This is the first book that I’ve read from Michael Cobley. I was drawn to it by reviews such as “An absolute cracker of a space opera” and “Here is a space opera which unashamedly honours the roots of the genre”. Also, it’s good to know that there are other related books by the same author in the Humanity’s Fire trilogy.
That said, I found the book overly complex, with a vast array of characters and numerous distinct plot lines that took hundreds of pages to come together. Too often, we were introduced to characters who then seemed to disappear completely. For example, two women in Captain Pyke’s close-knit crew, Dervla and Win, were introduced as integral members of his team. Once captured, the team took on impossible challenges to save them – but unfortunately, we never heard about Win again!
The most memorable character(s) of the book was the drone Rensik Estemil. Hugely intelligent and an effective fighting machine, he somehow got trapped in a mesh box (Faraday cage?!) – but escaped by casting off a mini-Rensik drone which saved the day.
musingstudio 