all the books in a trilogy don’t have to be the same kind of book, but here it’s the characters - reading them feels different than in the first two installments - the reader’s view of them and their interior lives are a bit like a b movie version of miami vice thru the looking glass rated M for mature audiences for violence -

So why’d I keep reading ?

The action - this book has some page turning action

The speculative settings and their economies - reading them is like trying the future on for size

The Tool character - because ever since Relic’s Impossible Creatures who hasn’t wondered what the internal life of an augment would be life? It’s a reasoned mashup of Caliban, and Grendyl, and Frankenstein and the bears from dark fables and woodsmens’ disaster lore all rolled into one - this is no lion, no aslan because human made for war, for fear ?

The honest-dishonest female subordinate & survivor, Jones - I haven’t seen her name in most of the top tier reviews but she’s a character worth getting to know ! I encourage you to read the book just tobmeet this character alone, there are few like her in YA fiction but plenty like her in the real world - Want to try on for size what it’s like to have to fit in with the guys and have a crazy creep for a boss and not be able to quit your job ? She’s your gal and I for one am damn glad she survived - in part through her simple honesty and will to survive when confronted with raw power.

Why didn’t I like it as much ? It felt a little too much like it was written for the screen .