I hesitate to use a comparison to Firefly, but the pirates in this story are comparable to Mal Reynolds and his crew--honorable from a certain point of view, but they're going to make a living one way or another, and if they can screw the Empire in the process, more's the better. And young Captain Tristan Kelley learns the true nature of the Empire he has served and becomes even more disillusioned than he already was. 
 I would say the main theme of this story is Tristan learning the difference between duty and loyalty, which becomes abundantly clear once he hears the stories of the Empire's effects on other worlds and he finds out who really screwed them over and allowed the pirates to catch them. And why. The final question becomes: who will Tristan choose? The Empire he's served since he was 16? Or the pirates, who aren't exactly how Tristan had thought they would be? 
 Not Marie's strongest work, in my opinion, though I can't really put a finger on why I feel that way. I really liked the characters, particularly the pilot and Pierce, both secondary characters. The stories from the war really made sense and felt right, but Tristan losing himself the way he did didn't feel right to me. Maybe it would if I've ever been temporarily blinded and bored out of my mind, left alone to wait for my captor to return. It felt too fast. But I can't think of what I might have done differently, either. 
 And yay for an MC who (view spoiler)[likes to wear ladies lingerie! (hide spoiler)] 
 I still enjoyed the read, so I'm waffling between 3.5 and 4 stars.