Athena Hera Sinistra is the sociopathic daughter of one of the elite Good Men who rule the Earth. She needs all her hard-won mayhem skills when thugs try to kidnap her one night on her father's spaceship. She fights back with a nightdress and a boot heel, and escapes in a lifepod, but now her adventures are just beginning, as she is captured by a darkship pilot, one of the descendents of the hated and feared exiled bioengineered tyrants that previously ruled Earth.
This is rip-roaring high octane mayhem, with the odd pause for a bit of not-too-sloppy romance, and some slightly-heavy-handed politics (although the bureaucratic-nightmare libertarian society makes a fun change). It's good to see a (relatively!) sympathetically drawn snarky sociopathic protagonist -- although naturally she mellows somewhat by the end. But the plot twists, the different cultures, the not-so-surprising big reveal, the chase-piled-on-chase -- all keep the pages turning. Mind candy, but fun mind candy. And a wonderful last line.
