It’s okay
The premise is interesting. The character development is reasonable, so far as it goes. There are a huge number of unexplained incidents and loose ends (were-panthers, cafe-interactions, alien revival process, options for potential offspring all left unexplored and unexplained). The romance is okay until the very abrupt ending with cliched descriptions of sex, only, with needles.
I would have preferred it without the religious bigotry. The author demeans all forms of religious belief except for Mother Nature worship, which is based on an alien misunderstanding. Then, the author goes out of the way to demean and deride Christian beliefs in One Trinitarian God using specifically Christian song lyrics and attempts to diminish the day of Christ’s birth. The heroine respects the religious beliefs of the heroes and they go out of their way to disregard her religious beliefs. They won’t even say Merry Christmas, even though it’s her heritage and a holiday her family celebrates. It’s not very respectful of her culture. Minus one star for religious bigotry.
The author also, ironically, derides funds spent on entertainment, which helped most of us get through over a year of COVID-19 lock downs and mandatory quarantines. I think entertainment is a valuable commodity for a community, as long as it focuses on producing love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
Minus a star for creepy sex with needles. I’m not taking off any other stars because no one violated the heroine’s consent, abused her physically, or patronized her sexually.
The Pearl and Violet books in this universe are good and this one is okay.