On Basilisk Station (Honor Harrington #1) by David Weber

contains spoilers - or maybe not?

So, what do we have here? A strong female lead character, some backwater planet at the edge of the “cool universe”, a #metoo moment in which the lead was attacked by the people in power, corruption, space battles and a vendetta gone awry. I’m not extremely fond of her (human-like?) cat, but those are great ingredients for a book, and I loved the pacing of it.

What’s not to like? Inventing things is hard for everyone, so some of the technology is only skimmed on, even though everyone is praising this hard sci-fi, I’m not 100% sure that’s the case. I understand this is a super advanced civilization, though people in power are monarchs? What were they? Elite few which get promoted through family ties and relationships? That’s a bit hard to believe from these hyper-advanced space-fairing people. And lastly, the whole white cap, black cap, no cap - what the hell? Are we back in 1600s where the captain of the ship was the all-knowledgeable guy, or girl in this case, to whom everyone bows? Again, a bit debatable, but hey I’m not the author.

Overall, great book, big thumbs up there.