I liked book one, Reign the Earth, but I didn't really love it, so I went into this one with a little hesitation. So imagine my happiness when I really, really liked it!
The Things I Liked:
- •Aspasia and her crew are awesome. I was worried when I realized that this was from Aspasia's POV, because the characters were my favorite part of the first book. But I needn't have! Aspasia is a fabulous character, and her story was one I loved reading. Her story and her life circumstances are quite different from Saskia's in Reign the Earth, but both women are passionate and care deeply about the people around them without being too similar. And while Saskia has a deep love for her blood-related family, Aspasia has created her own family on her ship (and yes, still is deeply concerned for her blood-family). I loved the nuances of all the relationships of the crew, too. Felt incredibly authentic for them to have such different and deep bonds. Also, none of them is perfect. Including (especially?) Aspasia. Which only makes her more interesting, as flaws can.
- •There is romance, and yes I love it. A ship on a ship, YAY, I love when puns work out. Even telling you who the ship involves would be a spoiler, so that's all I'll say. But I am here for every last bit of it, and I think you'll see why.
- •The plot just seemed so much more engaging! I mean, you're dealing with some really tough issues here- Aspasia has to balance out her survival with capturing (and in some cases, freeing) slaves for goodness sake. It's... a lot. But it also provides for a lot of really compelling scenes and a lot of gray morality. I mean- I think we can all agree that capturing slaves is awful, but when the motives are an attempt to free at least some of them... well, you see what I am saying, there's a lot of thought provoking stuff to ponder.
- •Obviously, there are feels! Lots of them, as you can imagine! Which is why I love when a book really makes you think, makes you wonder what you'd do, etc. It just pulls at the heartstrings.
The Things I Didn't:
- •Maybe this is a little picky, but I did want to know what happened (in more detail!) to book one's group! I mean, we did get a some update, but since I was pretty invested in them, I'd have liked to gotten a bit more closure in that respect. Though I have seen some reviews mentioning a third book? So Idk maybe I am confused and it's a trilogy, in which case... guess you can go ahead and disregard this point, but at the time of reviewing, this is listed as a two book series, so.
- •I did see some of the plot points coming. It didn't totally mess up my enjoyment of the book, but it's worth noting that I guessed some of the stuff pretty quickly.
Bottom Line: A very strong sequel, with a group of characters that somehow beats out their (very formidable) predecessors, all while amping up the action tenfold.