This was an awesome book! One theme is near future military operations in unsettled parts of the world (like the Middle East). Another theme is what it's like for someone to be a front-line soldier when they have a family with grown children, and happen to be a woman. I read about the book on Scalzi's blog (whatever.scalzi.com/2017/06/21/the-big-idea-linda-nagata-2/) and it sounded really interesting. I couldn't put it down. The action keeps going from start to finish.

The pacing is fantastic. It never starts to feel rushed. The author always makes time to talk about the world around the characters and she gives a feel for different places in the world so that you can see what's happening in detail. Many books get caught up in the action in the later parts of the book and the level of detail drops, but that doesn't happen here. It's just as engaging and vivid in the last chapter as in the first.

The books deals with lots of different relationships between people, and those these are folded into the overall narrative without making the book seem slow and without distracting from the main plot.

Oh, and by the way, it's a kick ass sci-fi consideration of what the mercenary profession will be like 50-ish years from now. Or maybe sooner.