I think this book suffers from not having a "goal" - there's no central driving force in the plot. Indeed, the plot itself is a series of loosely connected events that are all, essentially, self-contained, with problems solved within ~20 pages of their appearance. If we'd gone into this book going "this is the crew and they want to accomplish X but A, B, C, and D have gotten in their way" I would have been so down. Instead, A, B, C, and D happen and we just... Continue on and find an E, F, and G because... Uh... Because?

This is a pretty typical scifi universe. Allied planets, an uber-powerful military/government, some rebel factions, some systemic oppression, an enigmatic history that it turns out was completely wrong. Also, the only character with any real depth was Hal, but when we spend so much time with Vivi and Ty as well, it felt like we got the short end of the bargain.

I think I would still read another book in this series - namely because I'm curious to see where it will go from here - but it's not anything I would go out of my way for.

{Thank you Angry Robot Books for the ARC in exchange for my honest review; all thoughts are my own}