Not true to the end

This story got going pretty well, weaving together several different cases in a pretty compelling way. Unfortunately, this led up to a series of errors that reached total plot pileup at 80%. DNF ( )

Miles Flint has finally been promoted to detective on the Armstrong Lunar Base police force only to find that his first cases involve human fugitives from alien justice.

A great opening to this series. Although the focus is on the humans we do get to understand the aliens' reasoning. I wonder if later in the series we will see aliens fleeing what they see as an unfair human punitive system. ( )

Interesting book on the whole. Lots to think about as the book basically deals with morality issues. ( )

Rusch, Kristine Kathryn. The Disappeared. Retrieval Artist No. 1. Roc, 2002.
This first full-length novel in the Retrieval Artist series takes us back in time from the originating novella. Miles Flint is a newly fledged detective in the city of Armstrong on the Moon. He must enforce decisions made by a multi-species council involving humans convicted of crimes against nonhuman species. Each of the alien species has a moral code that does not fit well with human ethics. In one culture, slave labor is the norm for criminals. In another, parents may lose their first-born child if found guilty of theft. His partner, a senior detective who is not afraid to tell truth to power, tries to protect him from her bosses, and he returns the favor. The novel is a well-structured noir police procedural that follows several cases at once, each of which has its own ethical dilemma. I do wonder, though, why there is no mention of aliens ever being judged guilty of crimes against human law. Maybe in later volumes. ( )

I'm not sure when I first read this novel. I own it in both paper back and digital as well as audiobooks copy. Anyway my hubby is reading the series and so I'm rereading it with him. I have to admit that this book feels clumsy to me in a way. The story is solid but it's like the last couple paragraphs that he neatly becomes a retrieval artist. Otherwise I like the story quite a bit. It's so nice to see a young disgruntled DeRicci! She us one of my favorite characters. As is Paloma. ( )