I would say Claudia Gray is easily the best author in the current Star Wars pantheon, so it was quite a surprise for me when I just... kinda liked this book. It's still good, but definitely the weakest one she has given in the universe so far.

Gray remains a master in crafting characters, and they're without a doubt the highlight of the book. They're funny, and flawed, and each fear and self-doubt seem extremely realistic.

The Jedi, specially, engage in philosophical discussions of morals and the Force and that's always great to see, although I would've hoped it was made clear that a lot of it was, in fact, a crisis of faith and the characters' own flawed view, as I believe an unreliable narration would only enhance the experience story-wise.

The plot suffers with unnecessary flashbacks that affect the main story very little, but the book wasn't as much about the plot as it was about the characters journey, and as said before: each of them was a protagonist in it's own right.