Polaris Rising

Polaris Rising is a fast paced debut that mixes space opera with a heaping dose of romance- and it works. I had a lot of fun reading this and despite a page count in excess of 400 pages it never seemed to flag- a pretty good accomplishment for a debut novel. There are escapes and action galore and no shortage of snarky banter, not to mention the smoldering intensity between the leads- Ada of House von Hasenberg and Marcus Loch. 

Ada is on the run from her House which is trying to marry her off to Richard, a douchebag from a rival House who wants her back- badly. They were childhood friends once but no longer- Richard has changed, and Ada wants nothing to do with an arranged marriage. Her father has put a price on her head for safe retrieval, and the story starts with her being captured by mercenaries intent on delivering her to her father. Unfortunately for them Ada doesn't take well to being captured, and since her fellow prisoner is Loch, one of the more feared men in the galaxy, they soon come out on the losing end of that. 

As you can imagine there is instant sexual tension between Ada and Loch, and the story moves from there as the two of them try to stay ahead of Richard. The pace is quick as I mentioned- not a lot of downtime- and everything pretty much works. There's a nice mix of romance and worldbuilding, neither overshadows the other much, although there are more sexytimes than I typically read. I know this book walks a fine line for some as to whether the romance is too much or just right, and I come down a little in the middle. I like a good romance in an SF tale but sometimes less is more. 

The real issue I had was Loch. He's the baddest of the bad in terms of prowess- super strong, heals quickly, etc. There's a reason for this of course, but the way he growls rather than talks and the smoldering gazes- I couldn't help but roll my eyes at times. He's like a superman who can't be stopped and I would have liked maybe a little more vulnerability or nuance? He is developed to an extent but I just think he's pretty one dimensional. And at least two other characters- Rhys and Ian- struck me the same way, as if every prominent male in the story has to be a smoldering badass. 

The worldbuilding worked for me. It's rolled out in an organic way, as the story flows- not a lot of info dumping. Ada was awesome- I really liked her- and her sister Bianca is intriguing as well when she's introduced late in the story. And Veronica is a favorite- she's a woman with a secret who Ada befriends and they become very tight in their travels. The female characters in this book are top notch. 

Some final thoughts- and these might be a bit spoilery. Ada doesn't like to kill but finds herself forced to at various times, and this weighs on her. Completely understandable, but on at least one occasion she makes a decision that objectively is not very smart, and it of course leads to some necessary killing if she's going to escape. Given the fact that she's never really in life threatening danger- I mean sure in a firefight anything might happen- but by and large she's wanted alive and if the worst ever happens she can fall back on her House for support. So she doesn't really need to go out and do things that result in death. I found that to be a bit of weakness in the plot- if she hates killing why act like she's a super agent and start galactic crises? 

Having said that I enjoyed this novel a lot and flew through it. It's a little longer than maybe it needs to be, but at the same time with everything going on it doesn't feel rushed, so maybe that's a plus. And for a debut it feels very assured and smooth- I give kudos to the author for producing a fun SF tale that never flags and hits a lot of right notes.