I received this free from NetGalley and the publisher for an honest review.
I love sci-fi space opera with a strong female lead and this book has it. The battle scenes are gritty. My only problem is that the weaponry used on the ships is archaic considering the fact that they are on starships, bullets just don't seem like something that would be used in the future. Despite that I am looking forward to the next book.

I always hate to leave bad reviews, especially for new authors. But I just couldn't get into this one, didn't grab me at all, just bland and forgettable.

A good Military space opera, although the story line is fairly standard.
The characters are interesting with great action scenes.
One drawback is there too much detail in places slowing the story down.

Would benefit greatly from losing 100 pages. There is some strange WW-2 technology in use throughout the book. Very weird. This is 1,000 years in the future yet electronics and mechanics seem archaic.

Tons of unnecessary descriptions and dialogue which wreck the pacing and tension. The editor of this book did a lazy job.

The plotting is generally okay, but the behaviour of characters is like high school, and actins are often warped to service a creaky plot. Lazy Hollywood style.

No one behaves like this in any military ship. Gave up at 60%

Notes -

29.0% ".... to sacrifice reason just to service the plot is very Hollywood lazy, or stupid."

28.0% "... you could easily cut 100 pages from this book, and make it much better."

16.0% "... WW-2 again, it seems ... "A radio headset and microphone, stowed on a hook on the side of the chair, allowed the executive officer to maintain contact with all parts of the ship during combat and feed the captain’s orders down to fire control.""

15.0% "... This far-future spaceship seems to feel more like a WW-2 battleship, with "old cracking speakers" and "British breakfast teas""

14.0% "... all ahead full Cap'n. Not bad for a first-time author. Seems a bit overly virile and concerned with romantic potentials"

A common theme that does have a few twists. A new captain with a problem. Often it is the crew but this time it is a new first officer. Another common theme is the fact that the mission should be a milk run but turns out to be anything else. I liked the characters but there was just to much detail. I found myself skimming over a lot of the action and reading only the high points. This is a first book and the first book in the series. It has promise. People who love detail will rate this higher and people like me will give it three stars.