I found Beyond The Milky Way irritating at first. The main reason being that although the author had all the factual knowledge and made sure you knew it, I found the female character unbelievable. She would never go into space without the full training to be an astronaut and once in space never need to be handheld by the other crew members. But I remembered this was a work of fiction and once I’d pulled in my opinions somewhat I eventually got into the book. I good idea, characterisation and imagination, although there was something lacking for me.