I returned to this series several months and a good many books after I had read/listened to the previous two books in this series and at first was worried that I would be disappointed. I can definitively say that this was not the case. I've always had a soft spot in my heart for sci-fi tales of space colonization, a fact of which I was reminded of throughout the duration of this book. A natural progression from the events of Ghost Brigades, The Last Colony manages to continue the growth of its main characters, even when the plot somewhat throws them back in similar tension filled situations that they already dealt with in books one and two. It would be very easy to just rehash the events of the first two books and negate any character development (especially on Jane's part) but Scalzi doesn't do that, for which I am extremely grateful. 
 This being said, there were a few seemingly hastily dropped subplots that gave the impression that Scalzi just changed his mind on what he wanted to write and didn't feel like going back and editing those subplots out. This isn't a major problem as the overall plot is strong enough that I wasn't saddened by this minor lack of resolution, but it did leave me wondering "what was the point of building up the tension if character x was just going to drop in unexpectedly and bring up a new problem for us to have?" 
 But regardless of some of the flaws it has, The Last Colony did for me what many other books could not, which was to remind the reader why they love a certain genre/subgenre to begin with.