Full Speed to a Crash Landing

Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC!

A low 3 stars. Just not as fun as the blurb made it seem, but not a bad time overall. A lot of potential!

I love a space opera with a bit of romance, but this one was very flat and felt lifeless. The concept is great and for a novella, it wasn't too bad, but I never really cared about the characters or the plot. I was expecting rompy fun in the vein of a Jessie Mihalik book, but sadly, this story never quite got there.

The protagonist gets dangerously close to being annoying, rather than quirky-cute, sometimes. And this story definitely isn't a “high octane sexy space heist!” It's not sexy or dangerously heisty in any way, really. There are many elements of this that are conceptually fun, but it came across as slightly half-baked and unfinished.

Also, the writing thought it was funnier than it actually was. I could tell when it was trying to go for a more comedic tone, but it rarely actually succeeded in doing so.

It's entertaining enough for a quick read. But not much more! I probably won't continue the series.

I enjoyed this novella - it was the right length for the story being told. The author's pacing was great for me.

I struggled a bit with Ada's "voice" - I found her to be a little too...manic pixie dream girl who is also a criminal? I don't know if that was meant to be intentional - she's a fake in every way, etc - but it felt forced and not as charming and witty as I think the story wanted her to be, though I could be wrong. I couldn't figure out if she was meant to be an unlikable protagonist on purpose, I guess. I could be reading too much into it, but I feel like that might have actually been the case - she felt more sincere and genuine (and likable) at the end of the story, despite her revealing herself to be a liar and a very manipulative person. That's what I would like to believe, in any case.

I think I enjoyed the epistolary style section at the end of the book more than the first person narrative that made up most of the book, but that might just be my own bias (I love stories that utilize letters, or excerpts from "articles" or "books" from the universe.)

Since it's such a fast read, I would feel comfortable recommending this book to most people with similar tastes. I'm looking forward to reading the next entry in the series, since Ada's betrayal is out of the way and she won't need to be playing whatever character she was playing in the first book.

Mystery, witty banter, and high stakes in space.

I really enjoyed this. You get dropped right into the middle of things and it had me almost immediately hooked. All the pieces of the mystery were pretty obvious to me but I was so invested in the motive and how exactly everything fit together that I didn't mind. The whole thing was like a puzzle.

Ada as a main character is confident, capable, and funny. Lots of banter that reminded me of peak Veronica Mars. The world she exists in is incredibly fleshed out for the amount of pages it's given, and it never felt like info dumping. I feel like I have a good grasp on it but still want to know more.

I'm invested. I'll be looking forward to the rest of the trilogy.

This ARC was provided by DAW through NetGalley. All opinions are my own