This book was fine if you take into account the really outdated and 1990s attitudes towards gay people. I tried to read the rest because I had the omnibus edition, but the second book tried to explicitly tackle this in a cringey way that does not hold up in the year 2020 so I didn't finish it. The worldbuilding is interesting, the political intrigue is interesting. The love story is well-executed. I could do without the unnecessary love triangle because you know who Tessa is going to end up with it is obvious, but what are you going to do. Did it need to be as long as it was? Probably not, a good editor could probably cut it in half and it would lose nothing. It was well written enough that I was not completely bored and the timeline of this book is over the course of a year or two, which felt extremely fast. Am I peeved that the political intrigue didn't get wrapped up because it is a series? Yes. Am I peeved that Tessa didn't tell Bakhtian about the fact that aliens exist because she "thinks it will destroy him"? Yes. I feel like one book should be a complete story in itself, and I can't abide cliff-hangers. This book decided in the back half that it was really a love story all along, but I wouldn't describe this as being a romance. It is a space opera book with interesting worldbuilding, but I would say nothing that hasn't really been done before. Like if you read Shapechangers! by Jennifer Roberson it has the same vibe, but fantasy and ten years before there is a distinct "these are coded native americans" happening in these books. ( )

I think I enjoyed Elliott's "Icepunk" books (Cold Magic etc) moreso as this one had quite a bit more scifi then I was expecting. I'm uncertain if I'll finish the quartet or not, but I can see why so many people laud this highly. It reads well and even now 20 years since its debut, it ages well. ( )

Competently written, unique, but dull as dishwater. ( )

I have read a few Kate Elliott books before and enjoyed them but this wasn't really my jam. It's a story of a woman who finds herself lost in an allien world and has to come to terms with this world in order to get back to her brother and the constraints of her life with him and finding that maybe a different life could be possible. Add to it some alien politics and some slightly dodgy rigid gender roles and you have a book that just didn't quite sit right with me.

I may return and read the next books in the series but I'm in no real rush. ( )

was a good fantasy novel intermingled with an OK sci-fi novel. I feel like the sci-fi parts serve to bind a bigger story together though and for the sequels, it'll be needed. overall a thoroughly enjoyable novel. I am also a sucker for Kate Elliott's romance and fantasy stories so that helped ( )