I gave this a lower rating than earlier books in the series for a variety of reasons. It didn't get a lower rating as overall I've enjoyed the series and hope that the authors will turn it around. One, as noted in some other reviews, I felt like making Marco Inaros into essentially a deluded, loser ex-boyfriend who somehow retains the loyalty of other authority figures within his faction, with little of the previously seen brilliant military strategy reduced him to somewhat of a trope, and a difficult to believe one at that. It also felt like a bit of political commentary/making him a metaphor for Trump...with the idea of constantly shifting his narrative everytime something goes wrong to indicate that the new situation was always the plan, and his supporters continuing to turn to a blind eye towards his actions that are ultimately self-serving rather than helping them. While I am by no means a Trump supporter, and understand the impetus to try to make characters or situations in fiction topical, I felt it was a bit too on the nose, and likely in retrospect to feel reduce the believability of the character.
Again, as noted in other reviews, I feel like the authors spread themselves too thin in terms of numbers POV. It was a great way to handle the earlier novels, but in those they kept it to four at most, all of which played central roles to the overall plot, something I felt was not true in this case. Especially the first and last chapters, although those play an important role in reinforcing some overall themes, Anna's POV felt almost entirely unnecessary to the novel.
Also, much like later seasons of Stargate SG-1 seemed to suffer from, the central team of characters here (the Roci crew) and their interpersonal relationships felt a lot less central and important to the novel than previously. One of the things that really appealed early on in this series was the dynamic between this tight knit group (and also possibly Miller). While I felt the addition of Bobbie and even Clarissa to that group wasn't unwelcome, there was little focus on the characters' internal lives and connections to one another. This was particularly disappointing as I felt the book was really trying to push a theme we've seen a lot of in pop culture in recent years, the idea of your tribe/family being the family you choose not the one you're given and its importance across aspects of life.
That seemed like the major theme here overall, family, who it is, how you choose it. Why its important. What function it serves, and how that function is different for different members at different times. A deeper exploration of this by a tighter focus on a triumvirate of the Roci crew, Pa's crew, and Marco's crew and on how those dynamics differ would've benefited the book overall. We could have had a fascinating comparison of these three vary different dynamics and how they feel internally to these characters. I think a problem here was the author's being torn between this and a second major theme diluting their focus on both. We would be distracted from this story about tribes and families seemingly at random by a (sometimes heavy handed, explicit) focus on the theme of how history is shaped. What are the levers that drive human history, single individuals and their decisions being pivot points? Events themselves being almost inevitable, and individuals filling inevitable roles/archetypes? Technological advancement driving change? In the end, we're given a simple minded and direct explanation of it being all these things, delivered by a middle school child. If this was meant to be a major over-arching theme, delivering such a blatant statement of both the question and solution as well as the voice its delivered in is particularly unsatisfying. Again, its suffering from a lack of focus. If this was the sort of story they wanted to tell, give us more focused POV on Marco, maybe Johnson, Avasarala, and perhaps Prax, showing us how these different viewpoints play out. Show us, don't tell us, being a very basic rule of fiction.
Then we have just a little bit of the alien strangeness we've come to expect from this series seemingly tacked on in the form of a scene in which we're shown what's been happening to the disappearing ships, but with no further exploration. Similarly, there's a tease early on about possible negative effects from the sphere having to absorb all that kinetic energy that never pays off, even when there's a catastrophic event that seems like it also is about to have some sort of effect on the sphere.
Overall, this is a weak installment in the series. Hopefully, the authors will get back to playing to their strengths with the next book, otherwise I'm not sure I'll keep reading.
