Review: Action-packed with plenty of moral conundrums
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 09 8, 2012
I really enjoyed Partials and have been eagerly awaiting the next book in the series, so when I saw that there would be a novella that would provide some more background about the Isolation War, I was all over it.  If you haven't read Partials yet, you could conceivably read this one first, as it deals with events that take place before the timeline in Partials.  However, I'd recommend reading Partials before this novella, as the character this novella focuses on plays a small role in Partials, and reading this novella gave me a whole new appreciation for her.  Some spoilers to follow.First off, I think Dan Wells is frankly awesome at creating female characters.  I loved Kira in Partials, and I loved most of the secondary women as well.  They are fully-formed people with minds of their own, and they make their own decisions in life.  I really, really wish more authors would create such great female characters.Heron is certainly no exception.  In fact, after reading this novella, I think Heron has become one of my favorite characters in the series.  She is awesome.  Wells really knows how to do an ominous character, to write one in such a way that their motivations are easily understandable and believable.  Told in alternating chapters, the novella switches back and forth between Heron's creation and initial training, and the role she plays in the Isolation War.This book poses a lot of very interesting questions.  Heron does bad things, but does the blame lie with her?  There are a lot of ethical questions swirling around in this novella, and none of them are easy to answer.  I think Wells does a great job of pointing out the dangers in using technologies of war that remove actual human beings further and further from the front lines.  True, human lives are saved in this book, but at what cost to humanity's sense of morality?  By the time the novella ended, I found myself wondering if I could really blame Heron for her actions in Partials.  I certainly am not excusing the atrocities she commits, but this novella really makes it a lot easier to see what led her to act as she does.The other strong point about this novella's contribution to the series is that it gives the reader a much better sense of the world.  I thought Wells did a really good job of world building in Partials, but this book provides background that helps really flesh out the setting.  It was interesting to learn what had driven the creation of the Partials in the first place, as well as to realize what had led to their act of rebellion.  With this novella, Wells answers the questions about what's going on in the rest of the world, giving the localized struggle in Partials a broader context.I was completely immersed in this story the whole time I read it.  It's very fast-paced and packs a lot of interesting detail without the narrative ever getting bogged down.  I'm looking forward to the next installment in the series now more than ever, thanks to this novella.