As a big science fiction fan, seeing it finally showing more variety on sub-genres and perspectives is extremely refreshing! While Winter's Orbit's narrative moves around the romance, the world building and sci-fi elements are way more fleshed out than I expected and made me highly interested on the universe.
Not only that, but the main plot and cause of conflict is the unrevealing of the mysterious death of one of our main characters' previous husband that is surrounded by political intrigue. I was utterly invested on the investigations and even when I could sense some part of a plot twist there were unexpected layers and outcomes. Certainly my favorite aspect of the novel!
And yes, this is theoretically a romance and my main source of enjoyment was the political machinations. Which brings me to the reason on why this was not a 5★: Winter's Orbit exists in a such specific intersection between romance and sci-fi that kinda fails at both. On the romance aspect, even if it's driving the narrative there isn't enough there to make it great. They're cute, sure, and there are some nice scenes, but we don't really see them falling in love with each other because the unusual setting takes the space that would normally be there for developing the relationship. And the same happens with the sci-fi, although on a lesser degree. There's more romance than usual and sometimes I caught myself wishing they went back to the plot because I wanted to know more about the consequences for the world, not just the main couple. I had fun, but I believe that that's a result of that in-between state hitting the perfect spot on my venn diagram of interests. That's more of a lucky strike than good execution.
Even if their relationship could've been more developed, I found the depth of both Jainan and Kiem as characters extremely compelling. They both had very distinct voices, and their psychological turmoils were as complex as they were realistic. I could simpathyse with both of them even when they were in completely different lengtht waves. I am not a fan of the miscommunication trope, but it was so well executed here that I couldn't really complain.
Overall (contrary to my usual annoyance about series being able to just be standalones), I think that a well executed duology, with more room to expand and explore both the world and the romance, could have easily been the answer to most of my issues. And can I even call a story bad if my problem with it is that I want more?