Station Eternity

I'm going to start from this premise: If they had properly marketed this book as a sci-fi thriller or an action sci-fi or something, I probably would have fewer problems with it. I probably wouldn't have spent 300+ pages trying to keep track of clues (that didn't exist) so that I could solve a mystery (that wasn't really there); I would've just gone with the flow, as I did for the remainder of the book. It got better (not good) once I did that, but the marketing was literally the worst part because it established incorrect assumptions and expectations. They told me it was a sci-fi mystery/detective novel... I literally got zero of one of those genres, despite all claims to the contrary (by people who I'm guessing didn't even read the book or have no concept of what makes a mystery).

Beyond that, while it would've been a more tolerable read had they actually tried to set expectations in a better way, it still wasn't good. So much of it is peak white liberal woman writing diversity, not knowing shit about anyone or anything. The aliens are treated very similarly to how we (predominantly but not limited to English-speakers) treat East Asians with regards to their names; I seriously couldn't get that out of my head, especially as the explanation for why there are aliens named Tina, Ferdinand, Stephanie, Algernon and the like... is because it's the "closest approximation in our language" (or some similar rubbish). And all the random social justice throws? A psychiatrist telling a patient off for using the word crazy because it's ableist, the weird handling of race and poking at racist characters (with the single Korean character needing a non-Korean man to tell her what is part of Korean culture because she's "so disconnected")... It kept happening in so many ways that I had to roll my eyes at how White Liberal Lady this book genuinely is.

Along with that, there is very little creativity in the handling of non-human species, even when they are vaguely interesting. The Sundry are a hivemind (but they still act like humans despite being a bunch of insect-like sentients); the Gneiss are rock people (who are still more culturally like humans despite... being fucking rock people). The qualities that make aliens... alien? Aren't really there and are... quite superficial. There's very little deviation based on perspective.

The other thing that ruins this book is the timeline. The timeline is atrocious and difficult to follow, which I'm guessing is how so many people wrongly categorised this as "mystery." A book being obtuse for no real reason and difficult to follow does not... make it a mystery. It makes it annoying. So many chapters could've been pulled from where they were and re-slotted somewhere else to make things coherent, especially when it was never clear what time or place you were in until you were at least half a page into a chapter. Or section, actually! Sometimes the middle of chapters just would suddenly jump without any indication anywhere of what was going on.

My final gripe is with the number of references to Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I have no problem with references, but these were at one point so excessive and frequent that it really just felt like "Did you get it? Did you? Did you see it? Get that one? What about that one?!" I wanted to scream because it honestly just made me angry at how many there were. I'm fine with references when they're utilised well, but this was just the equivalent of smashing me in the face with a brick for at least the first half of the book. Annoying as hell.

I wouldn't recommend this, and I have zero desire to read anything else in this series... especially because it's not a mystery like it keeps trying to claim.

"Your princess is here, and she's fucking metal!"

This book was kind of a mess. I love sci-fi, and the premise of a murder mystery aboard a literal space station had me all sorts of curious and cautiously excited. I guess I was picturing a Holmes-ian mystery in a Deep Space Nine or Babylon 5 episode when I picked this up. This was....definitely not that.Mallory has lived her life constantly on the run from murders that happen around her. From a young age, she's borne witness to murder after murder from people around her, and she's had enough. First contact with aliens has come and gone, and Mallory makes her destination the one place humans can't go--Station Eternity. But even after being there doesn't save her when the sentient station starts accepting more humans, and all her past trauma comes back with a vengeance.This was an incredibly convoluted story, made worse with the inclusion of the backstories of nearly everybody around her. Full chapters are dedicated to how a character got to the station, and not all of it was relevant. There was also lots of infodumps disguised as dialogue which really dragged things out in places.I also felt like the later scenes weren't exactly coherent in what they were supposed to get across. (subplot/backup character spoilers)Particularly where it involved the Gneiss's...Gneissi? Gneissus? Stephanie, Tina, and Ferdinand. Late in the book we get a plot dump about these rock-like aliens turning into...space ships and things? And there's this sideplot involving Stephanie and her grandfather/ship being at odds with one another that comes to a head in the middle of the murder investigation plot that felt unnecessary. Things just felt incredibly chaotic near the end.Finally, (end spoilers here) there just wasn't a lot of murder investigation. Mallory clearly has been through this before and a lot is made of her investigatory skills early on, but the only real investigation she does is get stung by a hornet and realize her aunt is the murderer. Everything else is just a lot of chaotic flailing and dialogue.So, I guess, in short, this wasn't exactly what I was looking for. I thought the premise was interesting and potentially rewarding, but we didn't get any of that delicious payoff. Kind of a letdown, honestly.