Really didn't like the first quarter of this book, and this would have been a much more negative review. The characters aren't particularly likeable, but maybe after reading the previous Stross book to this, they feel better developed and more believable. There's less terrible sex too (although not none).

Described correctly here on GoodReads as the start of a new series, as opposed to on Amazon which claims against Stross' wishes that it's a sequel in the Laundry sequence. These are entirely new characters doing their own thing in the same universe. It continues chronologically, but that's it.