What...? That was my overwhelming thought process as I read this book. (Granted, not a deep one, but I was deeply confused, at least.)
I could not figure out where I was or whether I had been here before or whether the people I knew from her previous two novels were here or not. Chambers does give you an overview of the world at the beginning, but at least for me it it was insufficient. Being told what was happening in real time versus the prelude to real time didn't help because I didn't remember the prelude from before! (Was I supposed to remember it? I'm still unsure.) So, I read this as a standalone novel, as a result. I'm not sure it bears up on its own.
The strength of the previous two novels was in explaining how humans fit into an alien system. Yes, there is an undercurrent of that in this novel (in fact, it is an important part of the final analysis) but the story itself is about humans fitting into their human system. It was certainly fun to learn more about how humans developed a society on ships, instead of a planet. But it always felt... scattered. I wanted to focus on the team that I remembered from the beginning.
Will I read the next novel? Probably? It won't be high priority, but I do enjoy her writing style.
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