The Outskirter's Secret

Steerswoman Rowan, sworn to seek and tell the truth, travels through the lethal prairies beyond civilization with Bel, a barbarian warrior and poet.

The Steerswoman was acceptable and inoffensive, but its sequel is excellent. It's chockablock full of things that I like: culture clashes, nomadic peoples, and intelligent protagonists. And while the series is not grim or depressing, it never sugarcoats the terrible choices made by its characters. In The Steerswoman, our heroines engage in violence for reasonable and intelligent reasons, and that serene brutality is continued in The Outskirter's Secret as they encounter a traitor with magnificently divided loyalties.

It only took me two months to finish, which probably counts as some kind of personal record for category of Book-I-Actually-Liked-Even-Though. The 'even-though' was the kicker, clearly. Kirstein writes an interesting world, and there's a lot going on both in terms of world-building and in terms of character exploration. But in terms of plot? Not so much. The writing is lovely, however, and once I started reading, I enjoyed it, until interrupted by sleep or obligation (this is not Murderbot, where I would forgot precious hours of rest to finish a book). Honestly, I was reminded of nothing so much as this:



Grainstacks in Bright Sunlight by Claude Monet

Just read a bit of this lyricism:

"Redgrass. Down the hills and up them, over ridges and show more out to the edge of sight, was a single sweeping carpet of redgrass, rippling in the steady south wind. The grass had already been dried by the morning sun, and its natural brilliance had returned; colors trembled across the land as each individual blade twisted and bent, now showing a brown side, now a bright red. It was difficult to focus clearly on the shifting and flashing; the earth looked feverish, as if Rowan were delirious but unable to decide on the particular hue of her hallucination. Driven by the wind, the hollow reeds tapped against each other, rough blades rustling, setting up a rattling hiss that Rowan had mistaken for the sound of rain."

Really, so much of it is like this. Rowan, the main character of the first Steerswoman book, and Bel, the Outskirter, have traveled east to the uncharted Outskirts. The plan is to join a friendly (-ish) tribe headed further into the Outlands, a place so inhospitable that it needs a large group of people and their herd to survive traveling through it for any prolonged length of time. The writing is lovely and gives a sense of both the beauty and desolation of the lands. As a swimmer and sun-lover, this line was one of my favorites:

"And the sky above was empty and blue: blue as a lake of pure, fresh water."

The pacing, however, is almost glacially slow, in keeping with discovery about secretive tribes among a generally secretive people, living in an unfriendly land. In retrospect, I think Kirstein does an excellent job of bringing the sense of displacement a person must have when shifting into a new landscape and culture. Rowan, however, is far more focused on the culture of the tribe they eventually integrate with than any of the dangerous creatures out in the plains and finds herself struggling with assumptions and understandings of relationships:

"Rowan had come to believe that Bel’s more sophisticated traits were unique to herself, and not held by Outskirters in general. The steerswoman had fallen back on the easier explanation. She was very surprised to discover, first, that she had made such an assumption, and second, that it was wrong."

As I said, I liked it. With such lyricism and world-building, it would be difficult for me not to enjoy it. However, the overarcing plot of discovering the intentions of the wizard in the Outskirts' role in the Guidestar falling makes very little progress. If the series is a journey of a thousand miles, this book felt like mile markers four to six hundred through South Dakota.

Rowan's curiosity is strangely lacking towards most of the creatures of the Outskirts. We get a lot of detail on the grass, a type of thornbush, but most of the other dangers felt incompletely discovered or described. I'm completely able to admit that might have been me, however. I just remember a couple of related incidents of things lying in wait in murky ponds or low-lying areas that seemed cursory.

I also found myself wondering about nutritional deficiencies in the Outskirter diet as well as bacterial aliments. And it isn't just because I'm a nurse--it's because Kirstein brought them up as well. I'm not sure those questions were answered, which is one of the things that is both intriguing and slightly frustrating with this series (is it intentional and to-be-revealed, or an authorial mistake? Hard to know yet).

I'd also note that I felt like Rowan's character was a bit inconsistent. Again, it's one of those things that could be authorial intention or using the character to do what one needed--I can't make up my mind. For someone whose main code is wrapped up in learning, Rowan consistently makes a lot of assumptions. I couldn't decide if it was because she was young--but only in terms of our world; she's supposed to be adult and well-traveled in hers.

“That I am a steerswoman means that I am a constant student. I try to understand everything I encounter. I study what I see, and if there are people who can inform me, I ask questions of them. “The simplest thing I study, and most constantly, is the land itself. I chart the country I cross, as accurately as possible."

But honestly, that's one of the main attractions of the series: a leading woman who approaches the world with her intellect, seeking to understand as well as act within ethical parameters. That, coupled with the writing, will bring me back to the next book. Hopefully, my reading buddies will join me again, and maybe this time I'll bring a little more focus to my reading.



Many thanks to Anna, Nataliya and Phil for the fabulous and enlightening discussions! show less

The region of the Outskirts is brutally minimal in what humans require and elaborate in what can kill them. The motivations other than power of the unseen wizard Slado are frustratingly opaque. The people, culture, and the choices are interesting rather than involving.

It wasn't until book three that I understood these books to be individual studies of a particular moment and place in time, with the central characters serving as a path connecting one to the other. This second book seems to get bogged down in one particular time and place until you realize that the bog is the point, and perhaps pushing the primary conflict along isn't something that needs to be done despite cultural conditioning. So if you're wondering when the main characters leave the place the second book starts in, the answer is - they don't. And that's fine.

I've read reviews of The Outskirter’s Secret, that criticize it for being too long, I didn't feel that way at all. I loved the details that we get on Bel's homeland tribes. I hated to hear that they gave up

writing, and had instead an oral tradition. But when I thought about it, it makes complete sense. The last time I moved the worst, heaviest part of the move were the books, and the cases to hold them were light in comparison. If your tribe is constantly on the move, in tents, books would be almost impossible to protect from the elements and too damn heavy. Aside from that unless the red grass could be turned into papyrus where would the paper come from without any trees. Aside from the lack of books the Outskirter's knowledge of show more poetry is vastly superior to mine.

It's little throwaway details like this that make the worldbuilding in this series first rate.

I liked Fletcher and had no idea that he was with the wizards until it was revealed. I knew him as a mysterious character and thought his name out of place for the son of a baker and not the camp's fletcher.




I about to start the 3rd book in the series, I can't wait to see where this one takes us. show less

I read the first book in this series, The Steerswoman because it was recommended by Renay.

This book follows on from book one, so I would highly recommend that you read the first book first. I mean, you could pick this up and follow along with no clue as to what has gone before, but why would you do such a thing? You’d miss out on all the backstory and you wouldn’t know how Bel and Rowan came to meet. Go read The Steerswoman first, things’ll work much better that way.

Determined to learn the truth about the Guidestars–two points of light that hang motionless in the sky–Rowan sets out into the Outskirts, where barbarian tribes and the land itself could destroy her. (blurb from Goodreads)

I will admit that it took me a while to get show more my head into this book. It seemed like Bel and Rowan were just wandering, wandering, wandering. But that could’ve been because I was reading in 5 minute bursts, and infrequently. So it probably didn’t take up too much time in the book, but in my head it seemed to go on forever.

I didn’t mind it too much, because I like both Bel and Rowan, I like the way they approach the world. They have similarities, but in many respects they are very different. Of course they come from different backgrounds and cultures so they should be different. So while I was enjoying spending time with them I was also wondering when exactly the story was going to kick off properly.

But kick off it did, and soon enough I was totally engrossed. I didn’t even mind my insomnia on a few nights as I took the opportunity to read a few chapters while waiting for sleep. And I’ll admit, I read more than I had intended, so that’s a sign of a good book.

The main plot revolves around the quest to discover where the fallen Guidestar is, and what it is, but also to discover is it part of a wizard’s plot. And if so, why?

But in the course of that quest we get to spend a lot of time among the Outskirters, the “barbarians” of the blurb above. And they have a really interesting culture and outlook on life. They are constantly on the move, the land cannot support them if they stay in one place. And the land they travel through is actively hostile against them, plus they often come into conflict with other tribes. So they live a lot of their life under threat. A fact which makes some of their laws and practices seem a bit harsh, but they have to deal with the realities of their land.

I really enjoyed this book and would highly recommend the series for anyone who enjoys science fiction/fantasy. show less

The Steerswoman and Bel venture into the Outlands to find out more about the fallen Guidestar. Super satisfying. More about how the world works is revealed. Love the way the Steerswoman thinks and attacks problems.