I loved book one, Tankborn, and it took me a long while to get into Awakening.

Overall, the Tankborn series is populated by fascinating characters and the world-building is superb. The romance side of things didn't pull me in to this story and I understand why it's there but it just didn't do much for me. I still admire the author for the themes she examines in the novel which largely come down to autonomy. I'd highly recommend reading the first book in this series.

I found the novel previous to Awakening , Tankborn, to be flawed but compelling. Karen Sandler created a really nuanced world that, while it absolutely addresses race, doesn't do it in that junky "it's all individual choices" way that refuses to acknowledge structural inequities. I felt like revelations later in the book kinda problemitized some of the science/metaphor, but, all told, the characters were so richly drawn and in such a tactile environment I was able to forgive some lumpiness in the plotting. Unfortunately, Awakening suffers quite seriously from middle book syndrome, and spends a lot time spinning its wheels and going in circles.

Awakening picks up a few months after the events of Tankborn, where we find Kayla working as a courier for the an underground pro-GEN movement. While I found the dilemma for Devak and Kayla to get seriously repetitious, some of their conflict was on point. He's highhanded all the time because he's used to determining the fortunes of all the GENs in his aegis, and, unfortunately, Kayla is in that category in the back of his mind. You don't just give up your biases once you learn they exist. Like in Tankborn, there are a number of times when I felt like things that were really obvious to me as a reader were inexplicably opaque to Kayla. Even allowing for vantage, it occasionally made her look thick. And that cliffhanger ending made me humph in irritation.

So. Enjoyable enough, but not as interesting as the first. Hopefully things will pick up for book 3.

I think the magic and the relevant social points made so efficiently in Tankborn made Awakening somewhat superfluous. That's not to say this is a bad book because that's not the case -- it just doesn't break any new ground. This feels like a rehash of what went before -- both to the audience and the characters involved.