Oh, hey, after a long digression the family actually tries to make some progress on their primary mission. Well, no, first we have to get through a secret origin of Twilight/Loid Forger that reaches back to his childhood and follows him through war and his entry into the intelligence service. But THEN the family makes some progress.

The funniest bit in the book is when Loid reviews the current progress and calculates how much longer the mission will take if they continue at that rate. It's nice to see some acknowledgement of the pacing problem of this series. ( )

"They tell us to hate each other. So we fight. And then we die. It's the most pointless thing in the world."

This volume we get the long awaited Twilight origin story, and some of the beginnings of the infamous east-west war. I honestly enjoyed Twilight's characterization and the acknowledgment that war sucks. We also meet a new character. Anya is as silly as ever too. ( )