Jazz pianist August Kitko is prepared to die. Giant space robots are heading toward Earth with destruction on their minds, Gus just screwed up a fledgling relationship with pop star Ardent Violet, and they're both performing at a rich guy's apocalypse party, so being ready to die is kind of OK in that situation, right? But then one of the robots, Greymalkin, hears Gus riffing on the piano during Greymalkin's inexplicable fight with another robot. Suddenly, Gus is kidnapped by Greymalkin, who turns out to be one of a handful of rebel robots who are NOT bent on wiping out humanity, and Gus's musical stylings fit so well with the robots' method of communication, so why not co-opt him as an unwitting translator?
I realize that's a LOT to process in one paragraph, and considering all of that happens in the first two chapters, it's also a rough way to start the book. However, once I got past those first two chapters, things settled down and the story became a lot more about sacrifice, love, music, mental health, and humanity and less about space robot fights (though there's still plenty of that too). I love White's Salvagers trilogy (starting with A Big Ship at the Edge of the Universe), and while this one isn't quite up to that standard yet, I'm definitely curious to see where Gus and Ardent's story goes.
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