Thank you to Netgalley and Gallery for the ARC

So this was sort of a hard book to get through. The beginning had promise, introducing some intriguing world building and a fascinating alien race. I was also excited for a diverse and queer sci-fi with nonbinary rep. First, this was a multiple POV story, that didn't have very distinct voices. I was confused at the start of each chapter for a large chunk of the book which character we were following. I also just did not care about any of the main cast, they felt quite flat and their relationships were not compelling. It took me about 30% of the way in to finally get a feel for where the story was going, needless to say it felt like a lot of set up. But then, set up for what exactly? There didn't seem to be anything driving these characters so the plot felt sloppy. I ended up purchasing an audiobook to aid me as I read because it was hard to follow and stay interested.

On another note, this book claimed to have queer and nonbinary rep, but then made non-binary out to be a third gender. As a non-binary individual myself, I did not really like this "rep". When a protagonist was describing a group of people, it was easily discernible who was "male", "female", and non-binary. It would be one thing, if this was some alien race that has a different set of sexes then humans, but these were humans. One would think that an advanced human civilization would not have such a binary sense of gender if non-binary was going to be included.

Once I finished the book, I felt myself thinking, "what was the point?". Not once did I connect to any of the characters or feel enticed by the plot, it was just a really odd read.