Salvage

I’ll admit, I went into *Salvage* expecting another snarky space adventure—and it *is* that, but it’s also sneakily subversive. Cherry Pendit isn’t just a lovable rogue; she’s a woman who’s spent her life being dismissed as a “proper” oracle, and her rebellion isn’t just about defying fate but reclaiming agency. Schwartz writes her as equal parts charming and exasperating, the kind of protagonist who’ll steal your wallet then buy you a drink to apologize. The plot barrels forward with a heist-like structure, but the real hook is the way it plays with prophecy tropes. Instead of grand destinies, we get small, desperate victories—like outbidding a crime lord for a ship that *might* not explode. Tess Irondale’s performance sells it. She nails Cherry’s swagger, but where she *really* shines is in the quieter moments—when the banter drops and the weight of Cherry’s choices hits. The pacing is mostly tight, though the middle act sags slightly under a subplot involving a minor character’s backstory that feels tonally disjointed. (We don’t need *that* much pathos in a book this fun.) The sound production is clean, with no distracting edits, though I’d have loved a touch more atmospheric audio in the space battle scenes to match the cinematic prose. Still, by the climax, I was fully invested in Cherry’s messy, glorious defiance. If you’re tired of prophecies that read like instruction manuals, this is the audiobook for you—just don’t blame me if you start talking back to your own fate.