So at first I thought I was gonna give this book 4.5 stars rounded up. It spent about the first 150 or so pages filling in the events of a 6 month time jump and dropping a lot of exposition and new alien names and factions that were needed for the plot moving forward. Not a terrible section but definitely not the greatest, and massive info dumps can be difficult even for folks like me who kinda enjoy them. Once that was out of the way though the incredible strengths of this series (character writing, dialogue, incredibly well written alien/human relations, and diplomatic problem solving) shine through as strong as ever. So, 4.5 stars rounded up.

Then in the last 5 or so chapters a huge bombshell was dropped that completely changes the series moving forward. I expected to look forward to reading the next trilogy in this series in a passive sort of way, but now I’m super hype and can’t wait. A complete 5/5 stars, this series is amazing and I’m so excited for to read the next one.