I am a big fan of murderbot in general, and this is really a classical expression of the form Martha Wells has honed to an art: a compelling mystery that also reveals the inner thoughts of Murderbot to itself and to us and causes it to grow as a person, er, bot, while also developing the relationships among Murderbot and the people it's come to care about. It's fun, it's got some depth to it in terms of personal development and exploration of the universe.

The "but" here is that, unlike most murderbot fans, my favorite book in the series was [b:Network Effect|52381770|Network Effect (The Murderbot Diaries, #5)|Martha Wells|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1568667704l/52381770.SX50_SY75.jpg|63614271], the full length novel. I'm just not really a novella person and the return to novella format solidified that for me -- it's a little shorter and a little shallower than my preference (and having it placed as a prequel to Network Effect also threw me).

So Murderbot. It's great. More novels, please.