After the events of Gemini, our protagonists (Kady, Ezra,
Hanna, Nik, and Ella) are trapped on the ship Mao and are running out of
resources. With the jumpgate destroyed, there is no way back to the Core
System- their only option is to return to Kerenza and its hostile Bei-Tech
occupation. As they suppress mutinies and reluctantly accept the help of a
dysfunctional battle AI, the team must find a way to defeat the overwhelming
amount of enemy troops and ships at Kerenza.
Meanwhile, on Kerenza itself, the colonists are hard at work
under the harsh Bei-Tech occupation- mining the hermium necessary for Bei-Tech
to fire up their jumpgate and escape. Faced with the horrors of the situation
at hand, Rhys Lindstrom, a Bei-Tech trooper, is disgusted. When he is contacted
by Asha Grant, one of the colonists and his girlfriend from before he enlisted
in military service, he decides to help the insurgency against the occupation.
They must delay hermium production until the Mao can come and rescue them all.
I really liked this novel, just like I enjoyed the previous
books in this series. All of the ragtag bunch of characters were written
extremely well. The unorthodox combination of files, video transcripts, and
message logs the authors used to convey the story was very interesting to read
and portrayed a feeling of authenticity to the book. There was a perfect combination
of suspense and action, keeping the reader at the edge of their seat. In fact,
I think the suspense in the book is done extremely well- it starts to build and
build and finally it crescendos into action. Readers of the previous books and
books with a story told in unorthodox ways (Like World War Z) would probably
enjoy this. Additionally, people who like sci-fi, space-traveling action novels
would also love this book.
Reviewed by NK, Grade 10
Montrose Library