Review: The Grissom Contention (Colonial Explorer Corps #2) by Julia Huni

Title: The Grissom Contention

Series: Colonial Explorer Corps #2

Previous book in this series: The Earth Concurrence

Author: Julia Huni

Genre: Adult, sci-fi

Publication date: April 2021

Published by: IPH Media

Source: Purchased ebook

Add it on Goodreads

Buy it: Amazon | B&N

Synopsis: Fresh from the mission to Earth, Siti Kassis, daughter of the "Hero of Darenti Four," enrolls in the Colonial Explorer Corps academy--the same academy where her father was the captain of the rev-ball team, and still holds flight records for the extreme piloting competitions. As the daughter of an honored alum, she's expected to lead the legacy students to victory in every training scenario and game.

But Siti wants to prove her own worth. Shunned by the other legacies when she refuses to play by their unfair rules, she joins a band of misfits for her class's most arduous trial: Prime Survival Week.

When Siti and her friends discover they've been dropped into a PSW with no rules and no end, will they figure out how to survive? Will they devise a plan to win?

My rating: ★★★★☆

After the very crazy mission on Earth where they discovered people still living there after the planet was supposedly evacuated 500 years ago, Siti heads to Grissom to finally attend Colonial Explorer Academy!

This book goes follows the first couple of training missions Siti and her fellow cadets go through. The missions weren't easy, but what made it worse was that some of the cadets were also legacies like Siti. But unlike Siti, these guys were elitist as fuck. Some were downright psychopaths! It was awful! Some of the things they did? Holy crap! I don't know how Siti kept her cool, but she got through it all and dealt with things in a smart way. It’s one of the things I love about her!

The missions, too, she handled smartly, especially because they always went sideways. I loved it though! It was crazy and engaging and just fun! And with these training missions going all sorts of wrong, it was very interesting to see Siti and her team readjust to all the curve balls being thrown at them. And I think it helped that Siti is turning out to be such a good leader. But one thing I like about Siti is that even though she's the unofficial leader, she isn't the only one making decisions. Her teammates chime in with ideas and she trusts them.

I already mentioned that I love Siti, but I liked the other characters on her team as well. There were two in particular that we saw in the last book that I loved. Their addition to the team was a nice surprise—I was not expecting them to show up at all! But I enjoyed it, and I especially enjoyed the fun banter between them.

I really enjoyed this overall! It took me a bit to get into the series, but I am fully on board now! I wasn't really sure where this story was going, but since I knew to expect a more character-driven story, I didn't mind and I really enjoyed the adventure. It was a wild ride for sure! I didn't have a problem keeping these characters straight, unlike the last book 😅 But I liked the characters, even the ones I didn’t because the elitists made for some good bad guys. Lol. I'm very curious to see where things go from here, especially in relation to some of the legacies 👀

Have you read this book? If so, what did you think about it? If not, what do you think? Does it sound like something you might want to read? Leave me a link to your review or comment below! 😊