I'm honestly impressed by how good this series continues to be. It continues to turn tropes and things on their heads in ways that actually make sense.
Case in point, this book takes a look at how the individualistic "I'm the protagonist and therefore all my ideas are good ideas" thing that so many books do would work in a more realistic setting. And it does that without resorting to having the protagonist do something outright idiotic; even if the protagonist's ideas are good ideas, just going off and doing them without talking to anyone about it still isn't good. Especially if you're in the middle of a war (coughKeeperOfTheLostCitiescough).
It mildly irked me that after |being built up to be the series' villain, the alien politician Wiznik was unceremoniously replaced by his lieutenant| in this book. |And his lieutenant|, the human cytonic Brade (who's been around since book 2), does make a good foil for Spensa, I'll give her that; Brade is like if Spensa didn't have anyone around her to temper her "stab everyone while laughing maniacally" instincts.
But |having Brade execute a coup against Wiznik in this book| is like if |Darth Vader had killed and replaced Emperor Palpatine halfway through Return of the Jedi|. It feels kind of hollow and pointless, and I think it would have worked a lot better if |Wiznik was killed by something else (possibly even an attack by the humans and their allies) and Brade took that opportunity to seize power|. Or something like that.
The problem of |the delvers| is also solved in a slightly weird way. I have no problem with the concept, but in my opinion, the execution needed more work than it got.
The climactic fight scene in this book is one of the best I have ever read. It's |Spensa versus Brade, both using their cytonic powers to teleport around Brade's control room trying to stab each other. Or, initially, to shoot each other, before the gun gets teleported into space|. I feel like it would be amazing to watch in a movie, and really hard to do well as a videogame.
This is the final book in the series, so it behooves me to talk about the ending. I think this series ended very well. For once we actually tackle the problem of "well, if you kick out the evil government, who's the government now? Things like food shipments still need to happen." And that's a problem I think a lot of Your Leaders Are Secretly Evil books have; governments exist for a reason, and getting rid of them just leads to chaos unless you can handle all the things that they were handling before you got rid of them.
As for the fate of Spensa herself, that's also handled very well: |we don't have a "The Shire has been saved, but not for me" ending, but we also recognize that Spensa is not the type to just settle down into a peaceful society and become a freighter pilot or something. Fortunately for her, the galaxy is full of potentially dangerous places that should probably be scouted out to see if they're actually dangerous and, if not, what the alien government was trying to cover up by designating them as Potentially Dangerous Places|.
Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: T for sci-fi violence and, I think, some swearing. And also the diones, who I think I've complained enough about in previous posts. I would absolutely buy a (proper) Skyward series videogame if it came out, but I also think it would be really hard to do properly, and easy to do very badly.
4 stars.
(Endnote: This might be my least favorite of the book covers. It's not that it's bad, necessarily, it's just that the others are better.)
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