Full review on my blog from 26th October: https://inkandplasma.com/2020/10/26/domino-strays/

3.5 rounded up to 4 bc this was great fun

trigger warnings: human experimentation, othering (mutants seen as lesser), psychological and emotional abuse/torture, death, gore, mentions of mass suicide, religious cult control.

I loved this book and its entangled plots. There were three separate timelines running concurrently and while I absolutely adored the parallels between the timelines, and the way they interconnected, I would have liked to see them as two separate books. One with Domino's childhood and the Everglades storylines and one with the cult storyline. That's not even *slightly* a criticism of Domino: Strays, I just loved what Tristan Palmgren was doing so much that I wanted to read more of all of it instead of it being constrained to a third of the book. If Palmgren writes more Domino, I'm going to be on it in a heartbeat. Especially if it's in this timeline, where Domino raids the compound of a twisted cult with Black Widow and a squad of powerful superhero mercenaries. I liked Domino's character a lot, particularly the way that she was torn between mercenary and hero, 'good' and neutral and all the spaces in between. I've got a huge soft spot for morally grey characters and the way that they struggle with people's moral expectations on them. Getting a whole superhero team of characters on a scale from 'hero' to 'merc' is a lot of fun and made for interesting interactions.

I also loved the way Domino's luck was used in the narrative. It made sense, was surprisingly balanced and it never felt like a cheap deus ex machina to miraculously save the day. It had rules and constraints and meant that Domino was still the clever, creative mercenary survivor type - just with a little lucky advantage. It was well balanced, with the negative side of Domino's powers shown too. Not that those would stop me from taking her powers in a heart beat.