Mallory Viridian would rather not be an amateur detective, and fled to outer space to avoid it…but when one of the new human arrivals on a space shuttle is murdered, she’s back in the game.

Mallory Viridian would rather not be an amateur detective, thank you very much. But no matter what she does, people persist in dying around her—and only she seems to be able to solve the crime. After fleeing to an alien space station in hopes that the lack of humans would stop the murders, a serial killer had the nerve to follow her to Station Eternity. (Mallory deduced who the true culprit was that time, too.)

Now the law enforcement agent who hounded Mallory on Earth has come to Station Eternity, along with her teenage crush and his sister, Mallory’s best friend from high school. Mallory doesn’t believe in coincidences, and so she’s not at all surprised when someone in the latest shuttle from Earth is murdered. It’s the story of her life, after all.

Only this time she has more than a killer to deal with. Between her fugitive friends, a new threat arising from the Sundry hivemind, and the alarmingly peculiar behavior of the sentient space station they all call home, even Mallory’s deductive abilities are strained. If she can’t find out what’s going on (and fast), a disaster of intergalactic proportions may occur.…

Once again humans are coming to the sentient space station Eternity this time carrying several people from Mallory’s past as well as a new ambassador from earth. Mallory is worried because when humans are around her murder soon follows; but to complicate matters she is just feeling off, in fact she is found unconscious in her quarters and comes around just in time to attend the welcoming party for the earth delegation. She is surprised to find her high school best friend, Amy, onboard along with  the police officer who persecuted her but most shocking is Amy’s twin brother, the boy Mallory had a huge crush on in high school and whose existence she had totally forgotten until she saw him again.  When one of the earth delegation is murdered Mallory investigates while also trying to find out what is wrong with the station whose systems are going off-line with no explanation.

We learn more about Mallory’s past and her connection with the alien Sundry species. Her teenage friends seem to be deeply involved with the murder victim and Xan is a bit off his game since his ship, also sentient, is gone having taken station host Mrs Brown to a different station to learn more about her duties with Eternity.  Tina seems to know more about the station’s problem than the others do and comes up with a creative way to solve both her own and the station’s problems.

This was a quick and satisfying read. We are learning more about our characters as they are learning more about each other and themselves. I did not suspect who the murderer was until about the same time as Mallory. This series combines two of my favorite genres - cozy mysteries and space adventure - and I look forward to reading more about Mallory and the rest of the residents, human and alien, on the space station Eternity. Highly recommended. ~~ Stephanie L Bannon

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