RogerBW's Blog

Capture the Sun, Jessie Mihalik 09 March 2024

2023 SF/romance, third of a trilogy. Lexi Bowen, professional thief, fell for human-adjacent hottie Nilo Shoren, but he dumped her and stole her job. But why does he have to be so nice?

This is unusual for a female-focused romance story, because the problems standing in the way of the happy ending are basically all Lexi's. She has trust issues, and commitment issues; he sits there and puts up with her, giving good advice which she ignores because she's Strong and Independent, and occasionally sighing wistfully.

It still just about works, because Mihalik's writing is always enjoyable and because as in previous books there's action as well as romance. But the weight of this book is more on the relationship side than previous volumes were, and I found Lexi sufficiently unsympathetic that I was unsatisfied overall. (Also, perhaps there are only so many variations to be wrung of out "female ex-military ne'er-do-well hooks up with honour-bound male human-like alien" in this particular universe, and we've read two of these incidents before as main plots and more in the background.) Some of the side characters seemed more interesting than the principals.

I will seek out more of Mihalik's work because the bones remain good, but this was a slightly disappointing example of it.

[Buy this at Amazon] and help support the blog. ["As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases."]

Previous in series: Eclipse the Moon | Series: Starlight's Shadow

Comments on this post are now closed. If you have particular grounds for adding a late comment, comment on a more recent post quoting the URL of this one.

Search
Archive
Tags 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000s 2010s 3d printing action advent of code aeronautics aikakirja anecdote animation anime army astronomy audio audio tech base commerce battletech beer boardgaming book of the week bookmonth chain of command children chris chronicle church of no redeeming virtues cold war comedy computing contemporary cornish smuggler cosmic encounter coup covid-19 crime crystal cthulhu eternal cycling dead of winter doctor who documentary drama driving drone ecchi economics en garde espionage essen 2015 essen 2016 essen 2017 essen 2018 essen 2019 essen 2022 essen 2023 existential risk falklands war fandom fanfic fantasy feminism film firefly first world war flash point flight simulation food garmin drive gazebo genesys geocaching geodata gin gkp gurps gurps 101 gus harpoon historical history horror hugo 2014 hugo 2015 hugo 2016 hugo 2017 hugo 2018 hugo 2019 hugo 2020 hugo 2021 hugo 2022 hugo 2023 hugo 2024 hugo-nebula reread in brief avoid instrumented life javascript julian simpson julie enfield kickstarter kotlin learn to play leaving earth linux liquor lovecraftiana lua mecha men with beards mpd museum music mystery naval noir non-fiction one for the brow opera parody paul temple perl perl weekly challenge photography podcast politics postscript powers prediction privacy project woolsack pyracantha python quantum rail raku ranting raspberry pi reading reading boardgames social real life restaurant reviews romance rpg a day rpgs ruby rust scala science fiction scythe second world war security shipwreck simutrans smartphone south atlantic war squaddies stationery steampunk stuarts suburbia superheroes suspense television the resistance the weekly challenge thirsty meeples thriller tin soldier torg toys trailers travel type 26 type 31 type 45 vietnam war war wargaming weather wives and sweethearts writing about writing x-wing young adult
Special All book reviews, All film reviews
Produced by aikakirja v0.1