This one suckered me in with a few tropes I very much enjoy.
Emotionally withdrawn MC because of a tortured past with a lot of strength, physically as well as in willpower. Hidden gifts, a mysterious legacy. You probably already recognize the type.
Another thing this book does which I enjoy a lot is characters not giving every detail of their thoughts away in conversations. People actually being able to school their expressions and hide their emotions.
Imo this makes for much more interesting confrontations and verbal sparring.

But even tho a lot of my favorite elements are there the execution is just abysmal.
The dialogue, as well as the action scenes, are fine but the reasoning behind any and all decisions is completely bonkers. No reason, no common sense.
There is nothing pushing the mc along the plot apart from the author putting faulty and illogical thoughts and reasoning in the heads of her characters at every turn. It's really frustrating.
Especially the mc acts totally out of character every time it's necessary for the plot even in cases where lots of other much better solutions are obviously available.
I even like where the plot is going! But I just can not reconcile with the absurd reasoning that is supposed to explain it.

There is no salvation in the sci-fi part either. It's all actually just soft magic but the author calls it sci-fi for some reason.

The world is not much better either. All these highly advanced aliens collectively act like bigoted backwater numbskulls. But it's their "culture" so it's fine.

I am really disappointed by this one. ( )

Pretty good world building. Fun action story. ( )

White, T. A. Rules of Redemption. Firebird Chronicle No. 1. Amazon, 2019.
I was initially intrigued by Rules of Redemption because I am a sucker for deep space salvage stories. After all, that is how the expanse series got started, and I am a fan of Katherine Rusch’s Diving universe stories. So, I was ready to explore wrecked warships with Kira Forester and her sapient drone, but the story quickly became more fantasy than science fiction, until the characters morphed into beings that would be right at home in the Marvel or DC universes. I kept hoping for some of the alien tech to be explained and for characters’ back stories to be filled out. Maybe White is saving it all for the next volumes in the series, but to me it smacks of sloppy world building. Three stars, but you might like it if kick-ass superheroines are enough to keep you plugging along. ( )

Holy smokes that was so good. I'll re-read it, shoot I want to see the movie. It would be such a fabulous movie ! It was Star Wars' space action, Star Trek's lovable characters, Oceans Eleven scheming, humor and some seriously cool creatures. The romance is there so well written into the story it was perfectly done (IMHO). Oh my gawd, Graydon, sexy, super macho, distant, difficult, grumpy, did I mention sexy ( shutters ) I love a man that can be great when he needs to. ** Wink ** The MC Kira, was a broken, self built, haunted, isolated, strong, intelligent, generous, loyal and selfless. woman. I cheered for her big time and the rest of the characters, and cried with their pain.
There was one thing I didn't like. It ended and the next in the series isn't out yet. Oye, It ended with such a fun cliffhanger. Luckily, was at home so the public didn't have to witness my snorting laughter at the stinger ending. BAM ( )