For me, the big bugbear with this book is that there's no explanation of who is behind Big Eyes (the principal antagonist), what their motivations are (the story touches on greed and weaponry - but who are they intending to use the weapons against?), and why they are allowed to get away with what they do. It's a similar story with the protagonists - though their motivations are clear, their backstory is limited (with the exception of the titular character).

Perhaps this is what happens when you turn a novelette into a novella into a novel, stretching the story beyond its natural limits. Or maybe I'm supposed to read the rest of the books in the series - but there wasn't enough of a hook to make me do that.

On the plus side, it was easy to read and didn't end up as a DNF -though part of that was wanting to take part in a book club discussion.