As with the first book in this series, The Collapsing Empire, this is a wonderfully written space opera with complex, human characters (who can also be a great deal of fun to read about) and a plot which pushes ahead briskly. I found it a little more predictable than the first book, and while the ending is very satisfactory, the surprise was not in who was going to win, but how they would go about it. Still, I hugely enjoyed the book, and am very much looking forward to the next.