The result is a really excellent look at how people dealt with the emergence of the Empire, why it was able to consolidate power so quickly, and how the fighting styles of people like Organa, Mothma, and Gerrera were so different and also so similarly ineffective at first at combatting the rise of tyranny. Obviously being an interquel book, nothing super canon altering can occur to the main trio of characters, but seeing how Mothma reacts to try and politically win back power for the senate, how Organa desperately searches for justice for the Jedi, and Gerrera looks to fight back with violence for his people really works well. Its aided by several other minor characters being excellent viewpoints even if I'm not sure they'll be back in the rest of the trilogy, most notably an old republic/Imperial spymaster looking for her old agents and a separatist cyborg who was trained to be their final weapon and now has no clear path forwards. This is an excellent novel on its own and is entirely stand-alone, but I look forward to seeing from here how the other two authors take what this book built.