the universe - little headings indicated whether we were on this planet, that planet, this ship, that ship... it was all a bit scattered. I think this book may be setting up various threads for a very strong 7th book - or at least, I hope so, because I've been really enjoying this space opera, and want to continue doing so.
Esmay Suiza's relationship with Barin Serrano has progessed to the point where they're discussing marriage. However, Esmay isn't really the focal point of this book - or rather, she shares that focus with Brun, who has returned as a major character, as she gets heavily involved in the growing political struggle between Rejuvenants and Agists.
This book jumped around a bit too much for my liking - rather than staying mostly with one or two characters' viewpoints as previous books have done, this leapt around all over the universe - little headings indicated whether we were on this planet, that planet, this ship, that ship... it was all a bit scattered. I think this book may be setting up various threads for a very strong 7th book - or at least, I hope so, because I've been really enjoying this space opera, and want to continue doing so.
rhodered's review
2.0
Unlike the previous books in the series which focused on just one or two main characters' lives, this jumps about all over the place. The Familias universe itself becomes the main character and everyone in it, from a clerks to admirals, all have their on-stage appearances within it.
As a book about a universe, it doesn't dig deeply enough into the universe itself for me. All these cute scenes between random people don't delve deeper, instead we are skimming the surface in multiple directions.
Also, infuriatingly, despite the sexist-pigs-world vs. Familias-world battle lines of the last book in the series, now it becomes quite apparent that the Familias world is plenty sexist as well. In fact, it's so sexist that I wonder if the author realizes fully how sexist she's made it. A few Serrano admirals aside, boys are very definitely in charge here, there and everywhere.
The only reason this gets two stars instead of one is (a) I have been following the story for so many books now, I can't stop (b) many of the characters are enjoyably drawn even if there are only a few pages about the majority of them.
As a book about a universe, it doesn't dig deeply enough into the universe itself for me. All these cute scenes between random people don't delve deeper, instead we are skimming the surface in multiple directions.
Also, infuriatingly, despite the sexist-pigs-world vs. Familias-world battle lines of the last book in the series, now it becomes quite apparent that the Familias world is plenty sexist as well. In fact, it's so sexist that I wonder if the author realizes fully how sexist she's made it. A few Serrano admirals aside, boys are very definitely in charge here, there and everywhere.
The only reason this gets two stars instead of one is (a) I have been following the story for so many books now, I can't stop (b) many of the characters are enjoyably drawn even if there are only a few pages about the majority of them.
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