Human+Alien best friends doing reverse Indiana Jones heists? I am listening intently 👀

I loved Maya and Auncle, their friendship was 10/10, no notes. Auncle calling Maya stuff like “my sweet, squishable friend”? Delightful. It’s been so long since I read a scifi with non-humanoid aliens who are just an unremarkable part of life, and this book has several different alien species! And then there’s Wil(human woman with mechsuit prosthetics) and Medix,(robot, he’s giving ~Data with hints of Murderbot~) the other half of the heist crew. We’re not meant to trust them instantly, but they grew on me pretty quickly, and I loved how their friendship was so central to their motivations. Look, I am a huge sucker for characters being best friends, okay?

Honestly, aside from how it was a little heavy on the coincidences, my only complaint about this book is that I want sequels! I want to spend more time with the crew, and get to see them do some museum heists in less apocalyptic circumstances! God, I would love a series that’s ~Leverage, In Space~. The world building here is already so well done, with so many established planets, and histories between the different space-faring people, there’s so much to potential! (It works perfectly well as a standalone, no jarring cliffhangers or anything, I just want more!)

This book so Star Trek-esque, it reminds me a lot of the Discovery series and I think this would appeal to a lot of Star Trek fans. It has some wonderful world building and lore that is accompanied with incredibly thorough character development. I enjoyed the fact that the characters seemed to grow and change throughout the plot, which tends to be forgotten in a lot of "hard" sci fi where the plot line is the focus.
I can definitely see the author building off the world they have built here, and I would be excited to read other semi-related stories in this larger universe.
Thank you for the opportunity to read this book! I will be recommending this to my friends as well as to others on my social media closer to the release date!

DNF at 36%
I loved THE DEEP SKY, so I was thrilled to get an ARC of this book -- unfortunately, it wasn't for me. I'm not a fan of alien stories in general, and this story seemed to still be revealing important world-building (like, fundamental rules and understandings about how things work) 30% into the book. I felt like I couldn't get my feet under me and enjoy the story, in part because of the over-complicated world-building, and in part because I wasn't sure what the driving narrative question was. Too many plot points seemed driven by coincidence, rather than choices, and alluded-to backstory bogged down the forward momentum. A miss for me, but because I enjoyed THE DEEP SKY so much, I'll definitely try her next book.

It was too expositional for me, and I stopped after chapter 2 (3%). I can see this being three to four stars for the target.

Thank you to NetGalley and Flatiron Books for the ARC.