After their last mission, the team is separated by a rift in the Shipworld governing body, some going to intersect a human-made starstream near Li Jared’s home planet, some going back in time to observe the Mindaru threat.

I was disappointed at how much time was spent on Shipworld, doing almost nothing. It was as if the author wanted to show off as many aliens as he could, but had very little for them to do. While the aliens were nicely unique, most of them were disposable, and the rift in the Shipworld governing body didn’t interest me. Bandicut’s mission and brief reunion with his niece, as improbable as that is (in all that time, did nobody ever get near the stones?), were much better, but even that took forever to get going, even after it finally started almost halfway through the book. Julie’s mission was also interesting, but was short-changed for other things. I wonder if that mission incites the evolution of the Mindaru. It’s too bad the stories were so unfocused, because I truly enjoyed coming back to these characters, and had fun when they were together.

Like the main characters, I was hoping for some follow-up to their last mission. While they got silence as thanks, this story provided very little entertainment until about the halfway mark.

It was unlikely when Julie Stone received communication stones a couple of books ago, but I was resigned to that, and she had a really good plot in the previous book, saving Earth. This time, the author stretches credulity as Dakota takes a tour of the site where her uncle disappeared from and suddenly finds her own stones. Did nobody ever wander to that spot in the cave? Did none of the people investigating his actions sweep the area?

Once everyone has their stones, though, the author used them well. Dakota’s story is the more interesting of them, as she volunteers to go off to the first colonies, and due to relativity, she ends up in the same time period as her uncle, John. Through several quick chapters, her colony ship malfunctions, and the colony is well-developed by the time she gets there. Similarly for the next colony out, and finally, humanity develop faster-than-light travel, while she’s on another sleepship. A comedy of errors, but it gets her there plausibly.

On Shipworld, John, Antares and Li Jared are trying to take some much needed rest, but Ik is restless because he can’t communicate with anyone without the stones that were destroyed in the last book. He sees another human in a conveniently placed device, and later goes after her, so he can show John. It turns out to be Julie, but they get stuck in that place, severed from John and the others. Fortunately, the hostess at the inn where Julie was orienting speaks Ik’s language, and translates. Julie’s stones split for him, as I guess they recognize a receptive host.

Unfortunately, the schism between factions of Shipworld’s governing body causes the gateways to malfunction, and Ik and Julie are sent to a completely different part of it. The two factions, while they can’t seem to agree on travel and communications, have similar goals. Humanity has connected a starstream, which allows hyper-travel, from the remains of Beteljuice to the galactic core. Combined with a time-dilation field as it passes Li Jared’s homeworld, used to deflect hostile asteroid projectiles from a neighboring system, is causing a strange phenomenon. It seems that the Mindaru of billions of years in the past are trying to use it to come into the future.

Julie and Ik are sent on a time travel mission to observe planets in the core, hoping to identify the Mindaru origin. They were not supposed to be detectible, but the Mindaru and the other turtle-aliens saw or sensed something. I think Julie and Ik might have actually spurred the evolution of the Mindaru, as they seem to have a racial memory and watched millions of years later as the duo returned.

Meanwhile, Antares and Napoleon go in search of Ik, fumbling through black market gateways, making deals to gain passage, and after way too long a story that serves no purpose, end up at the time-ship launch point, where they see Ik and Julie return. The saving grace in this part of the story was the women’s evaluation of each other, knowing John had been lover to both, and still loved each of them.

Most of the shipworld scenes seemed to be used to show off different aliens. I liked how the author described the aliens, all being unique, and with attributes that made them seem very alien. It’s too bad that most of them still had human emotional reactions, or sounded human, except for some static. Still, it was a highlight in an otherwise dull part of the story.

Then there’s John’s story. Separated from Ik and Antares, as well as the robot Napoleon, they wait as long as they can delay their mission to Karellia, Li Jared’s planet. They are joined by the robot Jeaves, and Copernicus who is bonded with their old ship, as well as a new alien commander, Ruall and her gokat, Bria. Ruall was neat, in that she was extra-dimensional, but in our space, she was 2D. Sometimes she disappeared edge-on, but her other dimension was invisible to us. The gokat had similar abilities, but appeared more solid. They could even leave the ship!

After interminable arguments and delays, about the least interesting things (like command codes and weapons, and Copernicus doing shipping routes?), they make their way into space. At the starstream, they reunite with Dark, the cloud, and find their way into the starstream. It’s inevitable that they meet Dakota. This was truly the highlight of the book, even as their commanding officers tried to close communications, suspicious. They barely get to talk, but the reunion was very enjoyable and satisfying. It can’t last, of course, and they detect probable Mindaru coming up the timestream. They attack, to no effect, except maybe in helping the Mindaru congeal into our time-space. They are all thrown out of the starstream.

Dakota’s ship can’t get back in, so after a debate decide to go to Karellia. Shouldn’t they have left a beacon for other human ships with what they know, in case they don’t make it back? The Mindaru ship disappears, and I expect we’ll see it in the next book. John loses Charli the quarx, but they are forced to continue their mission, which has become more vital.

The rest of the story takes place not on Karellia, which they want to avoid provoking, but the neighboring planet of Uduon, which is throwing asteroids their way. It’s inevitable that Uduon thinks Karellia started the fight, while Karellia thinks Uduon did. While we don’t get to find out the answer in this book, I found the lack of originality disappointing.

I liked the way John thinks about alien visitations on Earth, where in movies it always seems to happen in a small town to a loner individual. This is precisely what they do, reasoning it out logically. They choose a fish farmer, and Li Jared’s stones split to give Sheeawoon the ability to communicate with them. John can’t pronounce the alien’s name, so he calls him Sheeawn. It’s strange that the alien refers to himself like that at times, as if the author was overenthusiastic with copy-paste when he meant to do it only to John’s point of view.

Through a misunderstanding, a military commander arrives, and it was funny to see Bria the gokat steal their weapons into another dimension. They are brought to a spiritual leader of the Uduon, who communes with the other spiritual leaders, and John somehow gets sucked into it, understanding nothing. The leaders question Li Jared’s claim about Karellia’s innocence, so send the spiritual leader into space with them to investigate.

The book ends with worry (Ik and Julie), uncertainty (Antares), and investigation (John and Li Jared), all cliff-hangers in their own way, but none of them spectacularly suspenseful. I enjoyed spending time with these characters (even Antares in her less-than-ideal story), but was frustrated by the lack of forward momentum. I hope the conclusion to this story is more entertaining.