My rating: 4 of 5 stars
A bit of a letdown after the last two. With Miles and Mark on the sidelines, this is sort of an update on what the rest of the extended family was doing between DIPLOMATIC IMMUNITY and CRYOBURN, as Ivan_you_idiot (who takes considerable trouble to keep people thinking that) is dragged into intrigue and heroics by By Vorrutyer, the snarkiest lounge lizard and part-time undercover agent you wouldn't want to meet. And we watch in horrified fascination as Jacksonian and Barrayaran mores collide (with a bunch of Komarrans caught flatfooted.) (Jackson's Whole is the planet run by what amounts to a squabbling array of organized criminal syndicates.) And the sinking of t/h/e/ O/d/r/a/d/e/k/ S/t/a/d/i/u/m/ Cockroach Central. Among other tangents there is some retcon on how Ivan gets to be Lord Vorlastname when he is not Falco's son. (And speaking of retcon, the appended timeline appears to conflict with references in the text, which imply that it comes shortly after DIPLOMATIC IMMUNITY.)
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