Review: Between Points of Light by Lore Graham

After years of uninspiring findings, Harlon's position on a survey ship has lost its appeal. Vaulting to unseen star systems to investigate their potential for mining and terraforming sounds exciting in theory, but in practice it's just another corporate job. His life outside of work isn't much better.

When the crew's astrobiologist quits, Harlon arrives for his mission to find that he knows the replacement, Dexter—from a recent one-night stand. As they begin their mission thousands of light years away from any colonized star system, Harlon tries to keep things professional, but Dexter has other ideas.

For space loving readers of MM romance!

As per the blurb, Harlon is a lot jaded, seemingly stuck in his static life of work and solitary play that he doesn’t see a way out of it. Harlon is employed by big corporate and is in a constant cycle of going out into the vast reaches of space to discover viable planets. This sounds fabulously interesting and adventurous but in reality, quite mundane, and Harlon finds very little in his life that is professionally, or personally, fulfilling.

When a rare, wonderful one night stand becomes a surprise awkward work situation, Harlon doesn’t know how to reconcile his mortification with his desire to want more than his boring lonely existence. His new coworker Dexter, is full of enthusiasm regarding all the possibilities of space exploration, and his earnestness for the job and desire to continue his and Harlon’s recent intimacies slowly starts to rub off. Harlon resists and resists, but Dexter and surprise discoveries bring about a much needed and wanted change.

I adored Graham’s Under the Midnight Sun, and I had no hesitation in reading this story because of it. Now granted, the former was all about Nordic lore and this was seriously grounded sci-fi. I admit I didn’t love this as much, perhaps due to the very nature of the hardcore science and Harlon’s initial surliness, but Dexter’s open emotions and absence of cynicism were a big win here.

Overall, I still found this story very smart, with a romance to root for, some nice smexy, and a satisfying happy ending - all the reasons I’ll continue to explore Graham’s backlog, as well as be on the lookout for future works!

A copy was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.