Ahoy there mateys!  A long while back in 2017, Matey Sarah @ brainfluff reminded me that this series existed.  I had the two books in omnibus form and they were five stars reads.  Then Matey Sarah told me there were two more books in the series!  So I recently I re-read the omnibus and then moved into new territory with book three.  While I try to post no spoilers, proceed at your own peril . . .

The main character of these books is a steerswoman named Rowan who is the member of "an order dedicated to discovering and disseminating knowledge."  This order is almost all women.  Men are very, very rare.  A steerswoman  shares her knowledge for free and does not lie.  All she asks in return is that if she asks any question then it must be freely answered.  Don't answer and a steerwoman's knowledge is cut off forever.  Steerswoman are intelligent, respected, and awesome.  They are in control of their own destiny, travel constantly, and better the world.

The first book started with the mystery of an unusual stone and took place in Rowan's homeland.  The second book is set in the region called the Outskirts where Rowan's best friend, Bel, lives.  Rowan goes there to solve the mystery of the stones.  She finds an answer but it only leads to more questions.  In the third book, Rowan finds herself in the company of Janus, a steersman who quit the Order under mysterious conditions.  Janus isn't talking, demons are attacking, and there is an unusual artifact with mysterious powers.  Not to mention the continuing drama of the strange stones and magicians that Rowan is also trying to solve.  She thinks all these elements are linked but can't find the common ground.

Frankly things are a mess.  The interesting part of this book is that Rowan is forced to stay put in one town and do tasks that aren't part of her strengths.  It is weird but fun to watch her struggle and make bad choices.  It was fun to get insight into "regular" folks lives.  I particularly enjoyed Steffie as an addition to the bunch.  Assumptions keep being made all around and prejudices challenged.

This book also continues the trend of further blending more sci-fi into the story and it's cool.  Minor plot points that bothered me were how slow on the uptake Rowan could be in this book and that Bel wasn't a major character.  I get the reasons for both (and they made sense) but still bothered me.  Also the pacing in the second half of the book was off and Rowan's explorations and leaps of intuition were unrealistic.  I loved a lot of the new elements and plot twists but the reveal took too long for me.  I feel like there really wasn't any momentum to the overall story arc of the series in this book.

Can't really get into more because of spoilers but I still be looking forward to the next book.  Arrrr!