I would say that I enjoyed the series overall but I also think the first one was the most fun. There were a few lines in the first book that I thought would lead in a certain direction and I either completely misread them, or the author decided she already had enough to resolve without adding that into the equation so dropped that potential plot point. The second book adds quite a bit of complexity to the alliances of the world. With a main character that is a mercenary, we are of course already in a world of gray morals but Devi’s approach to life is also pretty straightforward and she follows the rules/code within that kind of life. The things we find out turn everything so gray that I just had a hard time reconciling some of the side characters and my perspective of them, and I felt like two characters specifically never got the justice they deserved so between that and things tying together almost too neatly in the final book, I found each novel less satisfying than the previous though overall they are all between 3-4 star reads for me, with 3.5 for the series as a whole.
Fortune’s Pawn – Devi, the narrator, is a young and ambitious mercenary whose life long goal is to be part of a special elite armor unit at the service of the Paradoxian God King. But she’s already gone as far as she can in her current mercenary outfit and she doesn’t want to wait ten more years to gain the experience. When she finds out that mercenaries with service on a trader vessel called Glorious Fool get fast tracked for the elite unit, she jumps at the chance – apparently with its bad luck, this freighter gets as much action in one year as most get in ten. With her credentials, she is quickly hired. At first there is quite a bit of a fish out of water element to the story, with Devi being the blunt, culturally isolated merc joining a culturally and ethnically diverse crew. There are four species in this universe, and humans have splintered into 2 factions – the Terrans and the more militaristic Paradoxians. There is representation from all but one of these factions on the trade ship. Devi does experience some culture shock, and does broaden her horizons a bit as she interacts with crew members whose culture she has little understanding of. While Devi is straightforward and knows to keep her nose out of things, she is also a very good mercenary. She might not ask questions but she notices oddities -like how they almost never have cargo or seem to spend more than they make on the little cargo they do have. Devi also develops an attraction for the ship’s cook, Rupert, and like the ship, there is more than meets the eye.
Honor’s Knight – After the concluding events of the previous novel, Devi has been partially memory wiped. All the revelations she discovered previously about the true mission and nature of the ship – gone and forgotten. But Devi starts realizing something is off and that she is forgetting more than she realizes from interactions with other crew members and even her own feelings and reactions. Plus, she seems to be seeing things. And her hands keep turning black. This novel especially turns everything upside down, with alliances changing and the idea of who is the good guy vs who is the bad guy flipping back and forth.
Unfortunately, some of the developments hit pretty hard, especially related to some characters in this novel. While that worked well for this novel, it ended up being a detriment to the series for me since I struggled to reconcile what happened here with the rest of the series and the outcomes. Plot-wise, it all is well-developed but emotionally, I never got over something that happened here.
Heaven’s Queen – We’re in the end game now! All the best laid plans and plots of the previous novel end up falling apart when some hyperdrive jumps gone bad lead to lost time and a missing captain. Tonally, the first part of this book also felt very different. Devi is an action oriented character and she is comparatively introspective in the first part here as she grapples with her feelings for Rupert. I understand her conflict but I also didn’t really love the shift in tone. A lot of that part of the novel was also mostly occurring only between them so I was so glad when we expanded back to having a broader group of characters. Everything wraps up, potentially even too neatly, and given how much moral complexity was added in the middle of the series, I was surprised how little Devi’s world view really was forced to change between book 1 and 3 (as I said, I thought there were threads being dropped that suggested some large confrontations for Devi that didn’t end up occurring).
Overall, it’s a series that starts out fun and engaging, and maybe went darker in the middle than it should have given the final conclusion. Plus, I am not entirely sure how much I enjoyed the love interest post book 1 … he was either making decisions that made him questionable or becoming so focused on Devi as the center of his world to make up for it that it was slightly off putting … you can’t make your girlfriend your personality.