Owen R. O'Neill

This was a very absorbing series. I stayed up *way* too late for some of these books.

I usually don't like books about broken, messed up people; I and those around me have enough problems at it is, without an extra drag on empathy. But Loralyss Kennakris isn't one of those sobbing, floundering heroines who you can see is leading herself into disaster by just being incompetent (at least, she's usually not that way). She's not "complex" in the sense that my English teachers seemed to like, a person who can't get over themselves and their own internal turmoil. Actually, she's pretty simple, in some ways, thanks to her background. That was interesting to watch.

This is a pretty gritty story. If you didn't get that from the blurb, you should go back and read the blurb again. It doesn't really wallow in the horrible things that happened to her, thankfully (otherwise I never would have finished it). But that horrible stuff is there in the background, and is essential to the plot and the character. It comes out occasionally in flashbacks (which are mercifully brief).

The other thing that kept this story interesting is that the protagonist is not just a messed up ex-slave. She turns out to be one of the most extraordinary fighters in the navy, and you can start to see that in this first book, though it really comes out in the second and third. She's smart (far more than her master knew), self-controlled, courageous, and very directed. Also, her background hasn't jaded her; instead, it has made her *more* empathetic to those who are suffering.

The other thing that's interesting about this series is how this messed up colonial interacts with the totally all-together, upper class aristocratic lieutenant who, you know as soon as you meet him, will be the slow-burn romantic interest, so I'm not giving anything away by saying it here. (And it's a very slow burn, by the way--it takes the next two books to really get going, and there are other distractions, too.) Those two work well together, surprisingly.… (plus d'informations)

This series is getting harder to believe.

I've been riveted by the series, staying up far too late wondering what happens next. This story has a fantastic setup: Kris is out on medical leave, and it's not clear she's ever going to fly again. On top of that, things aren't going well with Rafe, and mostly it's her fault. And then she gets sent, for no reason she can see, on some useless diplomatic mission, away from everyone she knows, and away from any prospect of action. Or so she thinks, anyway.

Turns out, though, that a suspicious number of elite troops were sent to the same place for various reasons. And the admiral in charge of things can only think about how he was cheated out of victory last time. Sycophantic underlings are egging him on to do something disastrous, instead of telling him the truth. The nation they are sent to has, for some reason, been accumulating astonishingly high-tech warships.

It's a great set-up, and when it all comes crashing down (as you knew it had to), Kris goes through the fire. Only this time, she's not a pilot. Instead, she's the... ok, you have to read the book to see that.

The problem I had with this book is that things got harder and harder to swallow. Somehow they discover an alien that can--oh, if I tell you, and you know anything computation, you'll burst out laughing. And I just can't imagine the surviving general doing that, even if all that stuff happened.

It's still a good story, and it kept me up too late. But I was just skimming at the end, and rolled my eyes a number of times. Science fiction is, of course, fiction, and none of this is really realistic; but when you're struck with implausibility even as you're reading it, you get pulled out of your suspension of disbelief and the magic is broken.… (plus d'informations)